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geoffbarra 
Forum Newbie
Joined: September 25 2007
Location: United Kingdom
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Points: 20
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 Posted: March 22 2010 at 22:28 |
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I have been following this topic for some time - and am pleased to discover many like-minded ELP fans.
Keith Emerson was my teen idol - an amazing musician and showman who had the same hairstyle that I had (or was that the other way round?).
Of course music is simply a matter of personal taste and 5 stars - or no stars for an album is just a matter of opinion.
I love ALL of ELPs albums and rate each 5 stars.
Pirates and Officer and a Gentleman are (in my opinion) fantastic marriages of atmospheric music with story telling and emotional lyrics - that no other band has even attempted.
'Benny the Bouncer', 'Jeremy Bender' and and even 'The sheriff' are great 'pub' songs - and 'Daddy' is one of the most poignant songs I have ever heard....and the Piano Concerto, I think, is an awesome piece of music....
ELP had so many different sounds - that ALL their music is unlikely to appeal to EVERYONE - but in all honesty they could probably make even rap appealing - to me.
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Without Prog - where would wise men be...?
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ExittheLemming
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 19 2007
Location: Penal Colony
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Points: 11415
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Posted: March 22 2010 at 22:27 |
 richardh wrote:
ExittheLemming wrote:
Gerinski wrote:
O666 wrote:
Keith is wild player and he plays like god. Carl is powerful and he has pretty good technic and Greg balanced keith wild and his voice had commercial potential ( like collins). This combination can make magneficence masterpiece but it never happened. Every prog legends have 1 or more masterpiece but ELP dont have ONE 5 STAR ALBUM. One of friends told " they have many 5 star songs". I agree with that but they dont have 5 star album. |
Sorry but I totally disagree. The masterpieces of ELP did happen. Actually quite a few of them, and I don't mean just masterpiece songs but masterpiece albums. A soccer team with 1 or 2 weaker players out of the 11 can still be a superteam if the other 9 or 10 are among the best in the world. Many masterpiece albums by other bands have also their weaker moments and yet they still deserve being called masterpieces.
I repeat, to me ELP debut, Pictures, Tarkus, Trilogy, BSS and Welcome Back all qualify as 5-star masterpieces.
Obviously it's a matter of taste, but I feel like many people have a strange negative bias against ELP compared to other great prog bands. |
Although I do broadly agree with this (after all I'm an ELP fanboy crusty) your post does highlight one of the anomalies re interpretation of the ratings system for album reviews. Of the entire ELP discography, I have rated only Brain Salad Surgery as 5 stars because every single track on that critter IMO is quite brilliant. Trilogy, Pictures, Tarkus and to a lesser extent, the debut are but a small kick in the backside off 5 stars but do contain flaws that force me to mark lower. How many times have you read a fawning review of say Crimson, Yes, Tull or Genesis where the reviewer states something along the lines of:
This track is a bit poppy/boring/silly/simple for me but you cant deny it, the remainder is a masterpiece of progressive rock music ***** ?
There was even one deluded piece of hirsute plankton who rated 2112 by Rush as 5 stars and admitted he thought all of side two of the album sucked ?! (Has he considered suing his parents for malpractice?)
So, are we forced to conclude that all ELP fans try to be honest and as objective as possible with regards their fave band or that the remainder are a disingenuous rabble of barely literate apologists for patchy masterpieces ?
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Yeah I can relate to that easily as I only gave BSS 5 stars amongst ELP's back catologue yet have given other bands such as Yes,Pink Floyd,Genesis 5 stars for more than one album .Yet ELP are my favourite band
However I believe there is an issue with ELP's albums in that they don't always flow well and come across as unfocused. Part of the reason is that ELP were a 'schizophrenic' band struggling at times to focus attention on creating and developing single ideas.A case of too much talent in one place trying to express itself all at the same time perhaps. Or maybe too much jostling for position of the sizeable egos.This in itself took some sorting out and my feeling is that they were only truly succesfull in creating a masterpice with BSS.It flows well from to start to finish with Benny The Bouncer acting as a sort of interlude. Its only 2 minutes long but the fact that so many knock a mark off just because of its existence is extemely annoying! Jersualem makes total sense as an opener with its themes of early industrial advances in opposition with nature (as I see it). Toccata is the world spinning out of control before Still.. You Turn Me On offers some respite- light to the previous darkness.This is highly satisfying.BTB is just a bit of nonsense before the main event which has been set up perfectly by the first 3 tracks.
BSS rates so highly in my mind that I cannot believe that any other ELP album deserves to be regarded as its 'equal'. So the other albums have to be marked down  |
Bravo, you have just articulated quite brilliantly the dilemma ELP presents to their most fervent supporters re review ratings of albums by their favourite band.  Wish I'd thought of that.  BTW Glad to see you made the connection with Jerusalem representing the original uncorrupted world i.e. pre -industrial and BC (before computers) 
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XunknownX
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 02 2008
Status: Offline
Points: 158
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Posted: March 22 2010 at 22:16 |
The Truth wrote:
Padraic wrote:
Nothing. |
Well said |
I was just going to wright that myself.
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richardh
Prog Reviewer
Joined: February 18 2004
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 28064
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Posted: March 22 2010 at 15:52 |
ExittheLemming wrote:
Gerinski wrote:
O666 wrote:
Keith is wild player and he plays like god. Carl is powerful and he has pretty good technic and Greg balanced keith wild and his voice had commercial potential ( like collins). This combination can make magneficence masterpiece but it never happened. Every prog legends have 1 or more masterpiece but ELP dont have ONE 5 STAR ALBUM. One of friends told " they have many 5 star songs". I agree with that but they dont have 5 star album. |
Sorry but I totally disagree. The masterpieces of ELP did happen. Actually quite a few of them, and I don't mean just masterpiece songs but masterpiece albums. A soccer team with 1 or 2 weaker players out of the 11 can still be a superteam if the other 9 or 10 are among the best in the world. Many masterpiece albums by other bands have also their weaker moments and yet they still deserve being called masterpieces.
I repeat, to me ELP debut, Pictures, Tarkus, Trilogy, BSS and Welcome Back all qualify as 5-star masterpieces.
Obviously it's a matter of taste, but I feel like many people have a strange negative bias against ELP compared to other great prog bands. |
Although I do broadly agree with this (after all I'm an ELP fanboy crusty) your post does highlight one of the anomalies re interpretation of the ratings system for album reviews. Of the entire ELP discography, I have rated only Brain Salad Surgery as 5 stars because every single track on that critter IMO is quite brilliant. Trilogy, Pictures, Tarkus and to a lesser extent, the debut are but a small kick in the backside off 5 stars but do contain flaws that force me to mark lower. How many times have you read a fawning review of say Crimson, Yes, Tull or Genesis where the reviewer states something along the lines of:
This track is a bit poppy/boring/silly/simple for me but you cant deny it, the remainder is a masterpiece of progressive rock music ***** ?
There was even one deluded piece of hirsute plankton who rated 2112 by Rush as 5 stars and admitted he thought all of side two of the album sucked ?! (Has he considered suing his parents for malpractice?)
So, are we forced to conclude that all ELP fans try to be honest and as objective as possible with regards their fave band or that the remainder are a disingenuous rabble of barely literate apologists for patchy masterpieces ?
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Yeah I can relate to that easily as I only gave BSS 5 stars amongst ELP's back catologue yet have given other bands such as Yes,Pink Floyd,Genesis 5 stars for more than one album .Yet ELP are my favourite band
However I believe there is an issue with ELP's albums in that they don't always flow well and come across as unfocused. Part of the reason is that ELP were a 'schizophrenic' band struggling at times to focus attention on creating and developing single ideas.A case of too much talent in one place trying to express itself all at the same time perhaps. Or maybe too much jostling for position of the sizeable egos.This in itself took some sorting out and my feeling is that they were only truly succesfull in creating a masterpice with BSS.It flows well from to start to finish with Benny The Bouncer acting as a sort of interlude. Its only 2 minutes long but the fact that so many knock a mark off just because of its existence is extemely annoying! Jersualem makes total sense as an opener with its themes of early industrial advances in opposition with nature (as I see it). Toccata is the world spinning out of control before Still.. You Turn Me On offers some respite- light to the previous darkness.This is highly satisfying.BTB is just a bit of nonsense before the main event which has been set up perfectly by the first 3 tracks.
BSS rates so highly in my mind that I cannot believe that any other ELP album deserves to be regarded as its 'equal'. So the other albums have to be marked down
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JLocke
Prog Reviewer
Joined: November 18 2007
Status: Offline
Points: 4900
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Posted: March 21 2010 at 02:51 |
The Wrinkler wrote:
dude i just realized harry hood's signature, that made me rofl 
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Okay, so maybe it's a little funny . . . 
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progkidjoel
Prog Reviewer
Joined: March 02 2009
Location: Australia
Status: Offline
Points: 19643
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Posted: March 21 2010 at 01:32 |
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Nothing at all, they were one of the bands who got me into prog.
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The Wrinkler
Forum Senior Member
Joined: December 03 2009
Status: Offline
Points: 638
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Posted: March 21 2010 at 01:27 |
dude i just realized harry hood's signature, that made me rofl
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JLocke
Prog Reviewer
Joined: November 18 2007
Status: Offline
Points: 4900
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Posted: March 21 2010 at 01:13 |
Harry Hood wrote:
Greg Lake. |
You know, I have to say, whether intentional or not, your signature is incredibly insulting and disrespectful to the memory of mister Rick Wright. I don't understand why you haven't changed it by this point. Perhaps it's meant to be funny, but it isn't.
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uduwudu
Forum Senior Member
Joined: July 17 2007
Status: Offline
Points: 2601
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Posted: March 21 2010 at 00:42 |
Dellinger wrote:
ELP being humourless? I'd certainly not think that. So they get bashed for having all those fillers on an album, and then they get accused of being humourless? |
Detractors are not known for logic. And ELP have more than their share of detractors. [/QUOTE] When as a matter of fact all those fillers are mainly jokes? [/QUOTE] And I mean jokes in a good sense: even though I mostly don't like those songs, they are short pieces and if Keith or Greg felt like putting them on the album, well, it's their album, and it's obvious those songs aren't supposed to be taken as seriously as the "serious" masterpieces of the album.[/QUOTE] Yes, I think of them as being like the cartoons in a newspaper. Mind you, in that case the humour is probably the most enjoyable bit on that case. Successful humour in progressive rock - ELP but especially Tull with all of Brick (art included.) Zappa. Unsuccessful humour in progressive rock - Tull - Too Old To To Rock And Roll etc. But how about the um, lesser moments on Works?I'd rather listen to Eddie and Benny than Greg Lake's Works ballads. NP: BSS
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Dellinger
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VIP Member
Joined: June 18 2009
Location: Mexico
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Points: 12732
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 23:21 |
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ELP being humourless? I'd certainly not think that. So they get bashed for having all those fillers on an album, and then they get accused of being humourless? When as a matter of fact all those fillers are mainly jokes? And I mean jokes in a good sense: even though I mostly don't like those songs, they are short pieces and if Keith or Greg felt like putting them on the album, well, it's their album, and it's obvious those songs aren't supposed to be taken as seriously as the "serious" masterpieces of the album.
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uduwudu
Forum Senior Member
Joined: July 17 2007
Status: Offline
Points: 2601
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 21:33 |
I suppose it depends on how bad music is defined. The usual tracks from ELP to take flak are the funny ones, Benny and Eddie etc. These are less serious than KE9 and Tarkus and fun (mind you that bit about seven virgins and a mule had me wondering about hotel rooms and rock stars on tour...). The flip side is that ELP get s accused of being humourless and too full of itself. Nothing wrong with a bit of levity in the right place - just look at FZ's work. On the other hand a comedy track from Black Sabbath is probably not going to fit (Black Sabbath)... anywhere there. Humour takes courage. Like technology it is going to be one of the first things to become dated. For me the first albums from ELP are terrific. You get in depth epics or in depth shorter tracks like Bitches Crystal. Just 'cause a piece does not have a certain length does not make it a poor track. Besides, Tarkus is broken up into pieces so top 20 oriented Prog fans can get to grips with it.  Unless my memory fails me Karn Evil 9 does contain a huge top 20 type radio hit. WBMFTTSTNE.
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
Status: Offline
Points: 9869
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 21:17 |
ExittheLemming wrote:
How can a musical masterpiece have 'filler' ?
Are Bach's fugues considered horrid girly bubblegum pop because they are shorter than his concertos ?
I agree it certainly ain't math(s) but neither is it weighing bananas either
Your holistic view of appraisal i.e. the whole can be more than the sum of its parts, is fine for the visual arts but falls down when employed in the musical realm i.e. music is a stubbornly linear critter (go on, tell me you can anticipate the next track on an album you're hearing for the first time )
A 'masterpiece' in modern parlance if applied strictly should indicate that you consider the entire work the best ever created by that artist. e.g there cannot be two 'master' tapes. (I think this pedantic buy you get the drift)
For me, I have to like every track on an album before I give it 5 stars and yes, some tracks will be better than others and yes, I am more forgiving of short good (but not great) than long good (but not great)
Sorry I came across as a bit snarky before, it's just because I am a bit snarky at the best of times.
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Well, then, I can only disagree with that, nothing much to add, because I think at least in rock based music, such an idea of a masterpiece is too ideal and hardly ever fulfilled. Dark Side has Breathe, which ultimately by itself is not very necessary how much ever Floyd lore may be used to justify its existence. Same goes with Seamus on Meddle. But if we don't call even these albums masterpieces, I don't know what is. I have met the perfect album in the little bit of jazz I have heard - every track on Dave Brubeck's Time Out is awesome. But I don't encounter such a consistently high standard in rock, maybe it's to do with the sense of adventure in good rock music and I like to make an allowance for that. Oh, by the way, sorry I didn't notice your location, else I would have spelt maths, which is what I normally do anyway.
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ExittheLemming
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 19 2007
Location: Penal Colony
Status: Offline
Points: 11415
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 21:11 |
rogerthat wrote:
ExittheLemming wrote:
With all due respect this is Grade 'A' spurious bollocks - you are rating the ALBUM not just a long title track.
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Indeed, and every song on the album therefore cannot have the same weight because the masterpiece sidelong epic would make a much bigger impression than a two minute filler that would go practically unnoticed. It simply involves using your discretion and deciding whether that big track tilts the scales enough to call the album a masterpiece or not. If you say that you would rate an album with say one 45 minute masterpiece and one awful 5 minute track as four and not five, that doesn't make sense to me at all because it's music and not math.
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How can a musical masterpiece have 'filler' ? Are Bach's fugues considered horrid girly bubblegum pop because they are shorter than his concertos ? I agree it certainly ain't math(s) but neither is it weighing bananas either Your holistic view of appraisal i.e. the whole can be more than the sum of its parts, is fine for the visual arts but falls down when employed in the musical realm i.e. music is a stubbornly linear critter (go on, tell me you can anticipate the next track on an album you're hearing for the first time ) A 'masterpiece' in modern parlance if applied strictly should indicate that you consider the entire work the best ever created by that artist. e.g there cannot be two 'master' tapes. (I think this pedantic but you get the drift) For me, I have to like every track on an album before I give it 5 stars and yes, some tracks will be better than others and yes, I am more forgiving of short good (but not great) than long good (but not great) Sorry I came across as a bit snarky before, it's just because I am a bit snarky at the best of times.
Edited by ExittheLemming - March 20 2010 at 21:55
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
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Points: 9869
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 20:40 |
ExittheLemming wrote:
With all due respect this is Grade 'A' spurious bollocks - you are rating the ALBUM not just a long title track.
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Indeed, and every song on the album therefore cannot have the same weight because the masterpiece sidelong epic would make a much bigger impression than a two minute filler that would go practically unnoticed. It simply involves using your discretion and deciding whether that big track tilts the scales enough to call the album a masterpiece or not. If you say that you would rate an album with say one 45 minute masterpiece and one awful 5 minute track as four and not five, that doesn't make sense to me at all because it's music and not math.
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ExittheLemming
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 19 2007
Location: Penal Colony
Status: Offline
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 20:07 |
rogerthat wrote:
Gerinski wrote:
I quite agree, I'd rate higher an album with several true masterpieces but some flaw, than a consistently good album but with no real highlight in it. Of course we need some sense of measure, a masterpice of 10 min in an otherwise full of sh*t album of 50 min is not enough to rate the album 5 stars, this is common sense. I love the song Lifeline in Neal Morse's same titled album but I rated it 2 stars because most of the rest sucks. And yet I rate any of the first albums of ELP until Welcome Back (included) with 5 stars without hesitation. |
 Yes of course, we have to use our discretion to decide which track tilts the scales if at all and by how much. Tarkus is so obviously the highlight of the album that the question of whether or not you like the other tracks seems irrelevant to me. This business by the way of focusing too much on the bad tracks is how an album like Tarkus winds up with a lower average than Moonmadness, which at least imo lacks masterpiece tracks though it's overall very solid. Or Trick of the tail for another example. |
With all due respect this is Grade 'A' spurious bollocks - you are rating the ALBUM not just a long title track.
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Evolver
Special Collaborator
Crossover & JR/F/Canterbury Teams
Joined: October 22 2005
Location: The Idiocracy
Status: Offline
Points: 5482
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 19:43 |
I think it's jealousy. ELP was filling arenas around the world, and at the same time, hardly anyony had heard of Genesis. In fact the world found Genesis when they stopped playing prog and started playing children's music. Their fans (let's call them "Genetals") from the seventies have never gotten over this.
--- Evolver now removes tongue from cheek, and runs from all the angry Genetals. 
Edited by Evolver - March 20 2010 at 19:44
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Trust me. I know what I'm doing.
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uduwudu
Forum Senior Member
Joined: July 17 2007
Status: Offline
Points: 2601
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 19:18 |
rogerthat wrote:
I am just listening to Barbarian and I have to wonder again, how is this not rock enough  ...this is Sabbath heavy, just listen to that riff...sick!
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Both BlacK Sabbath and ELP begin their debut albums with heavy pieces featuring the flattened fifth interval. This gives such music that lovely evil feel. It's what got young Johann S. Bach into trouble when he were a lad. He's play some organ pieces during funerals; then begin improvising on these sort of dark themes and... upsetting the hell out of the poor funeral goers. Now if you can get such music onto reactionary conservative rock radio  and away from the forward thinking classical stations then we'd be getting somewhere. Incidentally The Australian Symphony Orchestra once (at least) played Emerson's Piano Concerto 1. They also played Pictures at the same gig but not a word from the commentators (I have it on CD) on how Emerson used to perform recitals of Pictures in his hot rockin' combo of the same music. An obvious connection but no one joined the dots. Almost barbaric..
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Gerinski
Prog Reviewer
Joined: February 10 2010
Location: Barcelona Spain
Status: Offline
Points: 5154
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 13:00 |
rogerthat wrote:
I am just listening to Barbarian and I have to wonder again, how is this not rock enough ...this is Sabbath heavy, just listen to that riff...sick! |
Masterpiece song in masterpiece album 
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 10:38 |
I am just listening to Barbarian and I have to wonder again, how is this not rock enough ...this is Sabbath heavy, just listen to that riff...sick!
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
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Posted: March 20 2010 at 10:19 |
Gerinski wrote:
I quite agree, I'd rate higher an album with several true masterpieces but some flaw, than a consistently good album but with no real highlight in it. Of course we need some sense of measure, a masterpice of 10 min in an otherwise full of sh*t album of 50 min is not enough to rate the album 5 stars, this is common sense. I love the song Lifeline in Neal Morse's same titled album but I rated it 2 stars because most of the rest sucks. And yet I rate any of the first albums of ELP until Welcome Back (included) with 5 stars without hesitation. |
Yes of course, we have to use our discretion to decide which track tilts the scales if at all and by how much. Tarkus is so obviously the highlight of the album that the question of whether or not you like the other tracks seems irrelevant to me. This business by the way of focusing too much on the bad tracks is how an album like Tarkus winds up with a lower average than Moonmadness, which at least imo lacks masterpiece tracks though it's overall very solid. Or Trick of the tail for another example.
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