"Golden Prog Era" thread

 

In the US, things were exciting too - although not Prog as we know it, Country Joe and the Fish, Airplane et al were releasing exciting, experimental and progressive music - indeed, the "underground" scene put an emphasis on progressive music, and that's the sort of time the phrase "progressive rock" was used. I even found the first recorded use of the term on an album - albeit an album dated 1968 - although the term "progressive music" was much more common currency, as was "progressive blues".

 

- and then, of course, there were the leading lights - the Beatles' Sgt Pepper, Beach Boys' Pet Sounds, Dylan's Highway 61 and the evolution of the Byrds' sounds.

 

All of these exciting developments came together to form Prog - so whether you want to consider the "Golden Era" as starting at the point at which it got into full swing (1970-71), it's true "birth" (1969 - ITCOTCK) the gestation period (67-9) - or even it's inception (1965, when Dylan went electric at Newport - or possibly some earlier date, as many of the essential elements of Prog were put into place much earlier) - that's up to you.

 

In 1976-7, punk nearly killed Prog off, but for a few stalwarts (that was definitely the end of the "Golden Era") - but in 1980, it was revived, albeit in a comparatively minor way. Nevertheless, Marillion played their part, and it's largely thanks to them (and their frequent appearances at rock and metal festivals in the 1980s, not to mention their stubborn refusal to go away) that Prog and Prog Metal still exist as active forms of rock music and not just an entry in the history books.

 

But there really was an explosion of creativity in the early 70s with Yes (The Yes Album, Fragile & Close to the Edge), Genesis (Nursery Cryme, Foxtrot, Selling England and The Lamb), ELP (ELP, Tarkus, Trilogy, Brain Salad), Floyd (Meddle, Dark Side, Wish You Were Here, Animals) and Tull (Benefit, Aqualung, Thick as a Brick).  They all were released in a 5 year span, as well as some others already cited.

 

Just prior to that, the Moodys had a string of spacy albums and King Crimson had probably the first truly identifiable prog album.  What an amazing era.

 

 

 

Instruments like the Mellotron and Hammond play a large role in this, but the main thing is that back then everything was recorded analog, onto audio tape. Now everything is recorded digitally. You can do a lot of cool things with digital recording, but making a nice, warm sounding album apparently isn't one of them. If I was in a band and was seeking out a recording studio, I would seek out a retro studio. Digital recording gives vastly different genres a sameness to them. Pro Tools is Pro Tools and it doesn't matter as much what the physical environment of the studio is when you use it.

 

BRING BACK ANALOG RECORDING!!!!

The problem with too many recordings at the height of prog, was analog recording. Two track, four track, 8, 16 and so forth, rcording equipment - and every time bands/producers want to lay down more layers of recording that multi-track machine would allow. So analog recording was overlaid onto analog recording - increasing residual tape hiss; solutioncut back on the treble, with loss of some hiss and warmth, but not the full audio expereince as original heard in the studio. Then deliberate clipping or compression to ensure a 45 minute plus analog, electro-mechanical readable recording could get placed onto two sides of vinyl - when the optimum without  clipping, (so avoiding top and bottom end loss), was to have 15 minutes maximum a side. So with loss of the treble end, hey it is a more warmer sound. And then compression so AM and then certain poorer quality  FM radio stations could cope with broadcasting a recording - hey yet more warmth with frequency loss at one end and boost towards the bottom end. If you want an illustration of how bad these problems could be, check out Deep Purple's In Rock, in the pre-remastered and the remastered forms, the former is so muddy both on vinyl and cd. With the quality of the remaster semi-digital recordings nowadays may renders the original release unlistenable to a 21st century listener.

 

Finally, also remember that stereo format for pop and rock records was only standard from about 1968, and even then few folks (especially younger people) had stereo equipment this side of the Atlantic. And boy we did have to put up with some sh*t; why:

 

1. It was new technology - teething problems relating to scale of market.

2. Audiophiles (i.e. the middle aged and middle class) had their tastes catered for - and the record industry had distain for the growing youth market - hence best quality and attention went into serious music recordings and those labels calling thermselves 'audiophile series' - Decca was at first with stereo dreadful for rock, with the exception of the Moody's Days Of - which was issued originally on Decca audiophile label!

3. Quality of pressings, as indicated, was below parr, but when rock records started to shift in millions of units, the record companies got greedy and deliberately kept sub-masters on their presses long after these had started to wear and deteriorate. Hence poor pressings.

 

You make some valid points. I'm certainly not advocating a return to the equipment that Sgt Pepper was recorded on. However, the technology advanced in leaps and bounds between 1967 and the mid 70's. Heck, Sgt. Pepper would have sounded different if it had been recorded just a few years later as one can tell by the very different sound of the Abbey Road album. That said, I still think, oh, let's say Relayer, or Lamb Lies Down on Broadway or Dark Side of the Moon would not sound better if recorded on modern equipment.

 

And while Sgt. Pepper might sound better recorded on the same equipment as those 70's classics, it still might lose some of it's charm.