The 25 Best Progressive Rock Songs of All Time: Part Two
Sean Murphy20. King Crimson, “Red” The progenitors of math rock on their last album of the ’70s. Red is the paradigm that every pointy-headed prog rock band worships at the altar…
The 25 Best Progressive Rock Songs of All Time: Part One
Really Don't Mind If You Sit This One Out... Progressive rock came and went, but opinions differ on what specific years it covered and which artists epitomize it. Perhaps this…
Mozart and Mahler, Klezmer Style Courtesy of Uri Caine
I've been holding on to these clips for a while, but today, on the one hundredth anniversary of Mahler's death, it seems appropriate to celebrate them. From Symphony no. 5,…
King Crimson: In the Wake of Poseidon (40th Anniversary Series)
Considering that the only constant within King Crimson was change, the quality of their early albums is, in hindsight, even more remarkable. Poised to conquer the world, or at least…
14 Songs For Turning 41
To know the man, get to know his music. (Or, to paraphrase Al Pacino in Serpico, "If you love the man's music, you have to love the man!") There are…
Progressive Rock With a Capital P: Traffic’s ‘John Barleycorn Must Die’
One difficulty with talking intelligently about much of the amazing music made in the ‘70s is that it is so often lazily lumped together. Classic Rock, Progressive Rock, Freedom Rock,…
Robert Johnson: The Centennial of an American Genius
Does any single figure loom as large over an art form as Robert Johnson? Bach and Shakespeare come to mind, but classical music, like literature, took centuries and multiple…
What’s It All About, Then? Part Four: Jazz, Featuring McCoy Tyner
It occurs to me that I've said little, on the record, about McCoy Tyner. This is a shame, since he is one of my all-time favorite musicians and a case…
No One Has Ever Done Anything as Well as John Coltrane Played the Saxophone (Revisited)
The question isn’t, really, about who might be interested in this documentary; it is about who might not be. For fans who already know everything, or those indifferent to jazz…
The Dead Kenny Gs: Operation Long Leash
I have a dream. If I could get some of what I envision, we would live in a world where peace, love, and understanding wasn’t funny. The Wall Street miscreants…