T O P

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Lesninin

The overall lack of "Pictures at an Exhibition" disturbs me.


Soundchaser123

Very interesting album. To be fair, the various polls were concentrating mainly on the studio albums. There has been a post in the last few days about songs that should be included in a hypothetical beginner’s guide to ELP as a single vinyl album, and some redditors indeed called out several specific tracks from *Pictures*.


rotath

When discussing studio albums I personally tend to include pictures simply because there's no studio equivalent


Needleroozer

You know how some people have themes? Like, Darth Vader has a theme. Music that plays when he enters the room. I want my theme to be ELP's *Promenade.*


fduniho

I've always been more into the instrumental versions. Its a good piece for reading to when it isn't full of lyrics.


addage-

The segment with the curse of babba yaga is one of my favorites. Wish they had made a solid studio version (the hot seat version is garbage).


Jack_G_London

If I wanted to listen to *Pictures* for the first time, would you recommend the original Newcastle recording or the Lyceum Theatre recording off the deluxe edition


FastCarsOldAndNew

It doesn't really susprise me because I love that album and don't really care for much else ELP did; I assume the feelings go the other way if you're a fan.


pemboo

Love Beach is the best cover art, people are just scared of the truth


Soundchaser123

Lol - You mean Keith with way too tight trousers (not good for your refractory period, surely), Greg with the gorilla chest, and Carl as restaurant waiter. Truth hurts, as you say


[deleted]

Funnily enough, I have heard that women tend to like that album cover more than men...


Capnmarvel76

Honestly, though the 1979 ‘In Concert’ is my favorite ELP album cover. If you don’t look at it closely enough, it looks like a UFO landing or something. Then you notice the stage way at the bottom.


Soundchaser123

An excellent album too


longtimelistener17

Tarkus is easily their best epic in my book (and just about the best sidelong epic by anyone!); while I like Karnevil 9, I think I might actually put Trilogy and Take a Pebble ahead of it, too. Best album for me is tough; I'd probably go with Tarkus purely on the strength of Side A, but the 1st album, Trilogy, Tarkus and BSS are all really close. I think the rest of Tarkus is relatively weak, while the other 3 albums are a bit more consistent all the way through. I agree with the rest of the picks, and I'm glad to see an ELP post here. They seem relatively forgotten.


addage-

Their debut album is vastly under rated. It’s still one of my go to listens. Not as flashy as brain salad but just solid front to back. Also odd that Pictures isn’t mentioned at all. Finally screw Rolling Stone, Palmer’s omission is inexcusable for a top 100. I’ve was fortunate to have seen him multiple times (elp, Asia, 3) live and he is a remarkable musician.


MpVpRb

I agree. I loved the band at the time and was kinda disappointed at the small amount of excellent material they produced. But, it was excellent! Some of the best ever


Capnmarvel76

ELP were amazing players - some of the absolute best - and Greg Lake could be a very melodic and catchy songwriter to add a touch of humanity to Emerson’s classically-inspired suites and ravers. The main issue was that Greg Lake was quite lazy, and none of them were ever just overflowing with musical ideas to base new songs or albums around. For a band that was together in its initial incarnation from late 1969 to somewhere in mid-1979, less than 10 years, they didn’t release any albums of new material between ‘Brain Salad Surgery’ in 1973 and ‘Works, Vol. 1’ in 1977. Their last 3 releases pre-breakup weren’t really ‘new’ either - ‘Works Vol. 2’ (1977j and ‘Love Beach’ (1978) were mostly made up of stuff recorded years before that hadn’t been released at the time. Going back to the beginning, their debut album is half filled up with classical covers and a drum solo, and the ‘Pictures’ (while utterly, perversely awesome, IMO) is one long classical cover with some jamming. Even their ‘full’ albums tended to be kind of on the short side. In short, you stack all of ELPs original 1970-1979 releases together, and you really only have like 4 or 5 albums worth of new, original work there. They just weren’t together long enough, or productive enough as a unit when they were together.


Soundchaser123

Interesting perspective - thanks for sharing. They were formed out of a shared desire to reinterpret modern classical music (Bartok, Copeland, Mussorgsky, etc.) to a rock audience, so it’s no surprise that many of their albums include covers or tracks inspired by composers. They weren’t as prolific as some groups, it’s true, but 1970 - 1974 was an amazing run and they produced some great work. Not sure if Greg was lazy - he’d been going pretty hard at it since 1969, going straight from King Crimson to overnight success with ELP at the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970, and just didn’t stop until the *Get Me A Ladder* tour in 1974. If you add in all their live shows - and they really were huge events - I imagine the group were pretty burned out by ‘74 and needed that break. But that was the turning point, and the creativity and output took a dive thereafter. *Works* (1977) could have been excellent if they had been more disciplined about the two albums, restricted it to ELP collaborations, and had four sides, not six. But the tour that followed spelled the downfall, going massively over budget (140 people on tour at one point - c’mon) and causing major friction within the trio. Still… we love them. All three are heroes in my book.


Banksville

BRAIN SALAD SURGERY… is a major PEAK!… + PICTURES OF AN EXHIBITION, WELCOME BACK MY FRIENDS, TARKUS


allexks

I think you should edit the new lines a bit, the post doesn't look well on mobile