Why no love for ELP?

Big Kid Josie wrote: In a lot of "best prog keyboardist"/"best prog drummer" threads, you'll see Emerson and Palmer often omitted, which I find odd.  Whether you like their music or not, there is no denying that Emerson's one of the top 5 keyboardists in prog and Palmer one of the top 5 drummers, at least in my opinion.

^They certainly had a big impact on prog. As to whether their albums are good or not is fair game.

And I have enormous respect for their skill, but single greatest... top 5... one of the greatest...? I just can't bring myself to agree.

I like Triumvirat more, but you couldn't have had T'rat, and a score of other great prog bands without ELP.

micky wrote: Polymorphia wrote: zravkapt wrote: I've always found it strange that ELP were literally one of the most popular rock bands on Earth in the early 1970s but are second-class citizens on prog forums. At the same time cult bands from the '70s like VDGG and Gentle Giant are considered more important than ELP. I've never seen an instance of VDGG and GG considered more important than ELP. Better, yes. But not more important. better at what?  Never understand that. Better at marginalizing themselves by playing music that most people don't like or can't enjoy.  Yeah.. then perhaps so.. they are. Gotta love prog fans and their logic!  ELP was just as complex as talented.. but could sell a jillion records and influence 40 years of artists by the quality of their music, compositions, and performances. better? my ass.

Sounds like it's a popularity contest you want. Avatar must be the greatest film in the world.

And ELP as complex as Gentle Giant? Nah. ELP didn't have the manpower that Gentle Giant had to execute the latter's contrapuntal complexity. No count against ELP, just an aside.

For the record, I did not claim they were better in my post, but that claims of quality should not be equated to claims of importance. But I do like both Gentle Giant and VdGG better. You can see my reasons in my initial post. It's subjectively subjective subjectivity and it makes it's way into my ratings and reviews, as it should. I feel ELP's excess works against them many times. And I curl up and die inside when I hear Hoedown. "But at least they're important" is not an argument that's going to drive me to give any of their albums five stars.

And, yes, I know about your DT review.

Edited by Polymorphia - June 23 2015 at 21:09

To some, ELP represent the most bombastic, embarrassing excesses of the worst elements of the Prog genre, at least of the golden vintage period. It didn't help that pretty much every album after the debut (which is seriously good and their most consistent album) had some cringe-worthy tracks, and it's pretty fair to say that their albums sound pretty dated and could only have come from the Seventies.

But that's what made those early bands so important - that daring, experimental shake-up of traditional straightforward rock music, and they all sounded so completely different from each-other and like no other bands before , and ELP (for better or worse) can be proud of that claim.

I probably respect ELP more than truly love them (well, again that debut is the sole really special one for me), but there's no denying their status in the big important prog groups of the Seventies, regardless of how a few snobs try to dismiss them and re-write history!

I do like ELP, but listen up 'cause I'm speaking hard truth here, ya'll  

Horizons wrote: Because they're cringeworthy.

ELP were generally more inconsistent than the other big names in the British progressive rock movement of their day... most of their classic albums mix some very powerful and ambitious songs with overtly goofy songs (e. g. Benny the Bouncer) that either haven't aged very well, don't translate culturally to audiences outside the UK or just sound out of place on otherwise quite serious albums.

^^ Yeah, I don't like those goofy songs, another reason why I prefer the debut.

Edited by Meltdowner - June 24 2015 at 04:12

^^ I can relate to that, though I probably like their work a lot more. I like a lot of prog outside the buttersoft-mellotron-epic symph format and that hasn't helped me enjoy ELP as much as I am 'supposed' to. Love some tracks and the others are just meh.