Yes and 'How Do You Listen To Prog?'

I actually really like "tales from topographic oceans", even though it's really kind of indefensible in a lot of ways - it's overlong and unfocussed in many places, the playing lacks the crispy dynamic feel of their earlier albums, the whole "concept" is a bit flakey, and so on. I don't think the record's actually great in itself, but there are so many great bits on it, that I really enjoy listening to it.

"Going for the One" is pretty cheesy in a lot of places, I think, but the two tracks where they used the swiss cathedral organ ("parallels" and "awaken") I really like. I wish they'd used it a bit more. "Awaken" I love, I think it's the last really great track they did - "Owner of a Lonely Heart" and all that stuff I like just fine, but you don't, like, inhabit the musical landscape like you do w/say "close to the edge". In "Awaken", it's the whole section where the song breaks down to just the harp and pipe organ, then it builds and builds from there that gets me. Put it up on some decent speakers, nice & loud, and it's just fukcing great.

The new yes remasters are really good, I must say. They seem to have proper dynamics, not maximised like the omd and simple minds re's i got recently, the sound is nice & crisp, the bonus cuts aren't great for the most part, but they are generally interesting at least, and the packaging is nice. They made me happy!

No it isn't. Let's see - Neu: songs all on one chord (E usually); all in 4/4 time (no variation allowed); solos (none to speak of); virtuosity and technique (irrelevant). Not really much like Yes then.

I have to admit, I really love the sound of the full-fledged pipe organ when it's placed outside of the usual, expected context (church music, etc.). One of my favorite tracks by the Incredible String Band is "Antoine," which is just church organ, violin, and vocals...excellent arrangement.

On CD it's just called Spheres and only four relatively mellow cuts have been retained.

Prog?

As for prog, what's Over by Peter Hammill like? Of all the stuff he's done, this is what I'm most curious about.

That's "Ginasteria," coming soon to a store near you! Be on the lookout for the first single: "Pour Some Melody on Me"!

It's pretty good but more of a "song" album than a "prog" album - it's also one of the most miserable, self-obsessed, self-absorbed albums I've ever heard, all about his marriage breaking up

http://www.pepsi.com/music/shakira/wallpapers/wallpapers.php?wp=white_hot_800

Stewart - nothing yet. I've been sidetracked by one of those intensive Bowie binges that happens once every couple of years. I will prob get 'The Yes album' and 'Yes' at the weekend. Maybe a King Crimson or a Caravan or something if I can get them cheaply.

PROGMETHEUS UNBOUND
a provisional cartography of progward tendencies through the last 40 years of music; a prototype taxonomy of prog substyles, prog-adjacent musics, and post-1976 prog sprog genres.

Some may quibble with some of his classifications, but I thought his conclusions were eminently reasonable and level-headed.

Haha, I notice he hasn't gotten to Henry Cow and Art Bears yet. Points for trying though! Also points for recognizing Virgin Records' importance, not just for prog necessarily, but for experimental rock in general.

Actually it reads pathetically like some indie kid trying pretend he's like really really down with hip hop - or else a middle aged music journalist struggling to come to terms with the latest trends in hipster in-car entertainment

"The other thing is that of course an awful lot of not-at-all-awful music after punk fits some or many of those ‘progressive’ parameters. So the cartography above treats ‘prog’ as as a suffix or prefix, something that through hyphenation can come into surprising proximity with things we love. For some, maybe most still, it’s a contaminant, a worrying tendency, something to ward off with punky/indie-rock squeamishness. It’s really weird how long the reflex has persisted, with presumably less and less first-hand contact with the stuff as the years go by."

i thought some of his list was funny, other bits provoked puzzlement/surprise/sputtering (Bill Nelson's Red Noise? wtf?)
but also a few thought-provoking bits eg FGTH's 'Liverpool' album => all that Trevor Horn & ZTT hugeness => if that album is going to be in there then Propaganda's 'A Secret Wish' seems fairly qualified too - which is not something i imagine some of ILM might feel comfy with (and Morley is then in guilt-by-association with ZTT-Prog up to his neck)

in general though it seems a bit strained - i was just waiting for a '*' reference of 'the bassist used to wear flared trousers'

i like what (little) i've read of SR over the past yr or 2 - i maybe had stopped reading music papers by the time he was a journo cos i don't remember him - and the last section is interesting....BUT:
mellotrons != 'gauche and clumsily overblown gestures in quest of sophistication and high art stature' !
mellotrons were beautifully artificial/awkward/unworldy/delicate sounding - i don't associate 'sophistication' with the kind of phrasing/articulation generally needed on an instrument with a such an unweildy response/sustain/recovery time !

Can withdraw this extraordinarily twattish remark? No? Well I tried, ha ha.

I haven't read anything by Simon Reynolds for years - his compulsion to always stay ahead of the pack got to me after a while.

Yeah, Dada is pretty OTM here. He's pretty good at making up some cute lists, but doesn't have anything interesting to say. It's like he's trying to shout, "hey I like this rock stuff too!" after years of blathering on about his precious white label garridge blah blah etc. He even claims to like the White Stripes now (after some post earlier this year where he claimed he didn't even need to listen to them. Whatever. Nobody comes to you Reynolds to learn anything about rock music anyway. It's not like he's going to write a post that parses out the differences between Hackett and Howe's guitar styles or something. He should probably go back to his beloved electronic music; as it is, he's kind of making himself look silly.

Dleone totally OTM about the omission of Cuneiform. I mean, come on.