Music Banter - The Prog & Fusion Album Club

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- - The Prog & Fusion Album Club (https://www.musicbanter.com/prog-psychedelic-rock/49476-prog-fusion-album-club.html)

I just came across this finally lol, so I am wondering the same as Eric Generic? I would like to check it out.

Also I dont know if they have been mentioned but has anyone heard the prog band Alquin?

tore is taking a break. it seems like he didn't get a replacement for the time being.

Well, in lieu of Tore's taking off, I think we'll keep the PAFAC an open-source sort of thing where people can both suggest albums and create polls for those suggestions that generate the most interest.

For this coming week, I've got two suggestions for possible discussion-

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Soft Machine - Fourth (1971)

One of the original Canterbury bands and quite influential in the realm of jazz music in general, the Softs were a prodigious outfit that changed members quite often throughout the 70's, but were most well known in the earliest part of the decade for the talents of bassist Hugh Hopper, organist Mike Ratledge and drummer Robert Wyatt (who occasionally sang, but not often). Fourth was the last of the Softs' albums where this lineup was still intact, as well as being the final album featuring Wyatt. Not going to mince words, but there's a hell of a lot to like here, and it's as great a place as any to start for those who A. Don't know much about these guys or B. If you have even the most rudimentary interest in top class proggy jazz. Recommended!

or...

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http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_aoFDgPKFYz.../S660/ambrosia
Ambrosia - Ambrosia (1975)

What do you get when a bunch of Californian wannabe Beach Boys see King Crimson at a concert back in '72 and decide to follow suit? Before all that blue-eyed soul scthuffz like You're The Biggest Part Of Me, there was this little crossover gem: poppier and yet more muscular in places than most of America's often derivative and unspired prog-related music at the time, this self-titled debut has everything a proghead might want in a record: wicked instrumental chops coupled with vivid lyrical imagery, awesome songwriting and some muy excelente vocal harmonizing courtesy of frontman David Pack and the rest of the band. Besides all this, the proceedings are splendid on the production side of things as well: Alan Parsons, fresh off Pink Floyd's DSOTM, was behind the reins of this particular carriage, and the results are irrefutably grand.

Searching for an American prog. album that can rival the U.K.'s best? Have at ye!

I see this thread has stagnated while I was away, but I hope all interest in prog & fusion didn't die along with it! I'll give ressurrection a real attempt after my thesis has been turned in on the coming wednesday and I'll do so by posting a poll for which album should be the album for the week starting with the 6th of december.

I'll add the suggestions by Anteater here to the poll, but I'll of course accept other suggestions. Let's get this album club back on it's feet! :)

Homework poll for next week is up! :)

http://www.musicbanter.com/prog-psyc...next-week.html

It's working again :thumb: Also, very interesting suggestions for the homework. I had to think a little before voting. So that's good :)

Looking forward to this, my exposure to new albums has been woeful over the last while!

The votes are in. This week's homework album is Ambrosia!

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Originally Posted by Anteater

Adding it to the OP :) You know what to do!

Edit :

Also made a thread for Harmonium's album which was homework for week 34!

http://www.musicbanter.com/prog-psyc...on-1975-a.html

Oh man, I forgot about making the poll for this week!

Sorry guys :(

Is it okay if we extend the homework for Ambrosia by another week and then I get a new poll up for next week in a day or two?

Shower me with suggestions for albums btw!

I'll suggest :

Gong - Gazeuse! (1976)

http://www.oocities.com/henryviktorpetersen/gazeuse.gif

The core of Gong is, roughly speaking, a Canterbury band that plays psychedelic rock/prog about some guy's search for eastern type enlightment and which also include space travelling tea pots, clever metaphors for taking drugs and a certain kind of english humour .. or something along those lines. However, some side projects have budded off Gong that may not be described by those same things. Some time in the 70s, guitarist Daevid Allen said a wall of force prevented him to go on stage and left the band. Other core members left as well and the drummer Pierre Moerlen gained control of the band. What he did was turn Gong into a jazz fusion band and the debut of this line-up is Gazeuse!, also known as Expresso in America.

Although that might not sound like the best premise for a new album, the result is actually pretty sweet. Besides Moerlen, the album includes famous Canterbury guitarist Allan Holdsworth and early Magma bassist Francis Moze, among others. Something interesting about the album is the amount of percussion instruments dominating the sound, like vibraphone, marimba and glockenspiel. Together, they make for a very melodic album with a distinct sound not quite like anything else I've heard.

After a while, this line-up budded off the Gong band under the name "Pierre Moerlen's Gong", becoming an independent band project alongside the old Gong as Daevid Allen and his cronies were re-united. Thus this album could be regarded as Pierre Moerlen's Gong's debut rather than a Gong album. But anyways, those who are interested in fusion or have heard some of Gong's earlier material, but not this, should definetly check it out. Recommended!