The later masterpieces of 1970

On 7 August, 1970, The Moody Blues released their sixth studio album Question of Balance. Several of their previous recordings had been only OK, but this time they succeeded in creating not only one but two classic songs of the era. The opening song Question was a rare thing in that, unlike the group's previous output, it had a contemporary political topic: Vietnam war. My personal favorite was, however, the penultimate track, a beautiful ballad called Melancholy Man.

Four weeks later, on 4 September it was time for Caravan to release their second album If I Could Do it All Over Again, I'd Do it All Over You. Compared to their previous outing, the group was now clearly heading towards deeper waters. Prog influences were rearing their beautiful, if a little complicated heads. Several of the tracks contained on the album are recommendable, but if I had to select one, I think it would be the lovely Can't Be Long Now. Wait, I just selected it. Anyway, it is only the first 3 mins. and 35 secs. of the YouTube video below. The rest of the songs that continue there without a pause are Françoise, For Richard and Warlock.

Caravan's second album was the last one to come out while I still lived in Kuopio. Next, I was happy to move back to my birthplace Lappeenranta in mid-September, 1970, and start school there. After attending first grade for about three weeks, the next noteworthy album was out and this is where we need to take a short sidestep from progressive rock, or related genres. Led Zeppelin has absolutely nothing to do with them. But their third album, aptly titled Led Zeppelin III, really piqued my interest after it came out on 5 October.

The most famous song on the album is obviously its opening, Immigrant Song, which in a way seemed quite fitting to my then current life situation, even though I had not been forced to move from one country to another. Only from one town to another within Finland. But yeah, I did come from the land of ice and snow, and felt more than just a little alienated in spite of returning to my original place of birth (that I could hardly remember).

As great as Immigrant Song was, and still is, there were two other tracks that interested me even more. Both were more oriented towards melody and skillful guitar playing. Friends, yes, that's exactly what I was in need of. And That's the Way, so true, that's the way it was then. These three songs seemed to form my autumn soundtrack, until some other great album releases intervened.

The first one of them was the self titled debut album of a new prog giant, Emerson Lake & Palmer. It was released in October, but unfortunately I cannot remember the exact date and haven't been able to find it out afterwards, either. Those who know me are aware that I consider ELP the most overrated progressive rock act of the 1970's and that I loathe most of their pretentious output. But they have done some good work as well, and I consider their debut album overall their best ever. Its closing track Lucky Man is by far the best song they have ever made and could have taught Uriah Heep (see Come Away, Melinda earlier this same year) a thing or two about how to write a genuinely haunting anti war song.

As promising as the ELP debut was, something way more stunning came out at the end of the same month, on 23 October. Last year, when Yes and Genesis released their debuts, Yes beat Genesis hands down. This year, with their second albums, things took an unexpected turn. Time and a Word by Yes was a perfectly fine album, as discussed last time, but Trespass by Genesis was simply astounding and easily the best album of the year.

What had happened to the group that published a collection of mediocre pop songs only a year and a half earlier? The speed with which they had matured was breathtaking. The lovely medieval painting on the cover already prepared the listener to its themes. If you had to choose only one track to use as an example from an album full of masterful songs, you would probably drop the A side closing track Visions of Angels which isn't quite on the same level as the others, but after that you would be hard pressed. Well, I have that situation now and after careful consideration I give you Stagnation.

Before getting into one more great album of 1970, a couple of less significant, yet also important musical events. I started to grow a fondness towards the British singer-songwriter Cat Stevens when, on 23 November, he released the album Tea for the Tillerman. It is worth mentioning due to the inclusion of Father and Son, and in particular Wild World, which were both my favorites at this time. Even better things were to follow during next years.

Only four days later, on 27 November it was time for yet another debut from a future prog giant. Again, this first album didn't really impress but the second one would be a huge leap forward. The giant in question was Gentle Giant, whose self titled debut was already quite challenging and very proggy - no pop songs here: if you don't believe it, just try humming Alucard after hearing it once. My favorite track on this album was again the most mellow one, called Funny Ways.

All right, time to finally wrap up 1970 with only one more album release, and it was one of the best. The only one that was roughly on par with Trespass, was King Crimson's third album Lizard that came out on 11 December. The group had suffered a loss: singer Greg Lake had left, joined ELP, and sang Lucky Man just a short way up on this very same page. There were also other personnel changes, and style changes as well. The new Crimson sounded very jazzy.

I liked all the songs on the A side of the vinyl as well, but the true masterpiece was of course the 23-minute title track that filled the B side in its entirety. I have already written about this unbelievable musical achievement when covering the Top 20 Long Prog Masterpieces, you can check out that over here. Overall, I have to place Trespass as the best album of the year, but this long composition is the best individual song.

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR:
Genesis: Trespass
King Crimson: Lizard

UNMISSABLE TRACKS OF THE YEAR:
Beatles: Across the Universe
Beatles: The Long and Winding Road
Emerson Lake & Palmer: Lucky Man
King Crimson: Lizard
Procol Harum: The Dead Man's Dream
Wigwam: Häätö

1970: Goodbyes and hellos

Early 1970 was about saying goodbyes to a couple of sixties' most favorite artists. On 26 January, Simon & Garfunkel released their final studio album Bridge Over Troubled Water. The best, and probably also most famous songs contained therein had a very pathetic, grandiose feel to them, as if the dynamic duo were intentionally saying that this was to be the grand finale of their career. A swan song of an exceptional scale. The songs I am referring to are of course the title track and The Boxer. Everyone knows the former; let's listen to the latter.

Another sixties group that was saying its goodbyes in the spring of 1970 was of course the Beatles. 6 March saw the release of a new single Let it Be which was followed by an album carrying the exact same title on 8 May. Only a couple of weeks shy of being seven years old, I immediately picked two absolute favorite tracks. Granted, the title track was great and it was easily the third best on the album. But the other two felt like John Lennon and Paul McCartney doing their absolutely best for one final time.

Lennon's masterpiece was, of course, Across the Universe, the third song on the A side of the album. I think I can recall the beauty of this particular song moving me to tears at the time. I don't think I quite grasped that this was the greatest band of the 1960's singing their last songs, but nonetheless the song had a somehow final feel to it. After this, there would be no more.

But, as great as Lennon's song was, McCartney managed to easily outdo him this time with the third track on B side. I have always tended to prefer Lennon over McCartney, but The Long and Winding Road is the exception. Quite probably the most moving pop song ever made at the time of its release, it also came out as a single only three days after the album. It is these two songs that in some way completed the Beatles' incredible career. Perhaps there had been many downs as well as ups, but when you can artistically achieve something like this, what more could there be? There is no other way but back down, so why not quit while you're winning big time.

And that's more or less it for goodbyes. A couple of great artists had completed their recording career, many new ones made public their exciting new music. Before moving ahead with the calendar, let's make an important point about some Finnish music. And here it is: in my opinion, arguably the greatest progressive rock song ever made in my home country was also released as a single in 1970. But I have no idea when exactly. I haven't been able to find out even the month of release, so let's dig into it now and get it over with.

Wigwam had already released their debut album Hard n' Horny in 1969 and were about to release their sophomore effort Tombstone Valentine in 1970. Somewhere in between they released this absolutely stunning single called Häätö (in English, Eviction) which I was unable to find in YouTube so here is a link to Spotify instead.

The song comprises of three completely different sequences, which in itself was already groundbreaking. Henrik Otto Donner, who coincidentally died less than a week ago, first reads aloud some psychedelic poetry with violins in the background. Then, one of the group's two singers, Jukka Gustavson sings two verses in Finnish. Suddenly, the other singer, Englishman Jim Pembroke starts singing in English about not wanting to be a Judas. After that, it's Donner, Gustavson, and Donner once more.

Absolutely unbelievable, and years ahead of its time in 1970. Best of all, you cannot find any connection between the separate sequences. Even Gustavson's sequences have nothing in common between them lyrics-wise. And none of this has anything to do with an eviction. Connecting the sequences together is completely artificial, yet it works perfectly.

Precisely one week after the release of Let it Be, on 15 May King Crimson released their second album In the Wake of Poseidon. Last year's In the Court of the Crimson King had been an overwhelming success, so what could Robert Fripp and company do next? That's right, make a carbon copy. Well, some of the way. The opening track Pictures of a City is strangely reminiscent of 21st Century Schizoid Man; the next one Cadence and Cascade is much like I Talk to the Wind; and the title track is the counterpart to Epitaph.

Luckily, the group did not reproduce Moonchild in another form, and actually started to depart from their initial success. Their version of Gustav Holst's Mars, Bringer of War actually sounds pretty cool. But no, this was not the album that would really see them grow artistically. It would be the next one. Due out in December of this very same year. We will definitely get back to it.

Another group that had excelled in 1969 and came out with a new album now, was Procol Harum. Home was already their fourth one. It came out on 5 June. While it was overall a very good collection of songs, there is one track that stands head and shoulders above the others. The brilliant The Dead Man's Dream was not only a first class piece of music; its lyrics actually told a story. A horror story of the worst kind! I guess this was also one reason why I was so drawn to this particular song. The list of unmissable tracks of the year is getting long...

On 13 July, a new talent emerged with a debut album. Uriah Heep was at the time classified as a heavy metal band, because in those days true heaviness was quite hard to come by. Looking back, the group was more like a regular rock band with some prog influences. Their debut Very 'Eavy ... Very 'Umble contained one song that completely enthralled me, I suppose mostly because it was also a story that involved an innocent child - one much like myself at the time. As a critique towards war, Come Away, Melinda is maybe a little naive, but a beautiful song in any case.

And finally, on 24 July, Yes released their sophomore album Time and a Word. It was definitely more accomplished than their first one, yet a long way from the level they would reach in only a couple of more years. In many places, they were still sounding like some pop group, yet in others they really did challenge the listener with kind of stuff that was seldom heard. My favorite track represents the easier side of 1970 Yes: the title track of the album is in my opinion a perfect pop song. The pinnacle of what the group had so far achieved. Emphasis placed on so far.

And this is where we need to take a short break. By now, there was so much high quality music around that it is no longer possible to go through a whole year's output in a single sitting. We have now covered January to July of 1970; next blog entry will cover August to December.

The birth of progressive rock

1969 marks the official year of birth for progressive rock. Three future greats all released their first studio albums: Genesis in March, Yes in July and King Crimson in October. Each release was more successful than the last. The Genesis debut From Genesis to Revelation, out on 7 March, was a totally forgettable collection of mediocre pop songs, significant only because of the group's later output. Yes showed more promise, even though their debut was hardly stunning either. King Crimson, on the other hand, made a classic on first attempt.
















The first three months of the year were a truly dry season. There was nothing to get excited about. It wasn't until 9 April that I found my first favorite song of the ongoing year. This happened when Bob Dylan released a new album called Nashville Skyline, which contained the dreamy, mellow ballad Lay Lady Lay. I enjoyed it immensely and it became my soundtrack for that spring, as there was little else on offer. (I even liked Ministry's cover version made nearly 30 years later.)

The next truly significant albums didn't come out until June, after I had already celebrated my sixth birthday. On the 13th, Pink Floyd released their first collection of songs intended for film soundtracks (9 August in the US). The album in question was Soundtrack from the Film 'More'. Most of the songs composed for Barbet Schroeder's film were not particularly impressive, but I could easily pick two instant favorites. Of them, Cymbaline seemed to be a fan favorite as well, because Pink Floyd kept it in their concert set list for at least two years afterwards. A great song in my opinion, as well.

However, it nearly pales in comparison with the masterpiece that opens the album. Cirrus Minor is the definitive film soundtrack song and it stands as the absolute number one on my list of Best Songs of the 1960's. The almost unbearably beautiful, pastoral track has no use for drums and completes its serene soundscape with bird sound effects. I was unable to find a satisfactory link to the song only, so above you can check out the entire album and as already mentioned, Cirrus Minor is its very first song. You can also check out Cymbaline there, it is track number six.

Also in June, Procol Harum finally made good on the promise of their first recordings. I would call their third album A Salty Dog an instant classic. While the masterful title track is probably the best known song from that album - perhaps even from the group's entire output - it is definitely not the only great track on the album. If you can, check out also the lovely Too Much Between Us as well as the memorable closing track Pilgrim's Progress. Below, you can check out the title track.

11 July saw the single release of Space Oddity by David Bowie. The new, rising talent was already a recording artist: his self title debut had come out on the same day with Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in 1967. This was the first single release from his forthcoming second album, which would get its release on 4 November and carry the same title. At age six, I was fascinated with anything to do with space and listened to Bowie's masterful song in awe. The single release was in touch with the times: Apollo 11 was launched only five days later, and the first moon landing took place on the 20th.

25 July arrived, and the first album by future prog giants Yes was available in well equipped stores. The album was way better than the first effort by Genesis, but still, nothing special really. Slightly challenging art rock with some pop songs thrown in for good measure. On their next albums, the comparison between Genesis and Yes became much more interesting. We will return to that already the following year. My favorite track on this album is the B side opener Harold Land, but I guess I am in a minority here.

And then, summer was over. We were well on the way towards winter, when the next couple of interesting albums were released, actually on the exact same date. On 10 October, the one and only Frank Zappa released Hot Rats, whose opening instrumental Peaches en Regalia got me immediately hooked. It is probably one of, if not the best known track ever recorded by the immensely productive artist. The sudden style changes were a bit much on the first listen, but repeated attempts were rewarded.

The other album that came out on 10 October was of course In the Court of the Crimson King, by King Crimson. This was the album that finally launched the British prog invasion. Most people probably consider it the greatest prog album of the sixties, instead of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn that is my favorite. They may be right, but while Crimson King is an impressive piece of work, I always tend to doze off (or at least lose a significant amount of interest) when someone places nearly ten minutes of improvisation in the middle of an album whose total running time is under 45 minutes.

Yes, I have a problem with the latter part of Moonchild. Its opening The Dream is the most beautiful sequence on the entire album, but the overlong instrumental The Illusion is a bit boring - while I do admit that its inclusion on the album was a genuinely groundbreaking thing to do in the first place.

On 7 November, Pink Floyd released already a second album during the same year. The double vinyl Ummagumma contained one disc of live material and one of studio recordings composed, and I guess also mostly performed, solo by all members of the band. The live version of A Saucerful of Secrets truly kicks ass. Of the solo efforts, David Gilmour's The Narrow Way and particularly Richard Wright's incredible Sysyphus are masterpieces. You can listen to The Narrow Way below, and read more about Sysyphus here.

On 22 November, Fleetwood Mac became a household item by releasing their classic instrumental Albatross as a single. This was quite a pleasant way to start waiting for Christmas, and shortly after that, a new decade. Also, its peaceful melody gave me nice moments of welcome relaxation after listening to the more aggressive sequences of, say, Sysyphus.

And now, there is only one masterful song left to be mentioned, before we leave the sixties and enter seventies. South African born Manfred Mann became famous already at the time of my birth by leading a pop band that used his name and recorded drivel such as Do Wah Diddy Diddy. That group's recording career lasted from 1963 to 1969. After they split, Mann started gravitating towards jazz and prog, forming first Manfred Mann Chapter Three and still later, Manfred Mann's Earth Band.

Manfred Mann Chapter Three released only two albums in 1969 and 1970. The first one, released in November, contained one of the most astonishingly profound songs I had heard in my then young life. Where Am I Going? was not only a beautiful piece of songwriting. Its lyrics actually made you think. While I listened to the song, mesmerized, I also started to worry. "It's hard to be a man." It is? At age six and a half, I became a little nervous. And as I know now, it really is.

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR:
King Crimson: In the Court of the Crimson King
Procol Harum: A Salty Dog

UNMISSABLE TRACKS OF THE YEAR:
Pink Floyd: Cirrus Minor
Pink Floyd: Sysyphus
Procol Harum: A Salty Dog

1968

Apparently, the magnificient Some Velvet Morning by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood had been heard in an NBC television special already in December 1967. At age four and a half years, I never saw that, and more importantly, the song wasn't published as a recording until January 1968 when it appeared on Sinatra's album Movin' With Nancy. So, I'm going to classify it as a 1968 release and play it right here. And boy, was I amazed when I heard it on the album. Eerie and brilliant.

But otherwise, following the exemplary year 1967, this one was slightly disappointing. There was nothing that even closely matched the greatness of Pink Floyd's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, or the best of the previous year's Beatles songs. Some Velvet Morning was great, yes, but not as great as those.

On 23 February, a rather obscure Welsh group called The Bystanders released a single called When Jezamine Goes. It was hardly a groundbreaking effort and wouldn't be mentioned here at all if there hadn't been a B side that was one of my favorite songs of the era. It was called Cave of Clear Light and I knew already then that the makers of this song were destined for greatness. Later, the group reformed to be known as Man, one of the bigger names of the early seventies. We will come back to their greatest masterpiece in due time. In the mean time, here is Cave of Clear Light.

Eventually, the inevitable happened. Syd Barrett's LSD habit grew too much to bear and even though he had been the figurehead of Pink Floyd until now, the rest of the group were forced to let him go. Barrett was replaced by guitar virtuoso David Gilmour who could also sing, but was by no means the leader that Barrett had been, which I suppose already sew the seeds to problems that would arise about a decade later.

But for now, a correction to the unbearable situation was achieved and the new Pink Floyd released a masterful new single on 12 April. Julia Dream was a new beginning in much the same way as Arnold Layne had been the original beginning 13 months earlier. Likewise, it was not to be included in the group's album release of the same year. But in this case, that choice is harder to understand: Arnold Layne was nothing special, while Julia Dream was one of the best songs Pink Floyd had recorded so far and definitely way better than anything the group decided to include on A Saucerful of Secrets, due to be released two and a half months later.

As is fitting, Barrett's replacement David Gilmour sings on the new single, signifying that a change has come. And yet, there is no change in quality. Pink Floyd was still alive, and as brilliant as ever. For some reason, embedding the video has been prevented, but this is the best version of the song: Julia Dream. The same version appeared on the 1971 bootleg compilation Relics.

11 May saw the release of Irishman Richard Harris's (1930 - 2002) debut album A Tramp Shining which contained the classic song McArthur Park. Often imitated, rerecorded and even parodied, its memorable tune and overall pathos left an indelible mark on me, who at the time lived in my family's second apartment in Kuopio and was only ten days away from my fifth birthday.

On 28 June, Pink Floyd's full album A Saucerful of Secrets was released. High expectation turned to mild disappointment, as they often do. While the album was a decent effort overall, it seemed to possess little of the greatness and originality of the Syd Barrett era. Let There Be More Light served as an excellent opener however, and the psychedelic title track was later developed into a kick-ass live version.

In September, it was Procol Harum's turn to release their second studio album Shine on Brightly and likewise it wasn't one of their greatest, but promising anyway. I was particularly interested in the 18-minute effort In Held 'twas in I, which served as an early indicator of things to come: prog and art rock bands were going to use an entire vinyl side for single composition. This phenomenon would later become commonplace.

On 16 September (25 October in the UK), the rising guitar hero Jimi Hendrix released his third and final album Electric Ladyland. It contained his cover of Bob Dylan's All Along the Watchtower, which we already mentioned when going through the releases of 1967. It was an instant classic and remains better known than the original. An electrifying, atmospheric song where the electric guitar is played with astonishing skill, it was one of my late autumn favorites of the year.

In October, the most prominent group of the seventies Canterbury scene, Caravan released their self titled debut album. They didn't sound quite as proggy as they would during the first half of the following decade, but I immediately paid attention to their obviously strong songwriting skills, as demonstrated by songs such as Place of My Own and Magic Man.

1968 was concluded on 22 November with The Beatles's self titled White Album, which was a disappointment to me. Why try to return to their roots and sound like they had during the first half of the decade, when the group members had already found their inner artistic true selves and discovered the joys of psychedelia?

That said, there were still a couple of enjoyable pieces on the album that nonetheless became my late year favorites. They were located on vinyl sides two and three, and were both written by Paul McCartney. Try to imagine a five and a half year old trying to sing the lovely Blackbird and your heart might melt. And perhaps even more so when it comes to the brilliant Mother Nature's Son which brings our current blog entry to its pleasant closing.

UNMISSABLE TRACK OF THE YEAR:
Pink Floyd: Julia Dream

The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, by PINK FLOYD

The greatest album of the sixties was released on 4 August, 1967 and was called The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. It was performed by the British group Pink Floyd whose lineup at the time of said release was:

Syd Barrett - vocals and guitars
Richard Wright - keyboards
Roger Waters - bass guitar
Nick Mason - drums

Perhaps a good place to start would be a short snippet from a television show called Look of the Week. There, the show host first warns his viewers that the group about to perform is an almost unbearably loud one. Then, Pink Floyd gets to perform the opening track of their debut album called Astronomy Domine, and finally the obviously prejudiced host interviews Roger Waters and Syd Barrett. The guys actually have to defend themselves! Why on earth are they so loud and uninteresting, particularly to someone who has grown up listening to string quartets?!

On the album, Astronomy Domine sounds much better than it does here. It has of course been recorded in stereo and played way more accurately. We are not in the more challenging parts of 1967 psychedelia yet, loud or not. The track list continues with songs Lucifer Sam and Matilda Mother, which really introduce the listener to Syd Barrett's songwriting style - although Wright is credited as a co-writer on the latter song. Barrett is the master of naivety: half the time you have the feeling that you are listening to a recording intended for children. Yet many of the songs have and oddly ominous feel, and the instrumentation is not what you'd expect from a collection of kiddie songs.

Although all songs so far have been good, the fourth track is the best one yet. Flaming was later released as the group's third single. This took place several months after the album was released, on 2 November. Let's take a moment to enjoy this minor classic.

Flaming is followed by the album's two weakest tracks, after which it is time to flip the vinyl disc and start listening to side two. Its opening track is what Pink Floyd of the time was all about and must have left many others besides myself - at age four - dumbfounded and possibly even in a state of minor shock. Nothing, and I do mean nothing that had been released before in the history of rock music could possibly have prepared the occasional listener to the next masterpiece that was called Interstellar Overdrive.

Guitar driven rock and roll was certainly the order of the decade, yes, but not in quite this bold a format. Fairly obviously inspired by certain illegal substances, this instrumental runs nearly ten minutes on the album, and it is not hard for me to imagine that it has probably run for up to half an hour when played live. There are no lyrics. There is no traditional song structure. There is only one single repeated sequence played at the beginning, then again at the end, and a lengthy piece of total madness in between.

At the end of Interstellar Overdrive, the sixties listener must have been exhausted, so it comes as a relief that the next track is way easier on the ear. The Gnome is easily the best of the Barrett children's songs, and was quite rightly chosen as the B side of Flaming the single in November.

There are no weak or even average songs on the B side, everything is good. And the most impressive feat comes last. What balls one must have had to close a new rock group's first album with a track like Bike, in a decade when the absolute majority of guitar rock songs were straightforward. While in London this was a summer of sex, drugs and rock'n roll, I was only four years old and living in Kuopio, Finland, learning to ride my bike. This insane song became the soundtrack of that effort.

Bike begins like another one of Barrett's children's songs, but there is an abrupt change after the halfway point. What follows is the crowning achievement of Pink Floyd, as we enter a bicycle related sound effects sequence that cannot have been followed by anything but a dumbfounded silence back in 1967. At age four, I was of course stunned and perhaps many older listeners were as well. Apologies for being able to embed only the mono version from Spotify. This is due to some obscure EMI policy.

For myself, it is particularly moving to know that this masterful song was recorded on 21 May, my fourth birthday. However, for Pink Floyd things weren't going as well as you might have thought based on their successful debut album. The band leader Syd Barrett's LSD use was starting to spin out of control already when recording, and he was starting to look not too well already in early summer, well before the first album was even released.

Eventually, this led to Barrett's departure from Pink Floyd. This, in turn, caused The Piper at the Gates of Dawn to forever remain as one of its kind. When Pink Floyd's second album came out the following year, it sounded very different. The lineup had changed, leaving Barrett to appear only on that album's closing track, saying his goodbyes.

It's awfully considerate of you to think of me here
And I'm most obliged to you for making it clear
That I'm not here

1967: Age of psychedelia

Before we move on to the year psychedelia broke through, I have a small addition to the previous blog entry. It turns out that Simon & Garfunkel recorded a version of The Sound of Silence already on their debut album Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. which was released as early as 19 October, 1964. I suppose this version went largely unnoticed and the song became a classic only when it was remixed and remade in 1966. In any case, I was way too young to notice that original version and hence it got no mention in the previous blog entry.

1967 began with a bang when The Doors released their self-titled debut album on 4 January. It was a fitting start for a year filled with psychedelic music that differed radically from what had been heard before. It would have been an incredible feat to release something like The End only a couple of years earlier - in fact, it was pretty incredible even now. Since I was only three and a half years old at the time, it comes as no surprise that my favorite track on the album was Alabama Song, which has a somewhat children's song feel to it even though the lyrics are anything but childish.

1967 was, however, the year of the Beatles. The unbelievably popular British group had already started to record their masterpiece Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band towards the end of 1966. That album wouldn't come out until early summer, but in the interim, they released a double A-side single that was already on par with it. The release date was 13 February.

Neither Penny Lane nor Strawberry Fields Forever were eventually included in Sgt. Pepper, but in any case I could easily understand why the group couldn't decide which one to call side A. Both would have been among the best tracks of Sgt. Pepper as well. Personally, I have always preferred Strawberry Fields Forever with is slightly off-kilter, unreal soundscape. Which I guess is an early indication of my tendency to like music that sounds at least a little strange. Here is an "official video", done precisely in the style of the era. Most likely this is taken from Magical Mystery Tour, which I have never seen.

Another British band that would soon achieve greatness started its recording career on 10 March. Pink Floyd's debut single Arnold Layne is not really one of my favorites but deserves to be mentioned as a milestone. The band seemed to also think that their first single wasn't that exceptional, since they decided to leave it out of their debut album which would come out five months later.

1 June is then the memorable date when the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper was released and went on to make rock history. The most celebrated album of the supergroup's career, it really turned psychedelia into a mainstream phenomenon. I had turned four years old a week and a half earlier, and was nowhere near as impressed as the rest of the world. Yet even I had to admit that Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds, She's Leaving Home and A Day in the Life were pretty decent songs.

Only a couple of weeks later, on 16 June Pink Floyd released their sophomore single See Emily Play which became the first early warning that something truly exceptional would be coming later on. Summer of love was now well on its way, and this catchy song was on a quite different level than the more easily forgettable Arnold Layne. I suppose I must have hummed to the tune while I was learning to ride my bike - more about that a little later.

Three days prior to See Emily Play's release, the new James Bond movie You Only Live Twice premiered in the U.K. and the U.S. This was the first chance to hear one of the most classic Bond film theme songs, sung by Nancy Sinatra. A soundtrack album came out the following month. A magnificient piece of music that I also liked immediately.

And then came 4 August, the date when one of the most impressive debut albums ever was released. Pink Floyd's endlessly inventive The Piper at the Gates of Dawn seemed to be heralding a new era and was quite obviously years ahead of its time. I have come to realize that exceptional albums like this one need a more extensive coverage than I can fit here, so let's skip this album for now and dedicate the next blog entry entirely to it. Suffice to say that this was not only the best album of the year but the entire decade.

I intentionally skipped Procol Harum's mega hit single A Whiter Shade of Pale that was released already on 12 May. I have always thought it to be too simplistic to be particularly interesting. But as the group's self titled debut album was released in September, they started showing some promise with that album's opening track Conquistador, and even more so when the next single came out in October. It was called Homburg, and was impressive enough for me to start paying attention.

Towards the end of the year, there were some additional interesting single and album releases. The British group the Moody Blues released their second full length album Days of Future Passed on 10 November. This album saw an interesting fusion of classical elements with then contemporary pop music, the pinnacle being the classic Nights in White Satin. The video above may seem a bit silly but this was how pop songs were marketed back then.

Two weeks later, the Beatles released another single called Hello Goodbye, which was a sort of a prologue to their next album release, out on 27 November. Magical Mystery Tour was based on a film of the same title and contained several songs that had been published as singles at an earlier date. Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields Forever and Hello Goodbye were all included. Other classic Beatles songs on the album were the title track and The Fool on the Hill.

At the end of the year, there were a couple of releases that would grow in significance later on. Both were released immediately after Christmas, on 27 December. Bob Dylan, who was already an icon, released a new album called John Wesley Harding. That album contained a song called All Along the Watchtower, which became a classic later on when it was recorded by another artist. We will definitely get back to it when we reach that point in time.

The second significant release to immediately follow Christmas was the debut album of Canadian songwriter Leonard Cohen, called simply The Songs of Leonard Cohen. The album got only a limited release at this point. A wide release followed in February 1968, which is why the album and its classic song Suzanne are usually associated with that year rather than 1967. But the truth is that the original release took place a few days before 1968, so we will also include it here and close our blog entry with it.

ALBUM OF THE YEAR:
Pink Floyd: The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

UNMISSABLE TRACKS OF THE YEAR:
Pink Floyd: Interstellar Overdrive
Pink Floyd: Bike

Before moving on to 1968, the next blog entry will be solely dedicated to The Piper at the Gates of Dawn.

A prog fan's early days. And I do mean EARLY!

Summer's here, and that can mean only one thing. Thanks to upcoming holidays, I will actually have time to write some new stuff to ProgActive, and I am planning to do that in a pretty big way. Last year, my subject of choice was the top 20 Long Prog Masterpieces, which I started writing about on 17 June. That series was completed much sooner than I anticipated, on 8 July.

This year, the subject of ProgActive is much, much bigger and will most likely not be completed during the summer at all. I will do no less than completely cover this prog fan's musical journey from infancy to old age, in chronological order. I will cover all the significant songs as well as albums that I have managed to come across from mid-sixties to the present day, with (hopefully) meaningful insight and plentiful samples, both audio and video.

This year, I will not even attempt to create any kind of a "best of" list, with accurate standings for all songs and albums. I'm not saying that last year's top 20 wasn't accurate - I wouldn't make any corrections to it even now - but I do recognize the futility of going through my entire musical journey and attempting to somehow classify it with any king of a ranking in mind. Making high quality music is not, after all, a competition.

Also, I need to warn that not everything that gets mentioned here this summer, will be prog. This in spite of calling the blog ProgActive. There will be plenty of prog, but there will also be music that only borders that genre, and even music that has nothing to do with it. But naturally, and I guess you can call this a promise, those poor souls who do not appreciate prog will in places have a hard time going through the forthcoming blog entries. Prog will be the dominant musical genre here in any case.

So, without further ado, let's get started. I was born a little over 50 years ago, on 21 May 1963, to an exceptionally music oriented family. Even though I never shared any musical leanings whatsoever with my parents, I was obviously affected by the fact that in our home, radio was always turned on. Back then, there were actual programs and radio shows, but even then, music was playing more than half the time. I grew accustomed to it from infancy. And, while in my early years the music that was playing was hardly something I would have liked to listen to, there was always an occasional gem here and there. More often when sixties turned to early seventies. Finnish radio mostly played old people's music, but some rock and roll was thrown in every once in a while. Sometimes, even art rock of the time.

My musical memories began to gather in September 1965 when I suddenly noticed that I enjoyed a piece of music playing on the radio. The song in question was California Dreamin' by The Mamas & the Papas: the first of my favorite songs in chronological order. My first significant album came out only a couple of months later and started getting radio play. Not surprisingly, it was The Beatles, whose album Rubber Soul was released on 3 December, 1965.

One track in particular caught my attention. Michelle was my second number one favorite, following California Dreamin'. At the age of two and a half years, I was already interested in a beautiful melody and a relaxed, mellow overall performance. This is something that still applies: I have always been more keen on melody than rhythm, and more on peaceful quietness than aggressive noise. There are exceptions to that rule, but nonetheless it is the rule that mostly applies. No need to even ask if I am a Beatles person or an Elvis person. So don't. :)

The following year already became a small explosion of various musical masterpieces. Prog had not yet been conceived - and even if it had, it would probably have been a bit much for me at this age - but several artists published works that had an equivalent effect on me. Only a month and a half after Rubber Soul, on 17 January 1966, Simon & Garfunkel released Sounds of Silence which contained not one but two favorites of mine: the immensely beautiful title track, as well as the ethereally captivating April Come She Will.

The real stunner of the year was released five days before my third birthday. On 16 May, the Californian group Beach Boys released their greatest masterpiece Pet Sounds, which contained the undying classic God Only Knows. This is perhaps a slightly peculiar favorite of mine, especially considering my later development as a music fan, but I could already recognize a melody driven, exceptionally moving pop song when I heard one. A strike of genius from everyone involved.

The next song of 1966 that caught my attention attracted my more psychedelic side. In July, another American Jerry Samuels released the black comedy song They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haa! under the moniker Napoleon XIV. This release gave me new ideas about what one could do with music and a slightly sick sense of humor. And not very much music; mostly his imperial highness just talks. The overall effect was every bit as mesmerizing then as it is now.

Back in the sixties, artists recorded new albums in a way more rapid succession than they do now. So, even though only nine months had passed since the release of Rubber Soul, the Beatles already had a new album coming out. It was released on 5 August, it was called Revolver, and I enjoyed it even more than I had its predecessor.

One of my favorite tracks on Revolver was Tomorrow Never Knows, which already seemed to signal the coming of more psychedelic times. The Beatles were gradually changing from a pop group to something much more complex. But my ultimate favorite was another track on the album, which instantly became my all time favorite song until then. Even now it seems almost incredible that something this accomplished and great was released already in the late summer of 1966, with nothing even remotely similar to precede it. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Eleanor Rigby.

Following this, nothing really felt like, well, anything. Simon & Garfunkel also released another album in 1966, in the autumn, on 10 October. It was called Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme but I felt already at that time that it didn't quite match the magnificence of Sounds of Silence. The opening track, Scarborough Fair / Canticle, is a classic - granted. But the rest of the album left me wanting more of the same quality and that just wasn't present this time.

And this is where we will take a short break. We have now reached the end of 1966, and it wasn't until the following year that things really got under way. Psychedelia was the order of that day, and the first signs of true prog were encountered in the summer of 1967. In the next blog entry, we will reminisce Pink Floyd and one of the greatest debut albums ever made.