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presdoug 
Forum Senior Member
Joined: January 24 2010
Location: Canada
Status: Offline
Points: 8737
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 Posted: September 03 2011 at 12:32 |
 TODDLER wrote:
presdoug wrote:
moshkito wrote:
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...
We might have gotten that in the top ten radio (AM radio) in those days, but FM radio did not have a top ten for 10 years until it was bought out by all the record companies ... dig this ... the major conglomerate that distributes music in America owns the single largest number of FM stations in the country ... do you wonder why I do not listen to FM radio anymore? ... they only play the "artists" they deliver to all the stores, and nothing else, and don't even follow the required rules that the FCC had requested for these stations in the big city ... the requirements of which are being filled out by PSA's.
True! True! and very true! Why does it seem as if a lot of people don't get this? Is it the seperation of generations? We were exposed to everything as a way of life. Every single point you bring out here about AM and FM. It shouldn't be the seperate....I can't relate to the older folks thing because
...
|
I don't think there is a separation of generations any more today, than there was yesterday, or 40 years ago, when I was working at the Rathskeller in Madison, Wisconsin.
Just like then, there were factions ... the democrats that stood against the VietNam War and the Republicans that were trying to be cooler than thou by saying that we were not supporting the troops ... which of course was not true, and was a gross b*****dization of the whole situation ... somethings never change in life! But the democrats usually had longer hair than the republicans to give you an idea of the absurdity of the whole thing!
We were exposed to as much then, as people are now. And we were just as stupid then, as we are now ... the only thing that has changed? ... we're fatter, uglier and snore a little louder!
In the end, it is all about how much to do you want to open your eyes, your ears, and your heart ... and nothing else.
FM and AM radio were different. Again, in the first 10 years, FM was the voice of the new age and the new feelings and the new revolution, but when it started selling big, and many bands getting into the millions, they all got bought out by the record conglomerates. And that is when the proliferation of new music and groups stopped, and instead it become ... let's make a million with Genesis and bruhaha ... and dump the rest ... heck ... the WEA distribution conglomerate paid the Rolling Stones many millions to go on tour with a humungous penis on the stage for Mick to ride ... and then Led Zep got 100 million or something like that ... and you know the result of that was right? .... more than 5000 groups lost their distribution ability over night ...
And 20 years later, when the Satelite thing came out, it was even more blatant of a corporate thing .... and everyone thought it was cool, which means that the advertising got you hooked ... but none of us here had the balls to lay it on the line ... and still don't! And for me, the sad thing is ... a board like this, other than a thread like this one, is not interested in adding the history to the website and help make sense of the music ... now you know why so many reviews of "In the Court of the Crimson King" are so off base! They are no longer the snapshot of that day and time and place and people ... they are some imaginary idea of music that had nothing to do with anything else.
It speaks volumes for the importance and value of the music itself and the work of so many of us that deserve a little pat in the back ... we did really well folks, and we're still doing well! And that music is remembered and loved ... I would never trade a million dollars for the love and affection found in this place for some of the most beautiful music ever recorded! Go ahead and try!
Now we just need to get the rest of the folks in PA to believe also! |
^Hey, man, you lay it on the line, Moshkito-that is your greatest post!
|
Moshkito can surely teach me a thing or 2! He is a historian on a subject such as this one. |
But your stories are interesting and insightful, too, TODDLER! 
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jammun
Prog Reviewer
Joined: July 14 2007
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 3449
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Posted: September 03 2011 at 00:24 |
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Dean's doing just fine, just a little dust in the room.
Edited by jammun - September 03 2011 at 00:42
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Can you tell me where we're headin'?
Lincoln County Road or Armageddon.
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Atavachron
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: September 30 2006
Location: Pearland
Status: Offline
Points: 65602
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Posted: September 03 2011 at 00:18 |
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I think I hear Dean sneezing
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jammun
Prog Reviewer
Joined: July 14 2007
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 3449
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 23:46 |
Please oh please dont allow some potential employer to actually link this post to my email address, for I am going to tell you how it was. When in high school I wrote a letter to the editor of the school newspaper describing my weekly drug intake, indicating that it had no affect on my academic performance (which admittedly prior to said drug use had not been all that great). Some acid weekly, some mescaline weekly, some pot and/or hash daily, but never the nasty stuff (heroin, coke, meth, that was for idiots; and very rarely any alcohol. Friday night was not a drinking night, it was a tripping night). My history teacher read that letter out loud to the class shortly after it appeared, and said "I can assure you this person will never graduate from high school." I earned an A in that class. I had a close call in my senior year, when a mescaline purchase turned into a sorta drug bust. It was a slippery slope there for a bit, but in the end there was no evidence that any transaction had taken place (Judas informer was unreliable). I will say, it was 1971, all of my friends, and even those who were not my friends, rallied behind me. My academic performance was the best it had ever been, which seemed to completely addle and confuse the school's powers that were as well as that detective. My teachers stood behind me. "His school work has never been better, and he never misses class. He regularly participates in the classroom discussions, often to the exclusion of others." The school principal was at a loss. "It seems his grades are actually getting better over the last two years." Idiots. Imagine if I had been like the school jocks, drinking myself into a stupor regularly, showing up to my 7:30 AM class hungover. My friends and I, we were above that. We might have been experiencing a few visual and aural surreal artifacts at 7:30, but our minds were keen. We were Starship Troopers, exploring deep recesses of the inner self, and it was not coincidental that progressive rock was the soundtrack for those explorations. Not coincidental at all. I didn't care about school at all. I cared about being let out of school to go have a bit of hash, then go home and play my Hammond L100 for hours. All informed by the prog that was being played at the time. Understand, I have a few regrets and do not condone drug use. As one of my friends sez, 'you don't use drugs, drugs use you', which would have been a better slogan than that lame 'just say no' deal. Whatever. It was the early '70s and these things happened. I can tell you from first-hand experience, when a person goes to a concert and sees that classic Yes play Heart of the Sunrise with a 4-way hit of Orange Sunshine coursing through his bloodstream and completely rewiring his brain chemistry, it is a religious experience comparable to that which Moses had with that burning bush, when that angel of Yahweh did appear. Disclaimer: I have not used psychedelic drugs for 30 years now and do not necessarily recommend them. Just telling you all how it was.
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Can you tell me where we're headin'?
Lincoln County Road or Armageddon.
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TODDLER
Forum Senior Member
VIP Member
Joined: August 28 2009
Location: Vineland, N.J.
Status: Offline
Points: 3126
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 23:27 |
A great part of the 70's for me was listening to Pink Floyd. D.S.O.T.M. was great at first then I grew tired of it.....so it was mostly every release up to that point It was very exciting and personally meaningful to me. It allowed me to experiment. It gave me identity and provided me with the real deal. Ummagumma and Atom Heart Mother were more Avant-Garde Rock than psych. Roger Waters instead of writing about his school days most of the time was hanging about with Ron Geesin. Ron Geesin was a film composer with a diverse nature about him. The Scottish humour, T.V. commercials, and actual serious Avant-Garde pieces. He was multi-talented. Meddle and Obscured By Clouds were the bloodstream leading into D.S.O.T.M.
Some of the acoustic ballads off Umagumma and A.H.M. sound inspired like themes gleaned from literature and visual art. They seemed a little Julliard then as some of those pieces utilized broad dynamic range. They could have used string quartet in some of those pieces. As a teen I was very obsessed with Syd Barrett. In the 70's kids often thought of him as the strange guy who formed Pink Floyd and neglected to investigate his solo albums or put together how influential he was to other artists like David Bowie. Not at all the vision we have of him today with the many websites and abundance of Syd copy cats. In the beginning he wrote insane children's songs. It felt that way to me more so than the psych feel. I praised him for his lyricism and his unique sense of drama. He had expressive capacities within his writing. He was a very odd character in the rock music world. His career sizzled out rather quickly . The bright and cheerful yet bizzare Syd on Piper became the gloom and doom Syd on Madcaps. The difference after the breakdown was shocking. I played "Golden Hair' everyday and it reminded me of a song which fit the MORE album or even Atom Heart Mother, but the magic in "Lucifer Sam", "Scarecrow" etc...had vanished.
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TODDLER
Forum Senior Member
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Joined: August 28 2009
Location: Vineland, N.J.
Status: Offline
Points: 3126
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 22:33 |
Dean wrote:
I'm 54, so back then I lived in a village in deepest darkest north Bedfordshire with no access to music stores or venues other than small folk clubs that my Dad would take us to at weekends and the only "pop" music we heard came from the radio or one of the very few music variety programs on TV (well, we did get to see Hendrix on the Lulu show). I had an old steam (valve/tube) radio in my bedroom that had an old BSR turntable wired into it so I could play 45s (in mono), but most of the time I was listening to John Peel (Perfumed Garden and later Top Gear), Emperor Rosco and Pete Drummond playing hippy psychedelic music. My Dad wasn't a musician (he was a wood-machinist/carpenter) but he could knock out a tune on the harmonica if we weren't quick enough to hide them from him; he would often come home with bizarre instruments he'd bought of "some bloke in the pub" or at jumble sales; or he would buy strange albums of celtic folk or odd jazz albums that consisted of nothing but percussion or the soundtrack to "Secret of the Inca's" an album of exotica featuring Yma Sumac and her 5 octave vocal range; and being a woodworker by trade, he would occasionally make instruments, such as my first guitar (with only four strings because he could only scrounge four machine-heads). These experiences formed in me a curiosity for the unusual and the weird.
5 miles away was Santa Pod Raceway and as kids we used to cut across the fields and woods to sneak in the back-way to avoid paying, this was our small patch of America in the heart of rural England where we could immerse ourselves in Americana listening to Beach Boys and Jefferson Airplane over the Tanoy, while gawping at hot rods and top-fuel dragsters pumping the smell of Nitromethane into the air, where visiting celebrities like Don Garlits would show us how it was really done, shaving several seconds off our local boys best times down the strip. That love of drag racing was often the trigger for making like-minded friends at school and later at work (one of my work friends, Steve Horn, later went on to work for Santa Pod Raceway as a timing marshal and driver of the "house" jet car), but that came later, after (in 1968) I moved up to High School.
High School was a whole new world, being 10 miles away it started with a 45 minute bus ride where we would pick up kids from other villages en-route and the conversation always centred around music and cars and we would read NME and Sounds for the latest news and release (Melody Maker was ignored for being "too jazz & blues") and swap albums and singles with each other (cassettes hadn't been invented yet, though I did have a portable ¼ reel-to-real tape machine for producing mix-tapes, splicing the sound effects from Moody Blues and Floyd between the tracks... and of course the dragster noise from Simon & Garfunkel's 'Baby Driver'). These were the days before HMV and Virgin meagre stores, so Bedford's record shops also sold hi-fi and musical instruments, so after school we would trawl these shops looking for anything interesting that we'd read about in the music mags or heard on the late-night radio. I remember in the early 70s one of these shops' window display was Van der Graaf Generator's 'At Least We Can Do Is Wave At Each Other' - occupying the whole shop front with a real Van der Graff generator and cotton-wool clouds adding to the 3D cardboard cut-out of the album cover itself - this display mesmerised me so much I had to buy the album with money saved from my lunch-money.
The school playground at lunch time was a nest of small cliques of kids into various forms of music, this was divided mainly into two main groups - the skinheads into reggae, Motown and R&B and the Freaks and Rockers into head-music, heavy music and Prog Rock (yes, we did call it that in 1970-73); the cool kids had Zappa, Beefheart, Crimson and White Noise, the teenie-boppers were into Glam Rock, while me and my friends hovered between them, liking all music that came our way, from The Beatles to the Move, from Hendrix to Zappa, from Bowie to Bolan, from Hawkwind to Amon Duul, and of course The Moodies to Floyd, our eclecticism allowed us to be tolerated by both camps, albeit begrudgingly at times when I inadvertently mentioned "Electric Warrior" to the cool kids. 
London was 45 miles away by train, and that was the real Mecca of music for us, but at 14 years old getting there was an expedition (we did take one trip just to visit the Virgin import shop in Marble Arch - just about the only source of Krautrock at the time). In 1972 I saw Pink Floyd at Wembley Pool performing The Dark Side Of The Moon - hours spent listening to Meddle and Ummagumma hadn't prepared me for that - it blew me away. Later "expeditions" to London were to buy albums and Sci-Fi books from the many record & book stores around Soho, Totenham Court Road and Oxford Street. Carnaby Street was crass commercialised shadow of its former self by 1973, but still we'd visit the head shops looking for hippy clothes, loons and scoop-neck shirts and being approached by weirdo's asking if we "wanted to score"...
[I was never into drugs and still aren't, though beer, cheap wine and cigarettes were not a problem, however I saw plenty of it at the time (weed makes me sneeze uncontrollably). For me music was never about drugs, music was the drug, regardless of how high the artist may have been when they recorded it.]
Reading through the posts in this thread has reminded me of one source "deleted" music that was available to us - that was a warehouse type store just off Oxford Street that sold American Imports - these were bin-end remainders that hadn't sold in the US so were shipped over en-mass to the UK and sold a ridiculously cheap prices. These were instantly recognisable for being made of really thick cardboard and usually having one corner of the sleeve clipped off or a ¼" hole stamped through the corner - if I recall correctly my entire Bo Hansson collection and first Philip Glass albums were from this store, as was Tim Blake's Crystal Machine (though I think I perhaps bought that in a similar store in Edinburgh much later).
1974/5 began my obsession with The Enid - I followed them around the home-counties, bought everything they released and joined The Enid Appreciation Society - I was at their make-or-break gigs at the Round House and The Hammersmith Odean, but still the best gigs of theirs I attended were at smaller venues and college Student Union bars in Bedford, Cranfield, Northampton and Leicester.
By 1975 we had transport, my friend Steve bought a huge 6 cylinder Vauxhall Cresta off my Dad and that was our taxi out of the sticks and into music venues further afield, with Friar's Club in Aylesbury being our main port of call - here we saw Peter Gabriel on his first solo tour. |
Wow! I am amazed by this post! I discovered the Enid very late in life. I've been pretty obsessed with them in the past. They were very disciplined. The first 4 albums leave me speechless.
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TODDLER
Forum Senior Member
VIP Member
Joined: August 28 2009
Location: Vineland, N.J.
Status: Offline
Points: 3126
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 22:17 |
In the 60's and 70's I followed up on what was defined then as unorthodox recording methods. Beaver & Krause who roamed about San Francisco with a tape recorder ....actually it was probably Bernard Krause? Anyway,...they released In A Wild Sanctuary which for me was the very first of it's kind. An album of electronic/rock with strange tape recordings throughout. However this may not be 100 percent true. The first person could have been Wendy Carlos (then known as Walter), or a 20th century composer. but with In A Wild Sanctuary....Beaver & Krause opened doors (so to speak), for many of the future electronic artists. They were influential in that case.
I became used to the strange unorthodox recording techniques in the 70's like slamming wet bath towels against the wall while having mics set up. This produced the sound of a karate kick or the visual sound effect for martial arts. The kitty litter placed on a tympani drum and after slamming the drum with an impact in course....the litter would rise and the microphones picked up that sizzling sound of fireworks. When played back on tape it produced the sound of a fireworks display. That was the deal with the 70's. Artists were having fun with oddball recording techniques ...that today are produced by merely pressing a button or utilizing a sampled sound. Back then artists would sit by the railroad tracks, record the sound of a train, and find a George Martin type to mix it down or phase it into one of their songs. Things like that were fun to do. Now they are looked upon as a waste of time and quite ridiculous for anyone to consider.
Edited by TODDLER - September 02 2011 at 22:20
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TODDLER
Forum Senior Member
VIP Member
Joined: August 28 2009
Location: Vineland, N.J.
Status: Offline
Points: 3126
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 21:56 |
presdoug wrote:
moshkito wrote:
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...
We might have gotten that in the top ten radio (AM radio) in those days, but FM radio did not have a top ten for 10 years until it was bought out by all the record companies ... dig this ... the major conglomerate that distributes music in America owns the single largest number of FM stations in the country ... do you wonder why I do not listen to FM radio anymore? ... they only play the "artists" they deliver to all the stores, and nothing else, and don't even follow the required rules that the FCC had requested for these stations in the big city ... the requirements of which are being filled out by PSA's.
True! True! and very true! Why does it seem as if a lot of people don't get this? Is it the seperation of generations? We were exposed to everything as a way of life. Every single point you bring out here about AM and FM. It shouldn't be the seperate....I can't relate to the older folks thing because
...
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I don't think there is a separation of generations any more today, than there was yesterday, or 40 years ago, when I was working at the Rathskeller in Madison, Wisconsin.
Just like then, there were factions ... the democrats that stood against the VietNam War and the Republicans that were trying to be cooler than thou by saying that we were not supporting the troops ... which of course was not true, and was a gross b*****dization of the whole situation ... somethings never change in life! But the democrats usually had longer hair than the republicans to give you an idea of the absurdity of the whole thing!
We were exposed to as much then, as people are now. And we were just as stupid then, as we are now ... the only thing that has changed? ... we're fatter, uglier and snore a little louder!
In the end, it is all about how much to do you want to open your eyes, your ears, and your heart ... and nothing else.
FM and AM radio were different. Again, in the first 10 years, FM was the voice of the new age and the new feelings and the new revolution, but when it started selling big, and many bands getting into the millions, they all got bought out by the record conglomerates. And that is when the proliferation of new music and groups stopped, and instead it become ... let's make a million with Genesis and bruhaha ... and dump the rest ... heck ... the WEA distribution conglomerate paid the Rolling Stones many millions to go on tour with a humungous penis on the stage for Mick to ride ... and then Led Zep got 100 million or something like that ... and you know the result of that was right? .... more than 5000 groups lost their distribution ability over night ...
And 20 years later, when the Satelite thing came out, it was even more blatant of a corporate thing .... and everyone thought it was cool, which means that the advertising got you hooked ... but none of us here had the balls to lay it on the line ... and still don't! And for me, the sad thing is ... a board like this, other than a thread like this one, is not interested in adding the history to the website and help make sense of the music ... now you know why so many reviews of "In the Court of the Crimson King" are so off base! They are no longer the snapshot of that day and time and place and people ... they are some imaginary idea of music that had nothing to do with anything else.
It speaks volumes for the importance and value of the music itself and the work of so many of us that deserve a little pat in the back ... we did really well folks, and we're still doing well! And that music is remembered and loved ... I would never trade a million dollars for the love and affection found in this place for some of the most beautiful music ever recorded! Go ahead and try!
Now we just need to get the rest of the folks in PA to believe also! |
^Hey, man, you lay it on the line, Moshkito-that is your greatest post!
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Moshkito can surely teach me a thing or 2! He is a historian on a subject such as this one.
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presdoug
Forum Senior Member
Joined: January 24 2010
Location: Canada
Status: Offline
Points: 8737
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 20:36 |
moshkito wrote:
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...
We might have gotten that in the top ten radio (AM radio) in those days, but FM radio did not have a top ten for 10 years until it was bought out by all the record companies ... dig this ... the major conglomerate that distributes music in America owns the single largest number of FM stations in the country ... do you wonder why I do not listen to FM radio anymore? ... they only play the "artists" they deliver to all the stores, and nothing else, and don't even follow the required rules that the FCC had requested for these stations in the big city ... the requirements of which are being filled out by PSA's.
True! True! and very true! Why does it seem as if a lot of people don't get this? Is it the seperation of generations? We were exposed to everything as a way of life. Every single point you bring out here about AM and FM. It shouldn't be the seperate....I can't relate to the older folks thing because
...
|
I don't think there is a separation of generations any more today, than there was yesterday, or 40 years ago, when I was working at the Rathskeller in Madison, Wisconsin.
Just like then, there were factions ... the democrats that stood against the VietNam War and the Republicans that were trying to be cooler than thou by saying that we were not supporting the troops ... which of course was not true, and was a gross b*****dization of the whole situation ... somethings never change in life! But the democrats usually had longer hair than the republicans to give you an idea of the absurdity of the whole thing!
We were exposed to as much then, as people are now. And we were just as stupid then, as we are now ... the only thing that has changed? ... we're fatter, uglier and snore a little louder!
In the end, it is all about how much to do you want to open your eyes, your ears, and your heart ... and nothing else.
FM and AM radio were different. Again, in the first 10 years, FM was the voice of the new age and the new feelings and the new revolution, but when it started selling big, and many bands getting into the millions, they all got bought out by the record conglomerates. And that is when the proliferation of new music and groups stopped, and instead it become ... let's make a million with Genesis and bruhaha ... and dump the rest ... heck ... the WEA distribution conglomerate paid the Rolling Stones many millions to go on tour with a humungous penis on the stage for Mick to ride ... and then Led Zep got 100 million or something like that ... and you know the result of that was right? .... more than 5000 groups lost their distribution ability over night ...
And 20 years later, when the Satelite thing came out, it was even more blatant of a corporate thing .... and everyone thought it was cool, which means that the advertising got you hooked ... but none of us here had the balls to lay it on the line ... and still don't! And for me, the sad thing is ... a board like this, other than a thread like this one, is not interested in adding the history to the website and help make sense of the music ... now you know why so many reviews of "In the Court of the Crimson King" are so off base! They are no longer the snapshot of that day and time and place and people ... they are some imaginary idea of music that had nothing to do with anything else.
It speaks volumes for the importance and value of the music itself and the work of so many of us that deserve a little pat in the back ... we did really well folks, and we're still doing well! And that music is remembered and loved ... I would never trade a million dollars for the love and affection found in this place for some of the most beautiful music ever recorded! Go ahead and try!
Now we just need to get the rest of the folks in PA to believe also! |
^Hey, man, you lay it on the line, Moshkito-that is your greatest post!
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moshkito
Forum Senior Member
Joined: January 04 2007
Location: Grok City
Status: Offline
Points: 18064
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 19:06 |
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...
We might have gotten that in the top ten radio (AM radio) in those days, but FM radio did not have a top ten for 10 years until it was bought out by all the record companies ... dig this ... the major conglomerate that distributes music in America owns the single largest number of FM stations in the country ... do you wonder why I do not listen to FM radio anymore? ... they only play the "artists" they deliver to all the stores, and nothing else, and don't even follow the required rules that the FCC had requested for these stations in the big city ... the requirements of which are being filled out by PSA's.
True! True! and very true! Why does it seem as if a lot of people don't get this? Is it the seperation of generations? We were exposed to everything as a way of life. Every single point you bring out here about AM and FM. It shouldn't be the seperate....I can't relate to the older folks thing because
...
|
I don't think there is a separation of generations any more today, than there was yesterday, or 40 years ago, when I was working at the Rathskeller in Madison, Wisconsin.
Just like then, there were factions ... the democrats that stood against the VietNam War and the Republicans that were trying to be cooler than thou by saying that we were not supporting the troops ... which of course was not true, and was a gross b*****dization of the whole situation ... somethings never change in life! But the democrats usually had longer hair than the republicans to give you an idea of the absurdity of the whole thing!
We were exposed to as much then, as people are now. And we were just as stupid then, as we are now ... the only thing that has changed? ... we're fatter, uglier and snore a little louder!
In the end, it is all about how much to do you want to open your eyes, your ears, and your heart ... and nothing else.
FM and AM radio were different. Again, in the first 10 years, FM was the voice of the new age and the new feelings and the new revolution, but when it started selling big, and many bands getting into the millions, they all got bought out by the record conglomerates. And that is when the proliferation of new music and groups stopped, and instead it become ... let's make a million with Genesis and bruhaha ... and dump the rest ... heck ... the WEA distribution conglomerate paid the Rolling Stones many millions to go on tour with a humungous penis on the stage for Mick to ride ... and then Led Zep got 100 million or something like that ... and you know the result of that was right? .... more than 5000 groups lost their distribution ability over night ...
And 20 years later, when the Satelite thing came out, it was even more blatant of a corporate thing .... and everyone thought it was cool, which means that the advertising got you hooked ... but none of us here had the balls to lay it on the line ... and still don't! And for me, the sad thing is ... a board like this, other than a thread like this one, is not interested in adding the history to the website and help make sense of the music ... now you know why so many reviews of "In the Court of the Crimson King" are so off base! They are no longer the snapshot of that day and time and place and people ... they are some imaginary idea of music that had nothing to do with anything else.
It speaks volumes for the importance and value of the music itself and the work of so many of us that deserve a little pat in the back ... we did really well folks, and we're still doing well! And that music is remembered and loved ... I would never trade a million dollars for the love and affection found in this place for some of the most beautiful music ever recorded! Go ahead and try!
Now we just need to get the rest of the folks in PA to believe also!
Edited by moshkito - September 02 2011 at 19:33
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Music is not just for listening ... it is for LIVING ... you got to feel it to know what's it about! Not being told!
www.pedrosena.com
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presdoug
Forum Senior Member
Joined: January 24 2010
Location: Canada
Status: Offline
Points: 8737
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 17:00 |
Gerinski wrote:
I was born in '66 so I was too young in the actual prime of prog, but in my native Spain everything arrived very late due to the dictatorship of fascist Franco, plus I grew up surrounded by older brothers and cousins who were into prog, so I can remember some of the atmosphere.
Without internet, if you wanted to stay up to date you had to read rock magazines, in Spain you had to read Vibraciones and Popular 1, one would buy them and a big group of friends or family would read them, next week someone else would buy them etc, so with a minimum budget everybody stayed informed. Magazines came always with posters and stickers of the hype bands, and the walls of your room or your school notebook told a lot about the music you liked. Our bedroom walls and ceiling were completely filled up with posters of ELP, Yes, The Who, Purple, Bowie, etc and early spanish prog bands.
Someone said that it was difficult to get an album after some time of its release but I don't remember it like that, at least for the well-known bands. Record shops were frequently semi-specialized, and the discographies of bands were still short, so for a shop specialized in rock (no classical, jazz, or traditional music) if they had a stock of 1500 different albums they had pretty much all there was. Obscure bands were of course different, most of them I simply didn't know, and if you did you had to order the albums on purpose and they could be very expensive.
Imports were indeed a treat, difficult and expensive so anyone who had some was really proud of it and showed them off. We would all copy them in cassette tape.
By the way does anyone remember the 78 rpm vinyls? I surely remember having quite some of them at home, from my father, mainly jazz.
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I remember my dad had a collection of old jazz 78s-i say had because in 1969, when i must have been only 7, i discovered to my delight and my dad's anger that they would break into small pieces when dropped-when he was not looking, i totalled his collection, not meaning to be mean, but i was pretty young 
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Gerinski
Prog Reviewer
Joined: February 10 2010
Location: Barcelona Spain
Status: Offline
Points: 5154
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 16:48 |
I was born in '66 so I was too young in the actual prime of prog, but in my native Spain everything arrived very late due to the dictatorship of fascist Franco, plus I grew up surrounded by older brothers and cousins who were into prog, so I can remember some of the atmosphere.
Without internet, if you wanted to stay up to date you had to read rock magazines, in Spain you had to read Vibraciones and Popular 1, one would buy them and a big group of friends or family would read them, next week someone else would buy them etc, so with a minimum budget everybody stayed informed. Magazines came always with posters and stickers of the hype bands, and the walls of your room or your school notebook told a lot about the music you liked. Our bedroom walls and ceiling were completely filled up with posters of ELP, Yes, The Who, Purple, Bowie, etc and early spanish prog bands.
Someone said that it was difficult to get an album after some time of its release but I don't remember it like that, at least for the well-known bands. Record shops were frequently semi-specialized, and the discographies of bands were still short, so for a shop specialized in rock (no classical, jazz, or traditional music) if they had a stock of 1500 different albums they had pretty much all there was. Obscure bands were of course different, most of them I simply didn't know, and if you did you had to order the albums on purpose and they could be very expensive.
Imports were indeed a treat, difficult and expensive so anyone who had some was really proud of it and showed them off. We would all copy them in cassette tape.
By the way does anyone remember the 78 rpm vinyls? I surely remember having quite some of them at home, from my father, mainly jazz.
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chefrobb
Forum Groupie
Joined: October 20 2008
Status: Offline
Points: 75
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 11:45 |
Grew up in the LA area in the 70'z.....great times, saw some fantastic bands.....ALL the greats of the greatest time in music. Even had a High School class called "age of Rock" in which we could bring in our own records and give a brief intro to the class before listening to THE WHOLE THING.....1 a day.......think that could ever happen now??????
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chefrobb
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lazland
Prog Reviewer
Joined: October 28 2008
Location: Wales
Status: Offline
Points: 13794
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 11:13 |
Dean wrote:
Just passin' through 
...yeah, the lure of this thread was too great.  |
Good to see you back Dean 
I was interested in your comment about the drugs. I was never into them either. The lure of real ale always tipped my boat. I'm trying to give up the cigs at the moment (down to 3/4 a day from 20+ with the aid of e-cig), but not easy.
You are absolutely right about the music - that is the drug, and the only one worth having 
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Enhance your life. Get down to www.lazland.org
Now also broadcasting on www.progzilla.com Every Saturday, 4.00 p.m. UK time!
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout
Joined: May 13 2007
Location: Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 37575
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 06:33 |
Just passin' through
...yeah, the lure of this thread was too great. |
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What?
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ExittheLemming
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 19 2007
Location: Penal Colony
Status: Offline
Points: 11420
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 06:21 |
^ thought a trawl stagger down memory lane might entice you out of hiding. Great to have you back  (you incorrigible old hippy  )
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octopus-4
Special Collaborator
RIO/Avant/Zeuhl,Neo & Post/Math Teams
Joined: October 31 2006
Location: Italy
Status: Offline
Points: 14547
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 06:14 |
A very interesting and well-written self-biography. We could make a book of stories like this. Imagine people from each world's country (at least those allowed to access the web) telling how they went to be passionate with music in general and prog in particular. A chapter for each country made of short bios like this one.
It's just an idea that appeared suddenly to my mind while I was reading. It's already gone...
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I stand with Roger Waters, I stand with Joan Baez, I stand with Victor Jara, I stand with Woody Guthrie. Music is revolution
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout
Joined: May 13 2007
Location: Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 37575
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Posted: September 02 2011 at 06:06 |
I'm 54, so back then I lived in a village in deepest darkest north Bedfordshire with no access to music stores or venues other than small folk clubs that my Dad would take us to at weekends and the only "pop" music we heard came from the radio or one of the very few music variety programs on TV (well, we did get to see Hendrix on the Lulu show). I had an old steam (valve/tube) radio in my bedroom that had an old BSR turntable wired into it so I could play 45s (in mono), but most of the time I was listening to John Peel (Perfumed Garden and later Top Gear), Emperor Rosco and Pete Drummond playing hippy psychedelic music. My Dad wasn't a musician (he was a wood-machinist/carpenter) but he could knock out a tune on the harmonica if we weren't quick enough to hide them from him; he would often come home with bizarre instruments he'd bought of "some bloke in the pub" or at jumble sales; or he would buy strange albums of celtic folk or odd jazz albums that consisted of nothing but percussion or the soundtrack to "Secret of the Inca's" an album of exotica featuring Yma Sumac and her 5 octave vocal range; and being a woodworker by trade, he would occasionally make instruments, such as my first guitar (with only four strings because he could only scrounge four machine-heads). These experiences formed in me a curiosity for the unusual and the weird.
5 miles away was Santa Pod Raceway and as kids we used to cut across the fields and woods to sneak in the back-way to avoid paying, this was our small patch of America in the heart of rural England where we could immerse ourselves in Americana listening to Beach Boys and Jefferson Airplane over the Tanoy, while gawping at hot rods and top-fuel dragsters pumping the smell of Nitromethane into the air, where visiting celebrities like Don Garlits would show us how it was really done, shaving several seconds off our local boys best times down the strip. That love of drag racing was often the trigger for making like-minded friends at school and later at work (one of my work friends, Steve Horn, later went on to work for Santa Pod Raceway as a timing marshal and driver of the "house" jet car), but that came later, after (in 1968) I moved up to High School.
High School was a whole new world, being 10 miles away it started with a 45 minute bus ride where we would pick up kids from other villages en-route and the conversation always centred around music and cars and we would read NME and Sounds for the latest news and release (Melody Maker was ignored for being "too jazz & blues") and swap albums and singles with each other (cassettes hadn't been invented yet, though I did have a portable ¼ reel-to-real tape machine for producing mix-tapes, splicing the sound effects from Moody Blues and Floyd between the tracks... and of course the dragster noise from Simon & Garfunkel's 'Baby Driver'). These were the days before HMV and Virgin meagre stores, so Bedford's record shops also sold hi-fi and musical instruments, so after school we would trawl these shops looking for anything interesting that we'd read about in the music mags or heard on the late-night radio. I remember in the early 70s one of these shops' window display was Van der Graaf Generator's 'At Least We Can Do Is Wave At Each Other' - occupying the whole shop front with a real Van der Graff generator and cotton-wool clouds adding to the 3D cardboard cut-out of the album cover itself - this display mesmerised me so much I had to buy the album with money saved from my lunch-money.
The school playground at lunch time was a nest of small cliques of kids into various forms of music, this was divided mainly into two main groups - the skinheads into reggae, Motown and R&B and the Freaks and Rockers into head-music, heavy music and Prog Rock (yes, we did call it that in 1970-73); the cool kids had Zappa, Beefheart, Crimson and White Noise, the teenie-boppers were into Glam Rock, while me and my friends hovered between them, liking all music that came our way, from The Beatles to the Move, from Hendrix to Zappa, from Bowie to Bolan, from Hawkwind to Amon Duul, and of course The Moodies to Floyd, our eclecticism allowed us to be tolerated by both camps, albeit begrudgingly at times when I inadvertently mentioned "Electric Warrior" to the cool kids.
London was 45 miles away by train, and that was the real Mecca of music for us, but at 14 years old getting there was an expedition (we did take one trip just to visit the Virgin import shop in Marble Arch - just about the only source of Krautrock at the time). In 1972 I saw Pink Floyd at Wembley Pool performing The Dark Side Of The Moon - hours spent listening to Meddle and Ummagumma hadn't prepared me for that - it blew me away. Later "expeditions" to London were to buy albums and Sci-Fi books from the many record & book stores around Soho, Totenham Court Road and Oxford Street. Carnaby Street was crass commercialised shadow of its former self by 1973, but still we'd visit the head shops looking for hippy clothes, loons and scoop-neck shirts and being approached by weirdo's asking if we "wanted to score"...
[I was never into drugs and still aren't, though beer, cheap wine and cigarettes were not a problem, however I saw plenty of it at the time (weed makes me sneeze uncontrollably). For me music was never about drugs, music was the drug, regardless of how high the artist may have been when they recorded it.]
Reading through the posts in this thread has reminded me of one source "deleted" music that was available to us - that was a warehouse type store just off Oxford Street that sold American Imports - these were bin-end remainders that hadn't sold in the US so were shipped over en-mass to the UK and sold a ridiculously cheap prices. These were instantly recognisable for being made of really thick cardboard and usually having one corner of the sleeve clipped off or a ¼" hole stamped through the corner - if I recall correctly my entire Bo Hansson collection and first Philip Glass albums were from this store, as was Tim Blake's Crystal Machine (though I think I perhaps bought that in a similar store in Edinburgh much later).
1974/5 began my obsession with The Enid - I followed them around the home-counties, bought everything they released and joined The Enid Appreciation Society - I was at their make-or-break gigs at the Round House and The Hammersmith Odean, but still the best gigs of theirs I attended were at smaller venues and college Student Union bars in Bedford, Cranfield, Northampton and Leicester.
By 1975 we had transport, my friend Steve bought a huge 6 cylinder Vauxhall Cresta off my Dad and that was our taxi out of the sticks and into music venues further afield, with Friar's Club in Aylesbury being our main port of call - here we saw Peter Gabriel on his first solo tour.
Edited by Dean - September 02 2011 at 06:15
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What?
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Slartibartfast
Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam
Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29630
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Posted: September 01 2011 at 18:23 |
I was heavily into prog in high school. Had long hair and was a bit of a loner because I didn't smoke cigarettes so I didn't hang out with the freaks, wasn't in with the jock crowd, closest to the nerd crowd probably. There was a bigger set of prog fans amongst my brother's friends (about three years older) so they became my best friends. I got to see concerts in venues that I was too young to be in due to being under booze age. Then when I was 18 it got bumped up in two stages so I was always behind until I hit 21. I saw King Crimson on the Discipline tour and got a shirt, which I wore to school frequently. I remember a substitute teacher for one class thinking it was a Satanic thing on the front.
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Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened... 
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verslibre
Forum Senior Member
Joined: July 01 2004
Location: CA
Status: Offline
Points: 18576
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Posted: September 01 2011 at 16:13 |
TODDLER wrote:
Slartibartfast wrote:
Maaaan, it was horrible, we all had to grow long hair, smoke a lot of dope, call each other "man", wear tie-die t-shirts and bell-bottom blue jeans. |
Oh God I hated that stuff. Except for the hair. I didn't mind having long hair in the early 70's. However the Baptist did. During the 70's they created a vision of Hell for me. Hell was the place you went if you had long hair, smoked weed, and listened to what was better known then as "Hard Rock". |
Hilarious. Now think of all the tattooed, shaven-headed types churches embrace. And all anyone wanted to do in the '70s was zone out and trip out! |
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