This is a band that we will never see again live on stage. The band suffered a very bad fate with Keith Emerson and Greg Lake passing away so tragically short time one after the other. What there is, that's their great music. Music - sophisticated, thrilling, highest quality. It was music of the 70s. The 70s never come back and today's music is so dull compared with the 70s. There is no prog band that could be even halfway on a par with them. Those who could see these guys on stage were impressed by their shows. It was something you would remember your whole life. Today ELP are more and more forgotten. So here it is time to remember: Let's begin with their first. A stunning performance around the time the first album was released. You can experience here how great they would be only few years later. https://youtu.be/D2_a73goPa8 This is their album Tarkus. On side one there is the intensive 21minutes long Tarkus theme. Prog at it's best. Side two features six short songs that showed the quality of ELP also in composing compact songs of very different styles. https://youtu.be/fLS0Med0s6E Another masterpiece. 30 minutes of "Karn evil 9" . This track covers 1 and a half side of their album Brain Salad Surgery. https://youtu.be/Kbc9UZIQoy4 Here you can watch ELP in a concert video from 1970 with much stuff from their first album. And - sad as it is- here is their absolutely last concert from 2010: https://youtu.be/cxSgeQe36do They played there only their great tunes from the 70s. And that's it. They never come back. But...we all can always remember these great musicians.
I like ELP a lot.......IMO a great guitar player was the missing ingredient.....Even with one of the greatest rock keyboard players ever, Keyboards as the dominant instrument on every song gets old.....The Doors as Keyboard heavy as they were, at least fed us a steady diet of Robbie's quirky tasteful playing.....
The debut is still one of my favorites. They came out of the gates blazing. My copy: Emerson, Lake & Palmer – Emerson, Lake & Palmer Label: Victory (10) – 383 480 016-2 Format: CD, Album, Club Edition, Reissue, Remastered Country: US Released: 1993 Genre: Rock Style: Prog Rock
Don’t forget, Greg Lake played some great guitar parts on the debut, Trilogy and Brain Salad Surgery. The guitar solo on Karn Evil 9 is amazing.
The current 30+ pages ELP more aggressive than the punks?* thread is SHF gold * and Lake was a great guitar player
ELP in the 70s were inbeatable. But in 1978 they were forced to record a radio compatible lonplayer.. This should have been "love beach". A record that featured the worst cover that would have been possible. It was extremely unsuccessful and led the band into the nirvana. And this was the beginning of the end. And in the 90s their came " In the hot seat". An album that left the fans at a loss. Extremely weak. They did not do theirselves a favour with this. Better listen to their eponymous first album:
For me, "In the hot seat", their last studio album, is much more worse. But Love Beach had the ugliest cover. The long suite on Love Beach isn't too bad. But "in the hot seat" only showed dreadful tracks. The most disappointing way to say "Good bye" for the greatest prog band ever.
One thing with Prog is that so many of the bands aren't very much alike. It's as if a lot of these bands each are in their own category, yet they are prog. So ELP is the best band that sounds like ELP. King Crimson sound different album to album....Yet in each incarnation are the best band that sounds like KC. Jethro Tull is the best band that sounds like JT. Yes is the best band that sounds like Yes. and then how about Pink Floyd......... and how can fans of all these not like Mahavishnu Orchestra, whom I think don't get called prog much.
Same with ELP... listen to the ST and In The Hot Seat. The first is a masterpiece, the other one is cheesy Mainstream. I am a fan of ELP, but they were creative only in a very short time... 1970-73. ELP recorded only 3 great studio albums IMO... ELP, Trilogy and BSS. That is not much to the other Prog bands.
...and the greatest 'Mc' is doubtless yuuuugely thankful that his & his various bandmates' genius has rarely been tarred with that brush.
We were very very lucky to live through such times. ELP have always been a favourite of mine, especially up to BSS. But there’s always something to enjoy on each subsequent album and that includes ELPowell. And then we can go backwards and dive into The Nice, King Crimson and Atomic Rooster. At 63, I’m a very lucky boy.
You need to include `Tarkus' in that list (for all the shortcomings of Side 2...2 x `jokey' pieces are at least one too many!). I'd say it was the five album run including `Pictures' which defined their short creative spell, and while I love Works for what it is their moment had already passed I think. Yes had a longer spell of triumph from The Yes album to the very last note of `Awaken' I'd say...not many of the Prog bands made it past 1977 in good shape but they left timeless work along the way.
There’s no such thing as the big three. The big six ELP, Yes, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Genesis, Pink Floyd.
So, here's my history with ELP. Back in the early 70's I lived on a street of row houses. We lived close together, and we all got to know each other. There was lots of music going on in those houses, covering everything from Tamla Motown to Psychedelic. I sat in the Hard Rock area, Sabbath especially (my favorites), but also Purple and just about anyone who played at an 11. Then there were this strange family who lived a few houses down. They were peculiar in many ways, and when I say peculiar the father eventually got arrested for hiding in bushes and flashing passersby. Yeah, that really happened. Now, there were two sons, and their obsession was ELP. You'd of thought we'd of had a lot in common musically, but actually that wasn't the case. Back then guitar was king, and ELP just didn't have it. I couldn't get my head around why anyone would want to listen to a keyboards based band (and let's not forget, keyboards back then were far more limited than we have today). I was into Yes, but they also had killer guitar, and it worked. Uriah Heep also had great keyboards, but a great guitar. ELP, not so much. In short, I built up quite a bias against ELP. The only thing that really stuck with me was the cover art, especially Brain Salad Surgery. This bias lasted, oh, 40 years! Fact. One can't make sense of it, it's just how my musical path rolled. It actually wasn't until I first got into Surround sound that they came back on my radar. When the sets came out with a Surround mix I thought, "go on, give them a go!", and I did, and I've done a 180. I like them now. In fact, this thread is going to make me play some today, because it's been a while. I've enjoyed them quite a bit since. Well, at least the classic years, up to and including Works Volume II. Listening now, I enjoy all the albums in the main period of activity, but I must say there's something about the debut that really hits the spot. Technically, later albums are better and more creative, but I don't know, the one I play the most is the debut. It's quite beautiful. The one negative for me are the CD releases. It's been horribly handled. We got a single CD release, then 3-CD remastered releases with Surround, then 2-CD release remastered (again) without the Surround. Then a big box set. Then a follow up box set with Surround. And then how many other smaller sets, and odd live shows, and...... it's really really messy, imo. Worst of all, getting those Surround mixes isn't cheap for those that missed out originally. The band and its fans deserve better, imo. Still, where once ELP stood as a band I'd of said I actively disliked, they now stand as someone I consider pretty damn good. That's what counts, right?
Fascinating. I know this is purely personal and unique to myself and my environment, but when I think back to the 70's and all the people I knew, I never met anyone who was into all those bands. The ELP guys would like King Crimson, but not Sabbath. The Genesis folk didn't like anyone else. The Floyd guys might like King Crimson, but no way were they doing ELP. Tull fans also seemed to sit alone. It was pretty segregated back then in my experience.
