The 500 Best Prog Albums - Ever!

[Toy Revolver]

Yeah like I said if you're a jazz fusion fan this is almost certainly for you. I'm not and it's not, but it certainly deserves its place in the list. Just, you know, not mine.

yeah - i respect that and i'm glad you can give such an objective write up - i've tried going through the prog archives systematically but i like following your reports a lot more

like the rush production thing (where i still maintain i know better than you why you do or do not like something) i have my theory on why this doesn't resonate with you outside of just being too heavily jazz fusion infused - and this might be another way of saying you don't like fusion but i think it's because they never settle on a theme or a hook - it's in constant flux - but besides the bass i think this is almost entirely prog and only like 5% jazz so to me it's not really fusion - but whatever - looking forward to the next one

[Guybrush]

Typical progheads to lay claim to fusion jazz and anything avantgarde even when there's no "rock" in sight

[Toy Revolver]

Typical progheads to lay claim to fusion jazz and anything avantgarde even when there's no "rock" in sight

i'm sick of the japanese appropriating white people appropriating the music of black people - and calling it "prog-fusion"

[Trollheart]

You know, fuck it: I'm going to do it even if I get into trouble.

It wouldn't be prog fusion, it would be plog frusion... 

[Toy Revolver]

You know, fuck it: I'm going to do it even if I get into trouble.

It wouldn't be prog fusion, it would be plog frusion... 

a japanese girl once thought i was an idiot because i never heard of the crash - she was like very famous punk rock

when i figured out she was talking about the clash i was like yeah i know their music really well but she didn't believe me - she left the conversation thinking i didn't know who the clash are which has to be the most ironic reason i ever got shot down seeing as i know a whole lot about the clash

[Trollheart]

It's funny: you think it's a cartoon thing but it happens. We had a guy in our agent in Kyoto whom we all thought was called Locky (for handiness' sake I guess they all take western-sounding names) and after a while he lost it with my workmate. "Locky! Locky!" he fumed. "R-O-C-K-Y!" We finally got it. My god it was funny. A Japanese guy called Rocky!     

[Trollheart]

Album title: Fiction
Artist: Eskaton
Nationality: French
Sub-genre: Zeuhl (Lord have mercy on my poor soul!) (Copyright Edgar Allan Poe, 1842)
Year: 1983
Position on list for that year: 9
Chronology: 3 of 4
Familiarity with artist: 1
Familiarity with album: 1
Gold Rated track(s): Simplicious, Le Mort de Tristan
Silver Rated track(s): None
Wooden Rated track(s): None
Comments: Ah Christ in a bucket! I'm no fan of jazz fusion, but I can take it in small doses, but Zeuhl? Based on my previous experience with Magma, I think on balance I'd rather listen to an endless tape loop of the sound of  a man dying from terminal flatulence! Some hope exists though, as I see these guys thought - correctly, in my view - that the idea of creating your own specific language for your music might just be a barrier to wider acceptance, so they opted to go for - oh. French. Well, at least I can get a half-idea of a few words, which is more than I could say for Magma. Nevertheless, I don't see this being an easy listen for me, but at least it's only a total of forty minutes long, so there is that.

All right then, allons-nous mes braves! Or something. Let's go. Got something that sounds like a photocopier running then lasers firing in a video game or something before the vocal comes in with a descending spacey synthline running and a decent melody, or at least a discernible one, which I don't remember hearing on the Magma album. Different vocalists, one a female the other a male, exchanging and sometimes combining and the music a lot more decent than I had been expecting, to be fair. The second track sounds like it's slower and more restrained, with a sedate drumbeat and what sounds like a sitar or maybe then flute taking the main melody, a bit Gabrielesque in ways. Okay then it bumps up and takes off into the usual Zeuhl patter, which I find nonsensical and annoying, but there it is.

And so it goes. Seems to be a fair bit of jazz fusion, as I understand it, on this, and it's certainly more accessible than the M word, in fact it's kind of not really what I would term a Zeuhl album at all. Other than the often annoying vocals with shrieks and chants, the music is mostly decent and I reckon given a few more listens I could get into this, whereas I could listen to Magma till the bovines return to their residence and I would still hate it. So that's definitely something I see as progress.

Personal Rating: 7

[Toy Revolver]

tbh there's something about magma that makes me want to vomit - they just get on my nerves

[Toy Revolver]

man i just listened to about 30 seconds of that and it sounds like the same goofy unpleasant style - hard pass

[Guybrush]

Only listened for a few secs, but it sounded a bit like Zeuhl meets Canterbury scene.

Might be an improvement on zeuhl, but not on Canterbury, I think. Still, might be fun I guess.

[Trollheart]

Yeah I was being kind, since I had trashed Magma so badly (see the history of prog journal: I refused to listen to their second album, ducking out of it like a girl) but in reality no, this kind of thing is not for me. Still, if you put a gun to my head and asked me to choose one or the other bands I'd almost certainly wet and shit myself, but eventually I would choose these guys over Magma.

Well, to be honest, I'd choose guys digging a road with a blunt jackhammer and learning on the job to listening to Magma.

[Toy Revolver]

Well, to be honest, I'd choose guys digging a road with a blunt jackhammer and learning on the job to listening to Magma.

me too, especially since those guys are einstürzende neubauten

[Trollheart]

Album title: The Pearl
Artist: Harold Budd and Brian Eno
Nationality: English
Sub-genre: Progressive Electronic (it says here)
Year: 1984
Position on list for that year: 8
Chronology: Eno with Budd, 2 of 2; Eno collaborative, 9 of 24; Eno overall solo 18 of 53
Familiarity with artist: 3
Familiarity with album: 1
Gold Rated track(s): None of that nonsense here, son.
Silver Rated track(s):
Wooden Rated track(s):
Comments: I'm not really sure anyone has a bad thing to say about Eno. Possibly deserving of the title of Bryan Ferry's Robert Fripp, it was he who made all the weird spacey sounds in Roxy Music, before they became more a pop band, and over his solo career, as you can see, he's had over fifty albums, written music for movies and worked with artists from Bowie and Byrne to Lanois and Cale, and is surely one of the most respected names, not just in ambient or electronic music, but in music full stop. This was the second of his collaborations with ambient musician Harold Budd, of whom I know nothing, but really, once Eno's name is on it the album has to be well worth listening to.

So let's do just that.

Really nice slow piano brings in "Late October", and it certainly conjures up images of frosted trees, iced-over lakes and hard blue skies, leaves scattered on the paths and roadways like a reddish-brown carpet crackling underfoot or scrunched under tyres by uncaring drivers basking in the warmth of their car's heating system. A simple piece, but extremely evocative, the more amazing that it seems to be just the one instrument (there may be other synthy things going on quietly in the background, but it's the piano that takes your attention, and there's no percussion at all). This piano music continues on into "A Stream with Bright Fish" (which is not, I think, about clever piscean endeavours to buy out Spotify) with a sort of more upfront sound and darker synth or soundscape of some sort lurking behind, giving a feeling perhaps of thunderclouds approaching on the horizon?

"The Silver Ball" comes again a little more to the fore with a sort of empty concert hall sound, the piano echoing loudly and again softer synth sounds behind. Trying to describe this music is probably not only futile but unnecessary; it's just really nice relaxing music mostly - so far - delivered via the keyboard of a piano and with real heart and emotion. And it continues in that vein, almost all piano music, almost all relaxing, ambient stuff, but hard to differentiate one track from another, not that I intend to try. A great album to fall asleep to, I would imagine, which is appropriate, as I read that Budd often plays night time concerts for his audience to nod off to. Well, it's hardly storming the stage now is it, or punching the air?

Personal Rating: 9

[Lexi Darling]

Yes! Classic ambient record, big fan of both of these gentlemen.

[Toy Revolver]

Progressive Electronic (it says here)

i've listened to that record many times it never once occurred to me that anyone on earth would call it prog

great record not prog though - pure ambient