The much loved and hated ELP

NaturalScience wrote: micky wrote: No Pat.. .the whole point is the group didn't have a keyboardist when they composed  GoD and large parts of the album.    The whole group dynamic had changed.. the sound...  not because of the lack of wakeman... but of  not having a keyboardist in the band.   Moraz was brought in ...well into the sessions for the album.  I still think Moraz was an integral piece of the sound even if he didn't contribute compositionally.  He did a great job - that isn't to say they couldn't have found someone else who would, but that someone would not have been Wakeman - he couldn't wrap his head around what they created, whether that was a polite way of saying he hated it and thought it was sh*t, I don't know.

Wakeman ...like Bruford before him.. thought Yes had milked the cow of exteneded compostions dry.  He  came back for the GFTO sessions when they got back to working on 'songs' again... Awaken not withstanding.   I mean... as brilliant as GoD was from a technical .. a 'playing' standpoint.  What happened when you removed Wakmans compositional genius from the equation is Anderson took over.. and the result... GoD is a souped up version of an early Floyd song.  Nothing new at all.  Both Bruford and Wakeman were right... 

that is very true about Moraz... he did bring a jazzier side that Wakeman didn't have,.. .that is much more evident in live recordings ... his  take on the TFTO material  is pretty damn cool.  Again though... I'll stick to my guns though .. that Yes was always Yes.. with the vocal harmonies and Squires Bass...  those were the true integral parts of the Yessound.  Wakeman and others were replaceable and the sound shifted only slightly.. usually  only through the stylistic variances of  the player.  Those two things though. .are what defined Yes's sound. 

The Moraz situation doesn't make for the best analogy. I think you hear a huge difference between Bill Bruford and Alan White though. Bruford swings much harder, Alan White is a great drummer but not much swing to him.

ES335 wrote: The Moraz situation doesn't make for the best analogy. I think you hear a huge difference between Bill Bruford and Alan White though. Bruford swings much harder, Alan White is a great drummer but not much swing to him.

ES335 wrote: profanatio wrote: Emerson is unquestionably the greatest multi keyboard player to ever live   Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul make Keith Emerson look like Billy Joel.

Hey Billy Joel is actually a very accomplished classical player, but I get your point.

There was once a poll on here that pitted Emerson vs Chick Corea and 80% said Emerson would wipe the floor... I can not even type it, it is so absurd. Let me try again - wipe the floor with Corea.

It is peoples obsession and Emerson's own ego that turn people off. Did they do classical compositions? Well yes, but not too impressive compared to how they boasted.

Simple rock versions of mid level complexity compositions, that were way dumbed down. I still say cool when I hear it, but I never took them that seriously.

Oh and to the person who said that the great classical composers were hissed at in their day. That for the most part is simply not true and is actually quite the opposite from what really was going on. Mozart and Bach were defiantly not scorned because of their ability or compositional complexity. Also Emerson is a darn good rock player, but not a good classical composer or a top notch player (average at best ).

The one thing I do agree with is that they brought classical type music to the masses (though some of it made me cringe). Its sometimes had to believe that the Classical form was popular music for many years (and still is in many parts of the world) but at that time 70's it was not for anyone under 30. So when ELP came out and 16 year old kids were talking about Bach (although in an altered form) I thought it was a good thing.