MP3s Gone - A Lament

Hey Will

That was a lot of bands on your list. And I'm familiar with, and like, a lot of them. Many of them, I came to know through Prog Archives. Some of my personal favorites, from what you mentioned are.....

Big Big Train

Echolyn

Haken

French TV

Riverside

Frost*

SKE

Freak Kitchen

Frogg Cafe

Helmet Of Gnats

Hiromi Uehara

Izz

Mike Keneally

The Psychedelic Ensemble

Allan Holdsworth

Cool to have some conversation with someone, that actually has some knowledge of these bands. From the ones I listed above, I would pick Haken, French TV, Riverside, SKE, Helmet Of Gnats, Hiromi, The Psychedelic Ensemble and Allan Holdsworth.

I have SKE's album "1000 Autunni" and like that a lot. I think SKE is the guy's nickname. And he has also done work under other names. From below, I think he was also the main composer in the bands Yugen and Not A Good Sign. So that may be of interest, for you to have a listen to those. If you like Hiromi, then it's very possible that you'll like Chick Corea. And you may also like Return To Forever, which Chick was the leader of. Chick was one of the original musicians that helped to establish fusion as a genre. And Helmet Of Gnats is also one of my personal favorites. Several years ago I saw Allan Holdsworth here in a small club, in Seattle. It's been a long time, since I did that so I really don't remember much about it. As you can see there's a big list of things I can recommend. I would recommend all of them, but I would endorse the top section of this list more. If you do pursue listening to any of this, then let me know. I'm also taking a look at your list, and will listen to some of those I haven't heard. Or those that I've heard, but haven't listened to for awhile. So it looks like we both have something good, to occupy some of our time. Talk with you later.

Al Di Meola.....................Elegant Gypsy, Casino, or Splendido Hotel

Return To Forever...........Romantic Warrior

Chick Corea....................The Ultimate Adventure

Porcupine Tree................In Absentia

David Torn.......................Cloud About Mercury

Dean Watson...................first 3 CDs

Mahavishnu Orchestra.....Birds Of Fire

Zentraedi.........................Seven Medley Sins

Yuval Ron & Residents Of The Future...........Residence Of The Future

Frank Zappa...................Apostrophe

Bubblemath....................Such Fine Particles Of The Universe

Facemeat.......................Questions For Men

Spiral Architect................A Sceptic's Universe

Ritual..............................Think Like A Mountain

Paul Schutze...................New Maps Of Hell

NeBeLNeST.....................First CD

Yugen..............................either Labirinto D'Acqua or Iridule

Tipographica....................God Says I Can't Dance

Advent.............................Silent Sentinel

Not A Good Sign..............Not A Good Sign

Chopper

Your reply is valid, for any bands that are still active. Those that are actively making new music or have recently released music.

But there are several bands, within almost every genre that are no longer active. They reached their peak in popularity in the past, but for some reason are no longer actively making new music. They may have lost interest in the "music industry", maybe there was a death in the band. Or there may be other reasons for no longer being active. But for some reason, there's still a strong interest in their music from fans. And because of the bands past reputation, this continues to cause some interest from new fans. But in this type of situation, the band isn't popular enough where a record company will do any type of distribution or promotion. And none of the band members have the means or interest to maintain any site for the music. The band may have some degree of a "cult" following. But even with this degree of interest, there's still no one that is willing to finance a site for this band's music.

This is the type of situation that I'm talking about. And with the past situation, where Prog Archives was featuring MP3s of bands. They were also trying to have it, where there was at least one MP3 for every band. So any new fan trying to know more about the band, would at least have some means for becoming familiar with that music. I think any music sample, that in some way represents a band, is better than no sample at all. At least it gives the new fan some reference, as to whether it's personally worth pursuing a further purchase. Because just blindly buying new music, without having some preview of it's value, can become really expensive and wasteful to any potential new fan. That's the type of situation I was trying to describe in my original post. And I can see now, that I didn't fully describe it then. And I hope this more clearly describes, what I was originally intending to say.

So then any person that still had a CD or other recorded music, of that specific band. Because they purchased that music, when it was current to that band's popularity. They could easily submit a couple MP3s of that music for Prog Archives posting. And this would solve that problem, of new fans wanting to hear what that band sounds like.

Moshkito

I understand and agree with a lot of what you've said in this conversation. In general, companies are becoming more and more restrictive about allowing free copies of their music to be available. And this is valid, because they and the bands they represent, really deserve some return on their investment. But the opposite side of that discussion is also valid. The "market" is saturated with so much music, that it can become a major time and money investment to find any new music to your liking. So it really helps when a company or band will offer some free listening, to give the potential new fan a chance to hear something before a purchase.

I think it's also true, that not every music sample fully represents the band's entire music output. But it does in some way give a clearer sense, of what the band is capable of doing in a music performance. And this is far better, than not knowing anything about that band's sound.

And you also spoke of what it was like to find new music in the 60s and 70s. The most common ways of doing that were radio, magazine or sometimes word of mouth. My personal coming-of-age time period, in music, was in the late 60s and early 70s. And I was always hungry for hearing new music. My music of choice at that time, was music that is now considered classic rock. And I can clearly remember subscribing to a magazine that reported on this genre.

Some of the great memories of that time, were reading about Kiss, Queen and Bad Company. At that time, these were all new bands no one knew about. I can recall reading about Kiss' first album sometime before it's actual release in 1974. That was exciting. Not much later, I bought that album and had it before most other people knew about them. I did the same with Queen's first album. And it was also exciting to read, about how all the members of Bad Company had come together. And all had been members of other bands, before forming Bad Company. And it was really interesting to know about these bands, before almost anyone else. And then watch them rise in popularity, to the broader level of success they later achieved. There was something really exciting about being able to see that progression.

I still have a strong appreciation for many of those classic rock bands. But my music interests have evolved through many different genre types since then. And even today, I continue to pursue finding new and interesting music.

Another way of finding new music back then, was hearing an obscure program on the radio. Back then, it was common for me to listen to a rock radio station KOMA broadcasting from Oklahoma City. Once a week, I think on Friday nights, there was a music program called "Beaker Street". And the host would play all different types of new rock music. At the time, that music was called "underground" music. It met the usual quality standards of the more popular rock, but just wasn't as well known. And some of those unknowns, would eventually rise to a greater popularity.

I just wanted to reply, about some of the things that you brought to this conversation. And to recognize you for some of the valid points that you spoke about.