Why not more ratings for Gentle Giant albums?

This thread escalated quickly.. 

I love King Crimson, Yes, Genesis, etc., but for me, Gentle Giant is the most sophisticated and complicated prog ever written. Love these guys to death. They are the apex for me for what is possible within the genre. I don't think any other band had the arrangement/composition chops these guys had.

Be glad there is no avatar to accompany it

I laughed out loud when i first saw it a while ago. 

The Dark Elf wrote: ]  Please reference which prog sites you are referring to, please. No one in the history of inane prog banter has ever listed Gentle Giant in the big five. Until now, of course.

Biff Kennedy who is a well known(in local radio in my area anyway) prog expert and does the WXPN prog show every year with Dan Reed confirmed when Dan asked if GG were part of the big five. Bif said "oh certainly." Apart from that most fans on progressive ears mention GG when discussing big five or big six lists. I was on there for a long time and saw several of these lists. In all seriousness this is the first time a bunch of people(prog fans no less)have insisted that GG are not qualified to be in any big five list(popular or not). I only started this thread because it seems that members on here don't have a handle on how influential or important this band really are. My suspicions are confirmed with some of these responses and I have to say that I am truly disappointed.

irrelevant wrote: The "big five" or "first tier" is purely a popularity thing, not counting just within tight-knit prog circles. So GG are most certainly not a part of either list.

Well I guess it depends on who you talk to. Typically it's as much about who is important as who is popular. GG are mentioned more than RUSH are despite the fact that RUSH are more popular and well known. Even so I suppose according to you ELP wouldn't be on there because PF, YES, JT, RUSH, Kansas and Genesis have all sold more than ELP. As I've said before ELP's popularity among prog collector's has waned a bit. They aren't typically considered as important as they once were imo. But as I said before my poll(on this site no less!!!!)( so obviously it's just a few vocal anti GG fans in this thread arguing with me)showed more votes for GG than ELP. Believe it or not I am just as much of an ELP fan as I am a GG fan. That's not what this is all about. It's about giving credit where credit is due.

My only explanation for this lack of GG's respect is that a lot of you are younger fans(I won't say kiddies this time since some of you can't handle my humor)and you haven't been exposed to GG to the degree that you have ELP.

Most of the big five lists I have seen go like this(and I will admit GG aren't always on there but they usually are and they are on there just as much as ELP are if not more so):

ELP                                    Yes                               GG           GG
GG                                      Genesis                      Yes          PF
Genesis                            Pink Floyd                    KC           JT
YES                                    GG                                 JT            Yes
King Crimson                   KC                                 PF           KC


Typically those who aren't fans of a certain band will not put them on their list. If I was going strictly by album sales the big five would be:  Yes JT PF Genesis Moody Blues  If only seventies big five by popularity then yeah ELP would be in there but Genesis wouldn't and would that make sense for a prog list? It would be MB- JT- PF- ELP- KC (Genesis had no gold albums until 1978 but in the court of the crimson king was certified gold in 1977). Now do you see how silly it is if you go strictly by popularity in the seventies? This of course is from a US perspective.

I've just noticed that GG have 5 albums in the Progarchives top 100. ELP? They have one(their first). Match point. :D


Edited by Prog_Traveller - December 05 2013 at 00:50

^Well that's besides the point. Really, I didn't want to have two posts that were pretty much identical and was not able to delete the first one. Thanks for having confidence in me though.


I thought of the term Genital Giant a few years ago though. According to some hardcore GG fans it wasn't new to them though. Oh well. However, I never heard anyone say Jenny Sis until after I did.


Anyway, as for the rest of this discussion, I'm done arguing(hopefully). We'll all have to just agree to disagree.



Edited by Prog_Traveller - December 04 2013 at 22:35

Genital Giant wrote: Prog_Traveller wrote: I thought of the term Genital Giant a few years ago though. According to some hardcore GG fans it wasn't new to them though. Oh well. However, I never heard anyone say Jenny Sis until after I did. Do you want a medal or something? I was in a prog band in the 80's called Genital Giant.

I wouldn't tell that to many people unless they were GG fans. They might not understand the joke.

[Likewise you cannot cite a progarchives poll in the same breath that you blame its membership for its relatively low profile on the website]

Not the same breath. But regardless, I can do that because they are two separate issues. One is the bigger issue and one is just their battle with ELP.

Genital Giant wrote: One thing that is tough about Gentle Giant is the sophistication and complexity of their music tends to go over most people's heads, even a lot of Prog fans. I'm a musician and a composer, and I've frankly never run into another GG fan who wasn't at least a musician themselves. I'm not saying you have to be a musician to appreciate GG, but it sure seems to help.

That may be;.....just curious.... how old are you and what instrument do you play?