Niamh the Prog Nerd - Vinyl Tag 2021 (but with CDs! and...cassettes)
In the past few years I've begun subscribing to a number of YouTube channels themed around physical music collecting, music discussions, album rankings etc. I've been following these channels and watching videos while I've expanded my own collection. I was originally a heavy metal fan, and during the 90s and 00s I started listening and buying to a lot of alternative/indie rock, and then classic rock. In the past ten years, I've started to get heavily into progressive rock. There are some great channels focusing on these genres which I'll do a blog post in the future about.
I started buying my own music with my pocket money in the late 1980s. Of course, back then it was all physical format rather than streaming/downloads/digital. My format of choice initially was cassette so my early purchases were all on cassette tape. In about the mid 1990s I started buying CDs, and I've never stopped collecting albums in this format despite the advent of digital downloads. I've never bought any vinyl, despite vinyl revival- it's just a way of listening to music that I never really took to, and record players and vinyl records require much more maintenance and care than CDs do. So, I haven't jumped on board the vinyl bandwagon as yet.
Despite that, I'm going to do my response to a Youtuber called "Niamh the Prog Nerd" who has 23 questions about people's progressive rock collections as a 'vinyl tag':
I'm going to cheat though- firstly, I'm going to do it with CDs (and cassettes); as Fairly Secret Music (another awesome Youtube channel by the way) did in his response:
1. An 80s prog record from a band that formed in the 80s
2. An album by a three piece band
3. A Canterbury Scene record
4. An impulse buy record
5. An album people wouldn’t suspect that you own
6. An album with great keyboard work
7. An album by a non-prog band that made a ‘proggy’ album
8. The album that got you into progressive rock
9. Pick an album from a discography of 5 or less album
10. An album you HAVE to crank the volume up for
11. A chill out album
12. An album you play when you’re angry
13. An album you have more than one copy of
14. An instrumental album
15. An album by a band you love that disappointed you
16. An album that sounds better on CD
17. A new prog rock discovery
18. An album you had to buy the deluxe edition for
19. Triple albums: pick one STUDIO and one LIVE triple album
20. An album with the best bass
21. An album you have pre-ordered
22. The first album you ever bought
23. An album by a band more people should know about
And my responses are...
1. An 80s prog record from a band that formed in the 80s
I'm going to go with 'progressive metal' and pick Dream Theater, who formed in 1985 and released the album When Dream and Day Unite in 1989:
2. An album by a three piece band
This would also have qualified as an answer to the first question. I'm picking an album by the Texas trio Kings X, "Out of the Silent Planet":
3. A Canterbury Scene record
I'll pick Steve Hillage's band Khan and their album "Space Shanty":
4. An impulse buy record
The answer to 3. also relates to this answer. After listening to "Space Shanty", on impulse I recently bought an album by another Steve Hillage project, Arzachel. This is their only album (not listened to it yet).
5. An album people wouldn’t suspect that you own
I own this CD of Turkish Anatolian belly-dance music, that I purchased in Istanbul.
This is a standard choice but in prog can't look beyond the great late Keith Emerson on Emerson, Lake & Palmer's "Tarkus":
7. An album by a non-prog band that made a ‘proggy’ album
Do Opeth count? They have now made a number of 'prog rock' albums, when originally they were a metal band. Of their proggy albums I'll pick Sorceress
8. The album that got you into progressive rock
The first 'prog rock' album that I bought was Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. Pink Floyd and Rush were the first 'prog' bands I listened to.
9. Pick an album from a discography of 5 or less album
This was a difficult one within my collection for prog bands, and I had already picked a couple that qualify. In the end I went for a French psychedelic space rock band called Slift. I think they only have a couple of albums and an EP. I have one of theirs, Ummon.
10. An album you HAVE to crank the volume up for
A lot of albums in other genres qualify but within progressive rock I think Red by King Crimson sounds great if you turn it up to 11
11. A chill out album
I think Wake of the Flood by the Grateful Dead is a moody, reflective chill-out album.
12. An album you play when you’re angry
I couldn't pick a progressive rock album for this question. There's only one album for 'angry' and that's Megadeth's debut album. This is the 2018 reissue/remix of Killing is my Business...and Business is Good...The Final Kill
13. An album you have more than one copy of
This is also non-progressive rock. I have more than one copy of Gentle Giant Octopus; Rush Farewell to Kings, and some Iron Maiden albums but Rush and Maiden I want to use for a later question. I'm going to pick Oasis Definitely Maybe because I have three copies of it. My original cassette from 1994; a standard CD version I bought in 2011 and a deluxe 3CD version I bought in 2014. It's not so amazing that you have to have it three times, but just the way it turned out.
14. An instrumental album
This was a recent prog find. PFM, Stati di Immaginazione
15. An album by a band you love that disappointed you
I really like Genesis, with Peter Gabriel/Steve Hackett and even also during a lot of the Phil Collins as front-man era. This is their worst album, I think.
16. An album that sounds better on CD
Everything I have is on CD. I will cheat and select a classic rock compilation because I have it on both cassette and CD. And it definitely sounds better on CD. The Best of The Doors
17. A 'new' prog rock discovery
I recently bought Phantasmagoria by Curved Air. They are a 1970s progressive rock band of course, but I only just started listening to them.
18. An album you had to buy the deluxe edition for
I have Rush, Farewell to Kings in standard CD format too but I decided to buy the 40th anniversary deluxe edition with live CDs (performances from 1978) and some cover versions by other bands included:
19. Triple albums: pick one STUDIO and one LIVE triple album
I don't own any progressive rock triple albums, studio or live, in CD format. So I had to turn to classic rock for The Beatles - White Album (triple studio CD with the Esher Demos included) and Led Zeppelin's How The West Was Won (triple live CD).
20. An album with the best bass
In progressive rock, I will go for Yes, Fragile featuring the playing of the late, great Chris Squire:
21. An album you have pre-ordered
I have to cheat here, I have nothing on pre-order at the moment. I did put a new box set from Cherry Red Records, Rare Bird's Beautiful Scarlet: The Recordings 1969-75 on pre-order from them a couple of months ago. It's already arrived but it was the last pre-order I made and was waiting for.
22. The first album you ever bought
The first album I ever chose to buy for myself, with my pocket money, was Killers by Iron Maiden. This is the original cassette I bought in the late 1980s, which I still own.
23. An album by a band more people should know about
More people should check out Haken, a British progressive-metal band. This is their latest release, the appropriately titled Virus.
Those are my answers! I've decided I am going to do more music-themed and music-related blog posts, in addition to literary, fiction and writing posts and articles; so look out for all of those.
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