Moody Blues.

Dick Heath wrote:

NetsNJFan wrote: I agree, some of their stuff is bad, but you have to put it into historical context.  They were very much of the mid-'60s pop scene.  The fact that they made "Days of Future Passed", which still stands as one of the landmarks of Prog is amazing, considering it was 1967, a full 2 years before the advent of King Crimson.  That album was way ahead of its time and they should be credited for that. But i agree, after that their albums are too poppy mixed in with the good prog.  If they had continued in that highly pompous orhestrated vein I'd have been delighted.

 I was there, trying to flog that record when it was first released in the UK  - few people bought it. The Moody Blues had been a washed-up 1 hit wonder pop with Go Now (Denny Lane as the lead vocalist), still under contract to the mighty Decca Records label - the one that turned down the Beatles. During that period in the Uk the record companies were making the push to promote stereophonic records over monoaural. However, stereophonic reproduction gear was expensive and sold predominantly to the middle aged who weren't in rock'n'roll or pop, while the kids could just about afford a cheap mono player. I was one of the first teens locally  to a get a stereo player(probably a Dansette)  and that was the first cheap one offered on the UK market. Another problem, while classical and popular music got released both on stereo and mono (i.e. to the wealthy middle aged), there were many occasions when you couldn't get a stereo version for months after the mono LP was released - e.g. there was over a year's gap between the mono and stereo version of Mayall's 'Beano' Bluesbreaker album with Clapton, 8 weeks  between mono and stereo version of the Stones Aftermath (both Decca releases). Hence Days of Future was seen at the time as Decca  trying to break their Phase Four  stereo speciality label into the youth market but without frightening away the established  middle aged market, by using one of their popular studio orchestras (didn't they double up playing film scores at Pinewood Studios???) to accompany the group.
The album did not  initially sell in big numbers in the UK because it was first advertised to the typical Phase Four record buyer's market before the young music  fans - but our store got it in on sale or return deal. Most of us pop fans dismissed the album as a bad compromise and having few stand up songs. Nights In White Satin was the big hit but then as now clearly a tune with strong psychedelic overtones, and wasn't an edited version of Tuesday Afternoon a big hit in the USA (but not in their home country) - again supplying the summer of love with another anthem. The UK lost the Moodies for over a year, when they disappeared to the US to capitalise (successfully) on Tuesday Afternoon being a hit. And note when Yes were pressed by a producer to try strings and things on their second album Time & A Word, that got some strong negative reactions as well. While  orchestras seemed to work as accompaniment for folk singers (Simon and Garfunkel, David McWilliams, Al Stewart and so on), orchestras and pop/rock groups were not readily accepted -in that period. Exceptions were Nice and Deep Purple, but then specifically used for classical covers and the bands  own concertos.  I have problems thinking of any other (prog) bands from 1967 to 1975 that employed full orchestras - instead electronic keyboards were coming onto the marketplace enabling a few bands to sound like an orchestra (and of course  the mellotron  could provide the strings and flute effects, with increasingly unimaginative use of that instrument) but most bands would use electronic to sound very unlike an orchestra. And while the Moody Blues were away, they were temporarily forgotten (likewise that album) by most people and real ear-catching prog came in in the form of Krimson and Renaissance - both from a label respected by the youth record buying, public Island Records. As I've written before, ITCOTCK was sometimes said here in the UK during the late 60's to be the album the Moody Blues should have made but they lacked something to do it.

So  promoting of Days Of Future Past as being the first prog rock album, is much more to do with hindsight than what was thought when the record was first released. Precursor probably, fully fashioned progressive rock, no chance.
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Very Interesting....
I'm only 17, so I really don't have much hisotrical context on the subjct compared to you, but Days of Future Past is really the the first album (1967) besides classical music is my vast collection (about 730 cds) that i listen to regularly.  We still can't write off its extreme historical importance and ambitions, and that it is just a great album in general.

The most underrated band on this forum. No one ever talks about them.

FloydWright wrote: Here's my personal take, but this may or may not be accurate, and I invite people with more expertise in earlier music to set me straight if necessary. One of their first albums, Days of Future Passed, involved a live orchestra as well as some Mellotron. This is the album that I think really brought something new to the musical scene, especially given how good the sound was on it. That had to have been something almost entirely unprecedented for its time. After that, though, they never went back to actually using a live orchestra. They used a Mellotron to try to replicate the orchestra. This was one of the very first samplers, and while that was revolutionary as well, I think the execution had mixed results. When used as a backing instrument it could be very effective; when brought to the forefront, the limitations of the technology (I think) surely had to be evident even then. The other problem with the Moody Blues (to my mind) is a tendency to be lyrically and musically quite sappy and also to mix pure pop in with their records, right from the beginning. And in the most recent albums, they've deteriorated very, very badly into something that is almost pure pop...and not just pop, but like something you'd hear on the radio show Delilah. This is one of the reasons that I personally can't get into them very far, and I would be interested to know if it bothers other people. Comments?

They used orchestra on "Long Distance Voyager", although it was present only on some songs ("Talking out of turn", e.g.). Moody Blues is a band which has no mid-term: some people love it, others hate it. I have all their albums, and I agree with you: almost all of their work ater "The Present" is pure pop. But they still find a way to my CD player; at least it's good pop music and sometimes I like to hear it.

My fave album of theirs is the brilliant 'In Search Of The Lost Chord', though you can't go wrong with their first 7 albums.

I think the first person to use the mellotron was possibly Graham Bond in his great blues band The Graham Bond Organization, who had Dick Heckstall Smith, Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker, Jon Hiseman and Dick Heckstall Smith in his ranks. Graham didn't really use the mellotron in the same way or as much as The Moody Blues did though, and it was considered an unreliable instrument to use in 1965 (when Bond recorded his first albums) as it apparently went out of tune very easily.

Another album which I consider to be hugely influential on the development of symphonic prog was The Zombies' 'Oddesey And Oracle', which had extensive use of the mellotron and some excellent arrangements. Anyone who likes bands like Spring, Cressida, Czar etc. should listen in to this album too.