Unknown Soldier

Good point, as the idea is to generate discusssion and hopefully listen to albums that you might not know very well. To be honest, most of the albums that are put up in the "Album Wars" are usually considered great or classic albums of their genre. I`ve not actually seen an album here that I would say was crap.

I can see though, that a lot of people who are not overly into prog rock not going with Genesis here (Gabriel era Genesis was brilliant but also very peculiar) and their early 70`s sound was extremely whimsical as opposed to the bombastic style of Yes. A better match up probably would`ve been Genesis v Jethro Tull here.

boo boo

I guess so. Most prog bands were very whimsical and humorous, the idea that prog bands have no sense of humor is definitely one of the most horrifically inaccurate stereotypes about the genre.

Yes were very serious in their approach and never really joked around at least lyrically, they did musically show a sense of playfulness though. But most prog bands were very whimsical on both a lyrical and musical level.

Gabriel era Genesis had a pretty notoriously surreal sense of humor. You really think all that stuff about giant hogweeds, slippermen and yellow plastic "Shoobedoobes" was meant to be totally serious?

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Unknown Soldier

To take it a step further, most prog bands seemed to always have a light hearted track on some of their albums anyway, which often could`ve been seen as a filler, when in fact it was just a humorous interlude. A good example of this is "Jeremy Bender" from ELP Tarkus album. Not sure where this humorous trend started, but it was certainly around before the prog explosion of the early 70`s, I seem to remember a number of 60`s bands like Cream having humorous interludes as well "Mother`s Lament" from Disreali Gears another example. As for Yes having a sense of humour............well one look at Steve Howe`s face could easily dispel that idea.

The surrealism of the Gabriel era Genesis is something very special, something the band could never quite replace once he upped and walked out. I would go as to say, the only other British artist that rivalled Gabriel in terms of pure talent in the 70`s was Bowie.

debaserr

interludes = filler

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boo boo

Bullsh*t. Literature needs interludes and it's what ties things together and gives the reader time to process certain parts of the theme and story in their minds. Classical composers often considered them one of the most important parts of a composition as it segues on part of a classical piece to another. Films need interludes to provide breathers otherwise they will get criticized for being too fast paced and noisy.

A song not being a goddamn 3 minute verse/chorus/verse singalong rock anthem doesn't translate to being a bunch of wank and I'm ****ing tired of people spouting that bull****.

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Unknown Soldier

Interludes= Break in ideas.
Filler= Padding the sandwich out.

boo boo

That's why I'm glad that Genesis never tried to replace him. The element he brought to the band was gone when he left but Genesis were smart enough to not try and imitate it. As much as I love the Gabriel stuff I do find the Phil stuff to be very underrated, the two Hacket albums are great and in fact Trick of the Tail is in my top 5 Genesis albums. The band did lose something special when Hackett left also, but Duke/Abacab/Genesis is a very strong trilogy of pop albums that prog fans unfairly discredit just because it's "not prog" and because "Gabriel and Hackett are gone". Pretty stupid reason to write off something that's even not attempting to relive the glory days.

I definitely disagree with people who think Gabriel WAS the band, Genesis were always an esemble group meaning every member counts and even when they lost Gabriel and Hackett and adopted a more pop structure that stayed true until their sound got REALLY watered down in the mid 80s and overly Phil oriented.

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Unknown Soldier

Those albums came out when just about every prog group was putting out pop/rock stuff anyway or if they didn`t they were dying.

I don`t know what prog era Genesis fans were complaining about anyway! They could`ve listened to Marillion, whose debut album "Script For A Jesters Tear" turned back the clock 10 years anyway and sounded like Gabriel era Genesis.

boo boo

Pop Genesis still beats prog Genesis wannabes by my book.

About prog bands going pop in the 80s. How many were successful at it? King Crimson bordered on pop at that time but not without rejecting prog elements, they never went totally pop. Going totally pop gave Yes ONE commercially successful album followed by some epic failures. And going pop pretty much destroyed Gentle Giant and ELP.

But Genesis goddamn pulled it off. They were the only band that made the transition, suceeded at it and stayed successful for longer than one album. And yet of all the prog bands that get hate for going pop Genesis get it the most just because they were the one that was really f*cking good at it. Maybe because it's easier to forget all the miserable failures their other favorite prog bands made at going pop?

Prog fans really get me with their passionate anti-pop fetish.

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Unknown Soldier

One group quickly spring to mind and that is Rush whose "Grace Under Pressure" is one of my favourite pop/rock albums of the 80`s and were equally succesful before and after that release. Saying that with guitarists such as Lee, Leifson and drummer Peart they certainly knew how to rock and shake up the opposition.