As far as I’m concerned, Van der Graaf Generator’s third album will remain always as one of my very favorite prog rock albums. This really proves how much the band had improved in just three albums. The music is dominated by Peter Hammill’s distinct vocals, the sometimes spacy organ of Hugh Banton, the saxes of […] Continue reading →

When talking about the hippie scene from the 1960s, especially the music scene, one groups that gets brought up of course is Crosby, Stills & Nash (later with Neil Young). They were definately one of the big icons of that scene, and their self-entitled debut proves that. It’s too bad that out of control egos, […] Continue reading →

Colosseum, like Fleetwood Mac, was a band that evolved out of John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers. While Fleetwood Mac started off as a blues band, then eventually evolved in to your typical, multi-platinum corporate rock band by the mid 1970s, Colosseum went for a more adventurous path by combining the burgeoning prog rock scene with blues and […] Continue reading →

I could hardly believe it! I didn’t think Eloy could pull off another album almost as great as their 1977 masterpiece, Ocean. Silent Cries and Mighty Echoes was their followup release (excluding a 1978 live album, that is), released in 1979. My expectations were low. Prog rock was over by 1979. The increasingly corporate music […] Continue reading →

May Blitz was a short lived British-based trio that consisted of two Canadians and an Englishman. The two Canadians were guitarist and vocalist James Black and bassist Reid Hudson, with the Englishman being drummer Tony Newman, formerly of the Jeff Beck Group. This band basically combined psychedelia with blues and hard rock that’s not unlike […] Continue reading →

Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, or simply, Banco, is highly regarded as one of the greatest prog rock bands to come out of Italy, and after hearing this album, as well as their 1973 followup, Io Sono Nato Libero, I am willing to believe it. The band was known for the near-operatic vocals of Francesco di […] Continue reading →

Ege Bamyasi is Can’s followup to Tago Mago. This time around, the band decides to get even funkier, with a more percussive-oriented approach. The album opens with “Pinch” which, during the first few listens, seems pretty pointless, as it sounds like a groove and little else, with some rather bizarre and unintelligible voices from Damo […] Continue reading →

Hawkwind, like Gong, and much later, Ozric Tentacles, was one of the biggest names in space rock. If it wasn’t those first two groups I mentioned, it’s hard imagining there being a band like the Ozrics out there. And like the Ozrics, Hawkwind was (and surprisingly still is) a fixture on the British free festival […] Continue reading →

I won’t forget that day in 1996 I was in Rod’s Second Hand Store which was in Port Orchard, Washington. Now this isn’t the kind of store for the hippie in mind. Basically the store sold used Nintendo and Sega Genesis games and game machines, some crappy portable radios, and CDs and tapes. The CDs […] Continue reading →

Earth & Fire (do not confuse with the well-known American R&B band Earth, Wind & Fire), was one of the leading prog rock bands to come out of the Netherlands, along with Focus, Ekseption, Kayak, Trace, Supersister, and Alquin. 1971’s Song of the Marching Children is their second album and is by far their best, […] Continue reading →