I am interested in the years 1966 to 1968.  Can anyone give me

some of the bands that made the most musical strides in these years.

Obviously, the Nice, Floyd, Soft Machine, but I'm interested in something

that isn't jazz or classical done with more rock elements thrown in,

but something more harmonically innovative as well as sonic textures,

like studio effects.  

I'm curious what the year 1966 put out as far as innovative rock.  

I'd like to recommend http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaV-S5ivX3E" rel="nofollow - East West  as an 13-minute long instruemental track released in 1966 (at same titled album) as truly innovative as well. Unbelievable Mike Bloomfield's guitar work. Nobody was recorded something like that before. It was recorded at one live studio session and even today it doesn't sound dated.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyiAFbKxfrw

The Beach Boys-Smile was about experimentation. Phase shifting vocal harmonies , chanting, sound effects and combine this with the influence of J.S.Bach and you have a very odd sound. The Beach Boys vocally, keep their distinctive sound , but unlike any vocal style they harmonized in prior to Smile. It's so "off beat" for 67' and so ahead of it's time and 3 of the instrumental pieces are in the vain of the early Residents albums. Sections of Mark of the Mole and Not Available perhaps. It's a very strange connection..but it's obvious to hear. Especially in the "Fire tapes".

Jefferson Airplane's Crown of Creation is the Airplane album I must single out as being the most influential to Space Rock. Piper At the Gates of Dawn featured the instrumental "Interstellar Overdrive" which may have been the first attempt at completeness in Space Rock. Crown of Creation tends to create atmospheric sounds that later turned up in the music of Gong, Hawkwind, Guru, Guru and Amon Duul II. It was a different influence entirely to Space Rock than Piper...although "Lather" is quite like a Syd Barrett composition and take notice sometime. Imagine Syd Barrett singing "Lather" and it all falls into place. However...Syd Barrett listened to Jefferson Airplane and the developing stages of this type of experimentation can't be pin pointed and historically documented exacting without having the answers to certain important questions. It's never discussed that deeply on any of the Pink Floyd documentaries and hardly mentioned in the films on the late 60's. Ron Geesin would probably know the answers and point me in the right direction. Some people assume that because everything was bursting out in the 60's scene at rapid speed...that the confused event itself holds the explanation as to why credit to an artist can not be given and that the observation of changing music cannot be credited to that artist until several people from that period are interviewed to confirm it. That's a lie.

Beaver & Krause's In A Wild Sanctuary was very groundbreaking and influential.

 

 

Definitely, Brian Wilson was a good call. 

This came as a surprise for 1966.  

Someone mentioned Donovan but he never sounded proggy to me but folky psych rock but I can see how that might sound like proto prog. .There were many pysch rock and proto prog bands in 67 - 69.... including some one hit wonders and one LP bands. I have a lot of those early psych bands on cd .

 

Last days I listened to Country Joe MacDonald's Electric Music For The Mind And Body, which has some protoproggish elements, as in the instrumental "Section 43".

And also Buffalo Springfield's "Broken Arrow" from Buffalo Springfield Again.

That's what came to my mind as well. Such a great and adventerous album.

The Moody's first album (1965) featured Denny Laine (later of Paul McCartney's Wings). It was more R&B/pop than anything. Their big hit on their first release was "Go Now". It wasn't until Laine left and Justin Hayward and John Lodge joined the band that they eventually dropped their previous sound, got an offer by their label to do a rock version of Dvořák's New World Symphony (as a demo for Decca's new "Deramic stereo sound"). The Moodys decided to do their own thing instead, and the rest is prog history.

A great song for American ProtoProg but it came in October 1967.  

I think a lot of Prog's influence came from a more rock version of what was already

happening in things like soundtrack music, Herb Alpert, and Brian Wilson's influence:

Phil Specter.  I still say, as much as it sounds funny, Donovan's Sunshine Superman

is probably the most ProtoProg thing happening, even if I probably won't like a lot of it.

It's combining classical instrumentation with rock, as well as exotic instruments, and

odd, very slow meters  He even has that "royal court" imagery that Genesis would

out in September 1966.  Both of them sound amazingly different than regular rock albums, much

more "intelligent" musically, with many world music influences, and even classical, such as

Eleanor Rigby.  

East-West (13:18) 1966 The Paul Butterfield Blues Band “East-West”

And I like it (10:36) recorded 1966 / released ? Jefferson Airplane

Smokestack Lightning (10:52) 4 Sep live (Wolfgang’s Vault) 1966 Quicksilver Messenger Blues

The Same Thing (11:13) 19 Nov 1966 Grateful Dead live at Fillmore Auditorium

In the Midnight Hour (18:57) 19 Nov 1966 Grateful Dead live at Fillmore Auditorium

Eight Miles High                Jan/March '66                     Byrds           

Rain                                    April/June '66                     Beatles                                

Doctor Robert                    April/Aug '66                      Beatles                               

 Break on Through (To…)   Aug '66/Jan '67                   Doors                                 

 Light My Fire                     Aug '66/Jan '67                   Doors                                 

 Cobwebs and Strange        Oct/Dec '66                        Who                                   

 Third Stone from the Sun   Oct '66/May '67                  The Jimi Hendrix Exp       

 White Rabbit                                              Nov '66/Feb '67                Jefferson Airplane             

 C.T.A. – 102                       Dec '66/Feb '67                   Byrds                                 

 2-4-2 Fox Trot (The Lear Jet Song)                                                     Byrds (May/July '66)

Seven & Seven Is                                                                                Love (?/June '66)

Psychotic Reaction                                                                              The Count Five (?/June '66)

Bad Little Woman                                                         Shadows Of Knight (?/July '66)

I Had Too Much to Dream (Last Night)                       The Electric Prunes (?/Nov '66)

Blues' Theme                                                                  Davie Allen & The Arrows (?/Dec '66)

Strawberry Fields Forever                                                                   Beatles (Nov-Dec '66/Feb '67)

 

Ohhh damn!

 

Iron Butterfly is missing!

 

Hahaha ... I still have that TOUCH LP. Not even sure it is playable anymore!

..especially this one 

And a bit of Vaudeville mixed in with their trip:

Jefferson Airplane Takes Off 1966

Crown of Creation 1968

 

 

The Magnificent Moodies proto-prog? Really? Only Go Now stands out as being the embryonic beginning of the Moodies foray into Baroque Pop, the rest of the album is (as I recall) typical English Whiteboy R&B. 

Good call on Family, they don't get enough shout-outs on this forum, a truly great band - In A Doll's House is also heavily laden with Baroque Rock. 

You recall correctly. The Moodies were part of the r & b scene, and if that debut, is even remotely classified as "proto prog", then I would immediately submit The Yardbirds, John MAyall's Bluesbreakers, Fleetwood Mac, The Stones, The Faces, in fact virtually every single Whiteboy R & B band who had more than a 60 second spot on Ready Steady Go for inclusion on this ever expanding site of ours.

Look on the bright side, Dean. At least they are not Band Cramp sourced, and more than five people will have heard of them!

is the sonic (sound texture) element of it.  You could say that this even bordered

on suggesting the avant-garde or "sound-art" type music, as it probably was the genre of the three

elements of proto-prog, said very correctly above, that added that aspect to

prog rock.  I very much like the idea of proto-prog being all three: psychedelic,

baroque, and jazz-rock.  

It's interesting that wider arrangements had already been

going on in "middle of the road" type music from the early 60s.  There are

many people today who collect these "anomalous" records from thrift shops,

so they are no longer completely obscure.  It would be interesting to hear 

stuff going on.   I'm not sure the date it was happening, but it was

pop and opera/classical song structures, and symphonic arrangements.  

I don't know when Ina Martell's "Ich war allein" was released, but you 

can see that maybe the Beatles heard stuff like this and did Eleanor Rigby. 

Baroque, cocktail jazz, R&B and enigmatic (and at times, damn funny) drug-fueled lyrics.

 

 

another favorite of mine..........