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Old 06-19-2003, 07:12 PM
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spedblavio spedblavio is offline
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The early years (7-11ish): parents didn't have a lot of recorded music at home, but were both involved in music in their younger years. A couple albums I recall liking from this period:

Simon & Garfunkel Bridge over Troubled Water (I still like them; have Bookends on CD, don't listen to it much though)

Don Ellis Orchestra Live at Monterey - my mom was into jazz, I even saw Don Ellis and his band at a jazz club in the late 60's I think. This was a key exposure for me, and I'll bet a lot of folks around here might like this. It's the "progressive rock" of big band jazz. Don't let "big band" scare you, this is complex intellectual jazz that rocks and swings and does it in complex meters like the "classic" 19 beats per measure (the piece is called "332221222" for the way the beats are counted). Highly recommended (if you're not completely averse to jazz) and available on CD.

The first album I owned personally, and the next significant "landmark" was the soundtrack from 2001: A Space Odyssey. I was a huge fan as a young lad (10 or 11?) when it came out. Still am.

A cousin's copy of Tarkus was the next significant exposure as an early teen visiting relatives. A real fluke as he wasn't any sort of prog rock fan; don't know what he was doing with it. This was probably about the time it came out.

As I began to acquire recordings and a taste of my own, I had some early stuff: Carly Simon, Leon Russell, Elton John... I wasn't there yet.... later I joined a record club and got a little more hip: Uriah Heep, Moody Blues, then Yes, re-discovered ELP, Zeppelin, Tull, Pink Floyd...

But it wasn't until a met a friend, I was still in high school, he was just out, who had the good stuff, a huge collection of LPs and original San Francisco psychedelic posters covering his wall. Turned me on to Genesis, Gentle Giant, Henry Cow, Hatfield, Gong, Oldfield, ECM label jazz, Zappa, etc, etc, etc and on and on from there I go still.

The 80's were a bitch though. And frankly I'm still not terribly impressed with a lot of the current new "progressive rock". But here and there I'm finding some things around the edges that are interesting (Krakatoa's We Are the Rowboats is one example).

After all these years my tastes have broadened beyond strictly prog rock quite a bit, more traditional jazz as well as hybrid stuff like Bill Frisell, Latin jazz and various South American styles and other "world" music and mixtures like Michael Brooks' stuff with Nusrat Fatah Ali Khan, Philip Glass, Steve Reich and other more obscure and not necessarily minimialist stuff, and various other good stuff. Still don't own any pop music to speak of, or folk/bluegrass music (though I'm getting closer to that via Frisell, and early Cockburn is very acoustic, sort of "progressive" folk, sophisticated, complex and jazzy), I enjoy classical but don't collect it. No punk, new wave, disco. No rap, goth or industrial.

Bruce Cockburn has been a favorite of mine (for his music and passionate expression; my spirituality and politics are not as specific as his), and I think a lot of his material has plenty to offer open minded prog rock fans.

I like some of Kit Watkins' stuff.

I've had a big resurgence in my appreciation and listening time for Yes lately, spurred by my discovery of Magnification and then acquisition of the Rhino remasters (I only had really bad probably 1st generation CDs before that), after pretty much losing touch with them throughout the 80's and 90's.

I'm kind of interested in some of King Crimson's real recent stuff, but haven't been attracted to the whole Thrak period. Loved most of their 80's stuff, truly the band that carried the flame and stayed both true to themselves and evolved during the 80's.

Anyway, classic prog still gets listened to a lot around here, and I'm discovering old stuff I'd forgotten or never knew. Canarios' Ciclos is a great discovery. I want to check out Moving Gelatine Plates and Cartoon. And I still need to get Soft Machine Third.

And so on.

Last edited by spedblavio : 06-20-2003 at 03:39 PM.
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