I mean I didn't even like prog for the longest and aside from the prerequisite Pink Floyd and Rush songs on the radio probably the first prog I ever heard was In the Court of the Crimson King, because of course it was.

The first prog I heard - at least in terms of full length albums - was probably Dream Theater tbh. It may or may not have irrepairably damaged my view of the genre.

It would definitely explain why you can't stand the vocals. Or it might espouse that you only listen to genre tags, idk.

James LaBrie is bubonic plague in vocal form. I don't know anything else than that.

You've got the real reason. And please bear with me, I'm still in therapy over it.
:(

Wouldn't a dog or dolphin or whatever be better for therapy?

I'm unsure how well fish or canines are skilled in psychotherapy. I'm not sure I'd give my money to one.

canine therapy > ursine therapy

incisor therapy>>>>>>>>

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...inyl_Cover.jpg
Lizard (1970)

Looks like Crimson managed to release two albums in one year six years before Genesis did the same, though at this point it seems Greg Lake has ****ed off to become the “L” in ELP, so we're left with a guy whose singing I have to say I don't much dig. Well, we'll see how he his. This is what they call a transitional album, they tell me.

1. Cirkus (Including Entry of the Chameleons): Starts off deceptively slow and relaxed but quickly kicks into life, and reminds me again very much of VDGG. Some really nice horns and what sounds like orchestral strings here. Pretty decent track but I wouldn't be raving about it.

2. Indoor Games: I may have pinpointed – at least with this album – why I'm finding it a little harder to get into Crimson than I expected, and it hinges on those jazzy horns. VDGG use this style a lot too, and though I do like them, there are a lot of their albums I can't get into because they're too jazz-slanted for me. This song is just ok, nothing special. A bit boring if I'm perfectly honest. The stupid laughing at the end is particularly annoying.

3. Happy Family: More discordant jazz, god damn it. I really do not like this guy singing. What's his name? Oh yeah: Gordon Haskell. Well, **** him. I've yet to hear anything on this album that's going to make me like it. At best this is a meh but it's verging towards a Hate.

4. Lady of the Dancing Water: At least we finally get a ballad, which is nice, but what the **** is with Haskell? It's like listening to a Gumby try to sing. Hope he ****ed off after this album. I doubt I'm going to enjoy anything here, even this, when the enormous drag factor of his singing has to be taken into account.

5. Lizard (a) Prince Rupert Awakes (b) Bolero – the Peacock's Tale (c) The Battle of Glass Tears (i) Dawn Song (ii) Last Skirmish (iii) Prince Rupert's Lament: This multi-part suite runs for a total of twenty-three minutes and change, and I assume took up the second side of the album, and I have to admit it's speaking to me a whole lot more than anything on this record previously. Maybe it can be salvaged after all. Yeah, this is not only streets but city blocks ahead of what has gone before. Much of that is, to be fair, down to the fact that most of it is instrumental so I don't have to listen to Haskell, though again to be fair, when he did sing on the opening part he wasn't bad. I prefer Lake though. As far as this track (side?) and the rest of the album go though, night and day.

Result: I'd have to say a pretty damn big disappointment. Although the second side/epic suite/last track saves the album, up to that point there's nothing really there for me. At all. The last track is good, but more in a sort of “at least it's not as bad as the rest of the album” way rather than a “**** me how have I been missing this for so long?” kind of way, which is what I'm pretty much still waiting for. Bar the debut, of course.

http://www.trollheart.com/speed4.jpg

Fake prog fan.

Fake president.

#fakeheart

TH may not get very deep into King Crimson, but he'll raise hell with the sides.

Hahaha

Once TH disappoints the forum with King Crimson I say he disappoints us with Can and Magma.

Can are too sacred for that.

#fakegrind
I say you disappoint us all with your life.

Well so far we've had an album that apparently even Fripp himself hated (until Steven Wilson came to save the day, it says here) and now one that is seemingly the weakest of their career up to this point. Don't think this one is going to change my current mindset on them, but let's give it a go anyway.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ped_Cover.jpeg

Islands (1971)

1. Formantera Lady: Came and went without leaving the slightest impression on me. Boring as all hell.

2. Sailor's Tale: A little better, bit of excitement in it, but still nothing much to get excited about.

3. The Letters: Starts off very low-key and quiet, then explodes into a VDGG hornfest (oooer!) but it's still not gripping me. Yawn.

4. Ladies of the Road: A boring, annoying attempt at hard rock on an album that doesn't quite know what it wants to be.

5. Prelude: Song of the Gulls: Nice little almost classical instrumental, the first track on this album I've given a **** about. Very enjoyable. Beautiful, in fact. A welcome respite from the tedium this album is weighing me down with.

6. Islands: Okay this is also very nice. I'm not wild about this third vocalist either (seems he, and everyone else, left after this album anyway) but the sax from Mel Collins is very easy on the ear, and it's a really nice relaxing tune.

Result: Basically pretty disappointing, though reading about it I had kind of expected this. Nothing will bring me back to this album again, so currently we're at a 2/2 split in terms of albums by King Crimson that I liked and didn't like. I see though that what is apparently widely accepted as the trilogy of their best work is up next, so maybe things will take an upswing. At the moment, they couldn't drop any further.

http://www.trollheart.com/speed3.jpg

^Band?

Oh
Nvm.

I serached for songs from that album on Youtube and found Sailor's Tale. I like it allright so far. The drumming is epic!

Maybe I'm an anomaly. Nothing really since the debut has clicked for me. So far. It's not that it's bad, per se, just kind of meh what's the big deal?

Seventies highlights are Red an Larks Tongues.

I've liked everything up to and including Discipline (1981) so far. I'm sure I'm not nearly as into them as Frownie since I'm a prog and jazz noob dunce, but they manage to meld rock and jazz in a way that expresses the coolness of both and they did it seemingly without missing a beat at least for the entirety of the 70s. And not liking those horns is grounds for banning afaic.

Okay well we'll see.
Meh

I think this may be part of the problem. I've never mentioned it before, but I don't care for jazz. So any band, especially a prog one, who uses it in their music is going to have a hard sell to me from the get-go. This is also why I often find VDGG hard to get into. I'll have my prog sans jazz, please.

If I ever go to Ireland I'm getting TH drunk on guinness and writing that on his forehead.

wtf

Apparently the entire forum can agree that Trollheart is a piece of ****.

http://www.trollheart.com/BBT1.png
Artist: Big Big Train
Am I familiar with this artist? Somewhat
Subgenre(s): Neo-prog, Crossover Prog (?)
Nationality English
Linked with: Marillion, Spock's Beard, IQ, Jadis
Lineup: (Current)
David Longdon – Lead Vocals, Flute, Electric Guitars, Mandolin, Celesta, Lute, Piano, Banjo, Synthesisers, Percussion
Greg Spawton – Bass Guitars
Nick D'Virgilio – Drums and Percussion, Backing Vocals
Dave Gregory – Guitars
Rikard Sjöblom – Keyboards, Electric Guitars, Backing Vocals
Danny Manners – Keyboards, Double Bass
Rachel Hall – Violin, Viola, Cello, Backing Vocals
Robin Armstrong – Guitars, Keyboards

(Past)
Ian Cooper – keyboards (1991-1995, 1999-2004)
Steve Hughes – drums (1991-1998, 2002-2009
Martin Read – lead vocals (1991-2003)
Andy Poole – bass guitar (1990–2018), keyboards (2004–2018), guitars (2012–2018)
Tony Müller – keyboards (1995-2003), vocals (1999-2003)
Pete Hibbit – drums (1998-1999)
Phil Hogg – drums (1999-2002)
Sean Filkins – lead vocals (2003-2009)
Active From: 1991
Active To: still active
Albums: 10 at time of writing, plus six compilation or live albums and 8 EPs
Comparable to: Early Genesis, Van der Graaf Generator, Marillion, Pendragon


Although Marillion are generally agreed to have been the natural successors to Genesis (at least, seventies Genesis), like their heroes they too changed with the departure of their frontman, and moved away from real prog rock and into a more mainstream rock arena. But if anyone can be said to be the real inheritors of Gabriel and Co's crown, then you could make a good case for Bournemouth's Big Big Train. Not only did they emulate the pastoral, gentle sounds of early Genesis albums, and still do, but they typify that quintessentially English feel that albums like Trespass, Nursery Cryme and Foxtrot, to say nothing of Selling England by the Pound, brought to the genre in the early seventies.

Unlike either band, Big Big Train did not sign to a major label for their first release, putting out demos and recordings of their own before being snagged by Giant Electric Pea, though the band would create their own record label – Treefrog, later to be changed to Electric Recordings. Also unlike the other two bands mentioned, BBT have had in the double figures of members over the last two decades, and currently play as a octet, utilising such prog staples as violin, flute, mandolin, celesta and, um, lute.

The only members to remain current are the two founders, Greg Spawton and Andy Poole, although very recently (January was the announcement) the latter decided to leave the band. No reason given, but the split appeared to be amicable. Which leaves Spawton as the original Fat Controller, if you will, the co-founder and the only one to continue this particular train journey into 2019.
http://www.progarchives.com/progress...4221362007.jpg
Although their first proper album would not see the light of day until the following year, Big Big Train released their first, self-financed demo album, From the River to the Sea the previous year. Very impressive for a demo, it boasted twelve tracks and ran for just short of an hour. The only video I can find of it is the full album, so here it is. You can hear how raw the production is,but for a self-produced, recorded and financed album it's really not that bad.


Their second demo album – more an EP really – only contained seven tracks and was released a year before their debut album. The Infant Hercules (couldn't really be anything other than a prog record with a title like that, eh?) showcased their new drummer, Steve Hughes, who would be a mainstay until 2009.

Signing to Giant Electric Pea in 1994, BBT unleashed their debut album on the world, where it took pretty much nobody by storm, though it did receive positive reviews among the prog rock community. The album featured guest appearances from members of Galahad, Jadis and IQ, which at least showed that established prog bands were interested in what BBT were doing.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._Age_Steam.jpg

Interestingly, though Goodbye to the Age of Steam was completed in a mere six months, the next album would take three times that long. I guess that's a good thing, because these things shouldn't be rushed, and the time taken showed when English Boy Wonders hit in 1997. A longer album, with a lot more thought put into it, it continued the Genesis influence but added others to allow a sort of soft rock sentiment to pervade their music.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...oy_Wonders.jpg

This album would see the departure of drummer Steve Hughes, though he would return for the fourth album. Before that, Big Big Train ponied up the cash to build themselves a studio, a move that would repay them later, and began work on their third album. This took another five years, and resulted in the deceptively-simply-titled Bard, which mixed very very short tracks of often less than a minute with two epics, one of which ran for fourteen minutes, the other for sixteen. Having been dropped by their label due (presumably) to poor sales of their first two albums, BBT set up their own and released this on the new Treefrog Records.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...Train_Bard.jpg

This would see the departure of original vocalist Martin Read, after a decade with the band, to be replaced by Sean Filkins on the next album, which would be a concept album of sorts. Based on the Battle of Britain, Gathering Speed was out two short years later, and remains one of BBT's best-loved albums.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ring_Speed.jpg

Their fifth album could perhaps be described as Big Big Marillion's Beard, as members of both Marillion and Spock's Beard played on it, one in particular, Nick D'Virgilio, saying on to play with the band for another albums. This was also the first time BBT would use brass and strings on their albums, culminating in a five-piece brass band and a permanent violin player joining their ranks.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ce_Machine.jpg
Around this time the boys changed the name of their record label to English Electric, which would in fact end up being the title of two more albums, as well as a compilation. This would also be the last album with Sean Filkins as vocalist,and he would be be replaced by David Longdon, a Gabriel clone if ever there was one.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...rfall_Yard.jpg
A strange little album, The Underfall Yard consists of only six tracks, one of which runs for twelve and a half minutes, while the closer clocks up almost twenty-three. Not much chance of releasing singles from that then! Lucky they were by now on their own label, and so there was no such pressure on them.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._One_cover.jpg
With a three-year break in between, the period from 2012 up to this year became something of a flurry of activity for BBT, with no less than five albums released over five years. English Electric Part I and English Electric Part II followed each other within a year, released in 2012 and 2013 respectively and then came that three-year gap.

Oddly enough, at this point it seems both albums were jointly released on Big Big Train's own English Electric label and the original Giant Electric Pea. I assume some deal was made, but I'm not privy to the details. Three years further on and it seems the guys have embraced the vinyl resurgence, as Folklore was released on, among others, CD, digital download and double-LP vinyl. Having had more than enough songs left over from this album, BBT had planned to release an extra EP, but this in fact grew into a full-fledged album, Grimspound, which was released the following year. The album, their tenth, secured for them their very first ever placing in the charts, even if it was only number 45.

Not happy with releasing so much already, BBT reworked much of the material from the last two albums and it became, along with some new material, their, to date, latest recording, The Second Brightest Star, released last year, 2017.

Final Conclusion: As I said at the opening of this piece, Big Big Train are worthy successor's to both Genesis and Marillion's throne, now that the former are to all intents and purposes no longer active and the latter have changed their sound away from true prog rock, and if you want to hear what Genesis might have been like had Gabriel stayed, or if Fish had not left Marillion, put on a BBT album. Any album; they're all good.

Result: :)

I'll be damned if TH steals my well earned title.

Do you drop only one turd in the bowl?

No.

Then your position is secure.

Sweet!

Coming Soon...
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon....pL._SY355_.jpg
In Search Of Hawkwind
Trollheart Gets Into It, But Not Out Of It.

All right, here's the thing. If I continue as I am, and listen to King Crimson, or, as intended, Hawkwind's discog, I end up duplicating work, as I'm currently deep into my History of Prog, and both of these of course feature. So I need to stay away from at least the seventies.

So here's what I propose.

A sort of love or hate thing but on prog albums only. No discographies (at least, not yet) and no album before, let's say, 1979. Other than that I'll take suggestions for anything with a progressive rock or progressive metal tag, and if I've heard it before I'll review it anyway. I'll continue to review in my LorH style, track by track, and I'll do one album per member at a time.

So, who wants to start? Hello? Hello? Ground control to....
:shycouch:

Psychotic Waltz - Into The Everflow