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Great albums with no good songs

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Antoni View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Antoni Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 18:30
Originally posted by Junges Junges wrote:

Originally posted by moshkito moshkito wrote:

Originally posted by Junges Junges wrote:

...
This is a contradiction. If an album is great, then by its very definition it must contain good songs..
...

Hi,

Hmmmm ... what if the album is NOT about songs? I have never, once in 50 years, thought of TD or Klaus Schulze as "songs".
I think it was pretty clear that the thread's author meant tracks, compositions or whatever-word-makes you-happy when he wrote "songs". He even wrote "any musical content". So I don't understand the need to be pedantic, when it is pretty clear what he meant..
Well, I guess the poster is just not a fan of avant-garde, electronic, and krautrock music; he must be more of a polka enthusiast.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote ThyroidGlands Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 19:00
Originally posted by Mormegil Mormegil wrote:

Steven Wilson - Hand.Cannot.Erase.
More like "ears.cannot.stand"

Thanks 🛐

Well, I have a long list:
- Soft Machine - Third

- Spock's Beard - V
Same as with Soft Machine. Their highest-ranked album here is V, but I never liked it much. It's extremely pleasant, and I don't like that at all.

- Laurent Thibaut (the only album he released, I don't remember the name).
It's a highly ranked album but I find it super boring. At least it's short.

Originally posted by Grumpyprogfan Grumpyprogfan wrote:

Also, any Flower Kings album.

I feel exactly the same... I have quite controversial opinions about TFK. I think it's absolutely EVERYTHING that's wrong with prog. It's a band without originality. Why would I listen to a two and a half hour album? Truly, I find them unbearable. That they have a couple of good songs is different. Circus Brimstone is one of them.

((Note)) 
Don't get confused. What bothers me a lot is the band. I have absolutely nothing against Roine Stolt, I think he's a great guy and an excellent musician (I love his work as a guitarist in Transatlantic).
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote projeKct Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 19:33
Originally posted by ThyroidGlands ThyroidGlands wrote:

I have quite controversial opinions about TFK. I think it's absolutely EVERYTHING that's wrong with prog. It's a band without originality. Why would I listen to a two and a half hour album? Truly, I find them unbearable.
I'm tired of hearing this argument. First, this band has a LOT of originality (by this, I mean their sound is unique and they bring fresh ideas to their music). Second, their compositions are top-notch, some of the best in the genre. Third, they are excellent musicians. The only downside is their latest albums (since 2019), which haven't lived up to their earlier work.

Well, as you guessed, I'm a big TFK fan... Tongue
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote ingridguerci94 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 20:21
Quote I'm tired of hearing this argument. First, this band has a LOT of originality (by this, I mean their sound is unique and they bring fresh ideas to their music). Second, their compositions are top-notch, anime hentai some of the best in the genre. Third, they are excellent musicians. The only downside is their latest albums (since 2019), which haven't lived up to their earlier work.

Trout Mask Replica is one of my favorite albums of all time and I will never pass up an opportunity to post in a discussion thread about this album. Love it or hate it, I don't think anyone can argue against the fact that this is just a fascinating record.


Edited by ingridguerci94 - July 15 2024 at 20:39
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote ThyroidGlands Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 20:35
Oh, also The Way by the Cuban band Anima Mundi. I think it's completely unnecessary... Yes, the entire album is absolutely unnecessary.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote ThyroidGlands Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 20:38
Originally posted by projeKct projeKct wrote:

Originally posted by ThyroidGlands ThyroidGlands wrote:

I have quite controversial opinions about TFK. I think it's absolutely EVERYTHING that's wrong with prog. It's a band without originality. Why would I listen to a two and a half hour album? Truly, I find them unbearable.
I'm tired of hearing this argument. First, this band has a LOT of originality (by this, I mean their sound is unique and they bring fresh ideas to their music). Second, their compositions are top-notch, some of the best in the genre. Third, they are excellent musicians. The only downside is their latest albums (since 2019), which haven't lived up to their earlier work.

Well, as you guessed, I'm a big TFK fan... Tongue

Yes, they're really good musicians. I love Thomas Bodin, he's a sensational keyboardist.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Hrychu Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 10 2024 at 21:05
TFK's sound is actually very original imo. Listen to "Serious Dreamers". I have never heard this sorta blend between a swing wah wah jam and a dramatic 'angular ballad' elsewhere in prog rock ever. The verse portions are dark and moody while the chorus sections are much more optimistic with subtle bits of new jack swing influences. But that's just the beginning. After that initial section, they suddenly go into a dreamy fusionesque section embellished with anthemic harmonized vocal parts. 2:50 timestamp

Non-TFK-fans generally have this erroneous preconception about TFK that they're unoriginal just because it's some generally accepted knowledge, and they don't bother to delve deeper into the band's arrangement and songwriting techniques.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Awesoreno Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 01:05
I don't dislike TFK overall, nothing they've written is "bad" to my ears (apart from some clunker lyrics occasionally). But when CDs that could hold around 80 min of music came about in the early-mid 90s, I feel like they took that new parameter and abused it. I will not dispute that they have some killer tracks and some killer moments in much longer tracks. But I often have to sift through a bunch of the rest of the album that's just... fine. Nothing bad about it. It's just perfectly acceptable, nothing more, nothing less. So as some above have said, very few parts of their albums really stick with me. Talented guys, no doubt.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Awesoreno Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 01:08

Quote
Originally posted by Awesoreno Awesoreno wrote:

Most of the Tangerine Dream I have heard makes me feel similarly. It's certainly stimulating to me from an historical perspective, but I don't think I'm in a place in my life where I can really fully appreciate albums like Zeit, Phaedra, Rubycon, etc. Maybe Ricochet, I'll have to re-listen.

You listed two very different phases of TD  Zeit is very different from Ruvbycon & Phaedra. 
I can totally understand where the beatless Zeit can be boring and quite unsettling, but once the sequencers appear in Tangerine's creation, it becomes very different

yes, start with Ricochet for a reassessment (it's the most Floydian of their albums)
I do extensive research on artists as I listen to their discographies, so am very aware of their different phases. And I readily heard the difference. I just didn't connect with any of it.


Edited by Awesoreno - July 11 2024 at 01:09
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote richardh Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 10:40
How is any of this 'on topic' LOL

Anyway I got very bored with TFK until they came back with Banks Of Eden. Roine had suddenly discovered the 'edit button' bless him.Smile 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote verslibre Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 10:48
Early TFK is alright (not amazing). I saw TFK play Prog Fest in support of Stardust We Are. They were the last band of the night on Saturday. About ninety minutes in, we were done.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Logan Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 11:19
I bought The Flower Kings Stardust We Are in 2005 or 2004 based on recommendations, and found it very tedious. Considering that that was considered  a great album with no songs that I found that good, thjat could be my choice for this topic.  I could also add Spocks Beard's Snow and early Transatlantic as I also bought albums by those at that time based on recommendations that did not appeal to me at all.  I was pretty careless with purchases then.
 
This is not on-topic in that it is not what the OP intended, but The Shaggs' Philosophy of the World could be considered a great album with no good songs.  It is considered to be a great album of the so-good it's bad variety (and it is said that Zappa called The Shaggs better than the Beatles) and they are all bad songs in terms of competence.  But I love every song and love the album unironically.  They were young and very new to playing, but had a big impact with this greatly bad and badly great album.  There's  a certain naive earnestness to it that makes it charming, and it does sound rather avant-garde in its primitivist incompetent way.  The lyrics are a treasure.  It's the album I consider greatest with the worst songs that comes to my mind.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote verslibre Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 12:43
Originally posted by Logan Logan wrote:

I bought The Flower Kings Stardust We Are in 2005 or 2004 based on recommendations, and found it very tedious. Considering that that was considered  a great album with no songs that I found that good, thjat could be my choice for this topic.  I could also add Spocks Beard's Snow and early Transatlantic as I also bought albums by those at that time based on recommendations that did not appeal to me at all.  I was pretty careless with purchases then.


I saw Transatlantic headline a later event. Now that was tedious. What they played was so unremarkable, never mind the fact they followed Kenso, who had the audience in their grip for a relentless eighty minutes of mind-numbingly awesome prog-fusion.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote someone_else Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 15:17
King Crimson - Discipline
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Lewian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 15:22
Somebody should mention Tales From Topographic Oceans here and in this way show that they're not a real prog connaisseur. As nobody else seems to want to do that, it's up to me. Shocked
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Grumpyprogfan Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 15:34
Originally posted by Lewian Lewian wrote:

Somebody should mention Tales From Topographic Oceans here and in this way show that they're not a real prog
connaisseur. As nobody else seems to want to do that, it's up to me. Shocked
Would you describe real prog, please?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote cstack3 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 17:25
Tales From Topographic Oceans. 

It has movements, not songs.  

p.s. I'm a real prog connie sewer. 


Edited by cstack3 - July 11 2024 at 17:32
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote The Dark Elf Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 17:43
^ Rossini once said of Richard Wagner, "He has his beautiful moments, but he also has his ugly quarter-hours." I feel the same regarding TFTO. 
...a vigorous circular motion hitherto unknown to the people of this area, but destined
to take the place of the mud shark in your mythology...
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote verslibre Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 18:04
Originally posted by cstack3 cstack3 wrote:

Tales From Topographic Oceans. 

It has movements, not songs.  

p.s. I'm a real prog connie sewer.


Wait, you're not Connie Sauer?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote moshkito Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: July 11 2024 at 18:36
Originally posted by Awesoreno Awesoreno wrote:

...
I do extensive research on artists as I listen to their discographies, so am very aware of their different phases. And I readily heard the difference. I just didn't connect with any of it.

Hi,

I would think that folks that are not used to the free form styles of 50 years ago, TODAY, would not exactly enjoy a whole lot of the things that helped define, and make "progressive" so important at the time.

One  must also remember that the "controls" of synthesizers were very bad, and difficult ... if you ever read Edgar Froese's book on TD, you will find how they struggled to create an echo chamber ... until such a time when a synth could do it, which was still a few years to go. Also, how Christopher Franke at times had a really hard time getting to a certain point, to get his MANUAL abilities to make things come out like a sequencer, properly, and if the bootlegs are any truth, how they succeeded, even without the various modern things. But the different temperatures and locations always made his ability a serious challenge. It's a shame that he does not get any recognition for the work he did ... he deserves a lot of credit for it all.

I like to suggest to "suspend" the ideas that we have about music, when looking at things that are 50 years old ... it is a different time and place, and therefore the music would be vastly different to what we hear today.


Edited by moshkito - July 11 2024 at 18:38
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