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Shark
May 27, 20245 min read
Starring Rosi by Ash Ra Tempel: the definitive trip into cerebral space land
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Yes, this album sounds nothing like any other Ash Ra Tempel album. Yes, this album is light and...
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Shark
Apr 7, 20246 min read
Letzte Tage - Letzte Nächte by Popol Vuh: an ability to create music that's simultaneously delicate and powerful, detailed and expansive, earthbound in its origins and cosmic in its reach
With Understanding Comes Appreciation For the sake of new comers, first things first. Of the many legendary artists to emerge from the...
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Shark
Apr 1, 20248 min read
Per Un Amico by Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM): jaw dropping musical acrobatics with ease which never lose the pace of a sophisticated graceful poetic dance of sounds
With Understanding Comes Appreciation While the big bang of progressive rock was only a few years old, it is astonishing how so many...
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Shark
Mar 31, 20248 min read
Roxy Music by Roxy Music: from an art school project to the most adventurous rock band of the early '70s
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Roxy Music debut with the eponymous album was epochal. There had never been any pop songs with such...
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Shark
Mar 20, 20245 min read
Solar Music Live by Grobschnitt: mandatory for space rock cadets and beyond
With Understanding Comes Appreciation If you are into Krautrock or guitar driven space rock, I've got a record for you: Solar Music Live...
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Shark
Mar 12, 20248 min read
Darwin! by Banco Del Mutuo Soccorso: passionate vocals, complex song structure, fantastic keyboards, tranquil moments and powerful passages
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The reason why Banco del Mutuo Soccorso so much deserves their status as an epitome of the best...
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Shark
Mar 11, 202415 min read
2112 by Rush: conjuring up the kind of sci-fi images and otherworldly magic that would later become the hallmark of the band
With Understanding Comes Appreciation 2112 achieved a triple feat: 1) it saved Rush's career. It was like Rush was at the plate with two...
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Shark
Mar 10, 202410 min read
If I Could Do It All Over Again... by Caravan: a healthy dose of the psychedelic scene of the era, smooths things over with pop sensibilities and dresses it all up with progressive rock workouts
With Understanding Comes Appreciation As the 60s abruptly became the 70s, the psychedelia of the former era was transmogrifying into...
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Shark
Mar 9, 202414 min read
Third by Soft Machine: an ambitious album, which push back the frontiers of space modal jazz-rock far beyond while defining the Canterbury Scene moving forward
With Understanding Comes Appreciation From start to end, this album is an absolute killer. Every single second is just excellent, the...
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Shark
Mar 7, 20248 min read
Trilogy by Emerson, Lake & Palmer: everything has been carefully thought, arranged, and performed to perfection, a process that also included some form of sterilization
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Trilogy, ELP's fourth album, features the trio settling down in more crowd-pleasing pastures....
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Shark
Mar 5, 20247 min read
You by Gong: incarnates the perfect marriage of Canterbury jazz-rock whimsy, cosmic psychedelic guitar workouts and complex percussive accouterments
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The spacy province of Canterbury land was ruled by Daevid Allen-era Gong, and their You album is...
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Shark
Feb 28, 20247 min read
Ocean by Eloy: worlds atomize and oceans evaporate in eternity on this epic record
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Eloy's masterpiece, period. Ocean delivers shivers on your spine with that spacey rhythm the band...
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Shark
Feb 26, 202414 min read
The Raven That Refused to Sing (And Other Stories) by Steven Wilson: new prog-rock music in the vain of the 70's with top notch production can't go wrong
With Understanding Comes Appreciation As a fan of Steven Wilson I was at the time very excited to hear that his newest work was going to...
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Shark
Feb 23, 202413 min read
Tales from Topographic Oceans by Yes: a four-suite, progressive, poetic tapestry depicting the human perception of time and memory
With Understanding Comes Appreciation This is Yes, and perhaps even prog-rock, at its finest. I truly appreciate this album for what it...
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Shark
Feb 22, 202417 min read
Pawn Hearts by Van Der Graaf Generator: an album so sublime that it is one of the rare sonic portals into a truly alternative universe
With Understanding Comes Appreciation In just a few short years, Peter Hammill’s Van Der Graaf Generator project had evolved from a de...
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Shark
Feb 21, 20248 min read
Minstrel in the Gallery by Jethro Tull: evoking the world of Shakespeare in its literate lyrics, Elizabethan imagery, and the mixture of rustic folk music and refined classical airs into their rock
With Understanding Comes Appreciation When you see the cover, you say: hey! This look like "Aqualung!" But will the inside be on par with...
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Shark
Feb 17, 20245 min read
The Snow Goose by Camel: a beautiful fantasy that translates this moving tale of friendship, love, war and separation into a well structured sonic piece of music
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The last album I reviewed on this corner was Tanz der Lemminge by Amon Düül II, a very complex,...
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Shark
Feb 4, 20248 min read
Acquiring the Taste by Gentle Giant: techniques borrowed directly from the Renaissance and Baroque proved us all that there's so much more to do in rock music
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Gargantua & Pantagruel come to life! The entire classic era oeuvre of the British progressive rock...
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Shark
Feb 4, 20246 min read
Selling England by the Pound by Genesis: everything is firing on all cylinders on this genre-defining & hallowed record
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Okay: You're all alone on the desert island with your ten essential prog albums. The solar-powered...
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Shark
Feb 4, 20244 min read
Discipline by King Crimson: reinventing progressive rock music; a smart blend of cerebral art rock and post-punk, catchy and with almost pop sensibilities
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Unless you were a youngster in 1981, you have zero idea what it was like to buy this vinyl and be...
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