Van der Graaf Generator

Geck0 wrote: Indeed.  The only KC you'll hear in VdGG are when Fripp guests for them and even then, they sound nothing like KC!  The closest they get to a KC sound is "Meurgly's III (The Songwriter's Guild)" from World Record.And I find it amusing how people like Killer.  Yet it's a great tune, but it's also not one of their best.  I guess it's easily accessable and more tuneful than most VdGG.  It seems this tune first draws people in.  I think it did with me as well.Killer now however isn't my favourite tune.I mean, come on "Fishes can't fly, fishes can't fly, neither can I, neither can I"!  It's Fish, Peter, not Fishes!Or maybe that was his point...

    
Well, just look at the title of the album.

I would agree that "Killer is not the best tune, but it's still pretty darned good. It's the entry point. I will always be grateful for that.

Geck0 wrote: Oh of course it's the entry point and I don't hate the track at all and I always love to hear it live.  I just have other tracks that I prefer over it.  Killer probably doesn't reach my top 5.  The sax in the middle is mindblowing though!My friend hates it though, she says it sounds like a 5 year old is playing it!  Grrr!!!!!!

I would tell her that it must be one talented 5 year old then.

I find it amazing that people say that Pawn Hearts is not suitable for newcomers to VDGG, it was my first (and currently only) VDGG album, I loved it on the first listen.

In your opinion the other albums are stronger throughout, Micky 

I wouldn't recommend Pawn Hearts as a starter though.  I still recommend going through them chonologically, as I feel if one listens to Pawn Hearts, then may feel disappointed with earlier works.  I'd prefer to love the early works and then get even more excited about later works!

It's like buying "Relayer" or whatever you feel is your favourite Yes album and then the person loving it so much, they feel disappointed with "The Yes Album", for example, because they've listened to the best album first.  They won't feel the same way about "The Yes Album" if they'd heard it before "Relayer".

Does that make sense?

My favourite album happens to be Still Life, but that album is completely different to H to He and Pawn Hearts, both of which I also rate as 5 stars.

I agree, H to He is an excellent starter album, although I still stay work through chronologically, to see how a band develops over time.  I try to do that as much as possible with bands with a large discography.

The Wizard wrote: avestin wrote: I never had problems with his voice, I liked them since the begining and my wife as well. She also says it reminds her a bit of David Bowie. My mother said the exact same thing.

My mother said he sounds like Alice Cooper.

I love the band.  Hammils voice is full of emotion and I like this.  So are his lyrics, though far out at times, which I enjoy also.  The rest of the band are extremely talented.  I like dark music at times.  The world isn't always full of happiness, joy, and light.  Sometimes I need to relate to the pain in my life and songs like "A House With No Door" really do it for me.  I actually get a positive release of pent up emotions or deppresion.  This is not to say its the only reason I listen to them.  I truly love their music and enjoy them.  The keyboards are awesome and so is the sax and flute.  What a band.  I'd stop trying to like them.  It sounds like you've given them well enough of a chance.  There's plenty of prog bands I don't like.  As you I gave them plenty of chances.  A band that comes to mind is Marillion.  I bought three of their Fish era albums and gave them many spins only to dislike them more and more.  I never listen to them now and that's ok. 

Tony Fisher wrote: I have just spent an evening listening again to Pawn Hearts and Godbluff, trying to work out why I never got into this band, hoping enlightenment would come. At the end, all I have concluded is that Hugh Banton is a very fine keyboards player, that Guy Evans is a talented drummer but that I really cannot stand the band's music at all and that Hamill's vocals are probably the worst of any prog singer I've heard. So what DO the band's fans see in them??? I'm missing it completely.

Re: Pawn Hearts,

Ah but Stonie, the sax is there for a reason.  The music is supposed to be dark and brooding and the subject matter is not cheery.  The sax portrays the desperation perfectly, in my opinion.  It's not cringeworthy to my ears!  It's as beautiful as the piano intro.