A word from Prog-Rock pioneers Procol Harum tonight and a session they did for the Top Gear Program at the BBC, hosted by John Peel and recorded on August 19, 1968.

Here's the rundown:

1. Wishing Well
2. Skip Softly (My Moonbeam)
3. Long Gone Geek

Because precious little survived from this period of time at the BBC, some of these recordings are a bit damaged and have abrupt beginnings or endings. Can't be helped. But this one sounds pretty good considering how some others fared under similar circumstances.

At least it's preserved.

After running Gentle Giant last night, it only seems fair to also offer another pioneering band in the genre of Prog-Rock. Caravan actually pre-dates Gentle Giant by a couple of years and was considered right in the middle of the Progressive movement coming out of Canterbury, England. Having initially begun as The Wilde Flowers, members split off to become another Canterbury legend, Soft Machine, as well as Caravan.

Call it the whims of fate or sheer luck, but Soft Machine went on to achieve much greater acclaim than Caravan did, even though they were very much alike musically. Caravan got off to a rough start, signing with a somewhat half-assed record label who not only didn't do much to promote them, but promptly got absorbed by the parent label the year their first album was released (1968). Soft Machine, on the other hand, got the ear and producing abilities of Chas Chandler who in turn landed them on the 1968 Jimi Hendrix tour. The exposure certainly helped.

But Caravan did have a loyal following and have gone on to achieve something of an underrated, largely unappreciated band who, even though they didn't crack the mainstream, became something of a "musician's-musician aggregate", and in that sense they proved very influential to numerous groups throughout the world.

Tonight it's one of their first sessions for the BBC, recorded just around the time their first album for Decca (UK) was released. Recorded for the Top Gear program on August 19, 1970 they cut three tracks:

1. Hello Hello
2. If I Could Do It Again I'd Do It All Over You
3. As I Feel I Die

If you've never heard them before or only heard about them, now's your chance.

I am sure that, had there not been a Gentle Giant getting started in 1970, the Progressive Rock Movement might have taken a different turn, or just not gotten off the ground at all.

Gentle Giant, formed in 1970, immediately hit it off with an audience looking for music to think about. Rock had it's place and it was everywhere, but Progressive was something new - the mixing of Classical and Jazz and elements of Art Rock into music you really didn't want to dance to but sit and listen to.

Tonight's session comes from the BBC John Peel Program, recorded on July 21,1970. It features two tracks, City Hermit and Isn't It Quiet And Cold.

I'm not sure these were issued commercially. I'm familiar with the first three Gentle Giant albums and neither of those tracks ring any bells.

But Gentle Giant were a unique and forward thinking band and that was in short supply in 1970. They were, when they first played a concert, a breath of fresh air. And because of that, many bands considered at the forefront of the Progressive movement cite Gentle Giant as one of the most innovative and influential bands to come along in a very long time.

If you aren't familiar with Gentle Giant but have only heard about them, now's your chance. If you are familiar, maybe these songs will be a new discovery for you.

Either way, you win.

After leaving The Zombies, Rod Argent formed another band and continued the legacy of making memorable music. Argent came about in 1969, and by the time their first album came out in 1970 they had already become something of a household name with critics as well as audiences. Fueled by the advent and expansion of FM into an album-oriented format, Argent was a perfect fit with programmers and it paved the way for a string of successful albums to come out over the next several years.

Tonight it's 3 tracks recorded at the BBC between 1972 and 1973 and it offers further proof that, not only were the band making great records, they were also a great band to hear live.

So here's what's up:

1. Hold Your Head Up - 1972
2. Liar - 1973
3. It's Only Money (Part 2) - 1973

If you aren't familiar with them, by all means check them out. If you remember these tracks, you may not be all that familiar with these versions.

Into some familiar obscure territory for a Friday night with Audience, a band who were almost totally unknown in the U.S. (with the exception of a few underground FM stations at the time), despite some great singles, some really nice albums and good press.

Tonights track was their first single when they were signed in the U.S. by Elektra (they were on The Famous Charisma Label in the UK). Indian Summer got moderate amounts of airplay and did reasonably well (#74 on Billboard) on the charts. They did one or two tours of the U.S. to promote this album (their 3rd) and their final album "Lunch", but they both failed to click. They were however, big in Europe and their home base in the UK and enjoyed a moderate amount of success until their breakup in the mid-1970's.

A distinctive sounding band at the time, with vocals by Howard Werth who sounded remarkably like Van Morrison, they had all the earmarks of a band destined for success. But musical tastes are fickle and they got lost in the shuffle over here.

After their breakup, the band members went off into other groups and Audience was pretty much forgotten about for the next 30 years. But according to their website, Audience have since re-formed and are touring and recording with a new lease on life, via a growing following of the band from earlier recordings - a re-discovery, if you will.

Which just goes to show you that bands never die, they just go off and hide for awhile and let the rest of the world catch up.

When tonight's album came out, a friend of mine put it on the turntable and didn't tell me who it was. Within a few seconds I was convinced it was a track off a new as-yet unreleased Yes album. My friend broadly grinned and handed me the album jacket. Like everybody else he played it for, I was fooled. I was only marginally familiar with Brainbox, really only knowing they had a reputation as a Dutch Psych band who got started in 1968 but didn't make that much in the way of an impression in the States. They were reasonably big in Europe. But this was something else. The psych element was gone and it was replaced by an almost note for note copy of the Yes style, even down to the vocals.

Brainbox still isn't all that familiar with people, but once you tell them their guitarist Jan Akkerman would found Focus only a few months after this album came out, it begins to sound different.

Tonight's track, A Face starts off that last album. Parts didn't sell very well and was only moderately available, since the band broke up shortly after its release. It signaled a dramatic direction change for the band, and it would have been interesting to see where they would eventually go with it had either the album sold well or they just stuck with it. But that wasn't going to happen and the energy soon shifted to Focus and their first album out of the gate was a worldwide smash featuring the hit single "Hocus Pocus" (I was never a fan of the yodeling that was a signature of that track, but I will admit it was catchy).

If you aren't familiar with this group or this track, don't feel left out. Several million probably feel the same way.

But you can still pretend it's an unreleased Yes track.

It's safe to say if the Psych movement hadn't existed a lot of genres of music may never have come about. Because there was such a free form aspect to it, it was possible to jam a bunch of guys together, one who was a Classical musician, another who was a Jazz musician and a die hard Blues fanatic, and put them in the studio and the results were The Nice.

Had The Nice not existed it's also safe to say Prog-Rock might not have taken off the way it did, Emerson Lake and Palmer would never have existed and probably music would be at a dead standstill right about now.

But they did and they were wildly popular, especially in the UK and Europe from the late 1960's until their demise in the early 70's when Emerson, Lake and Palmer emerged from the ashes. Keith Emerson was a founding member of The Nice, and coupled with their musical abilities was a completely off the wall live presentation that made them the stuff of legend for a very long time. As a sidelight, Lemmy, who would later go to pursue his own career with Hawkwind and Motorhead, was a roadie for The Nice and it's been said he was very much inspired by the sheer pyrotechnics of working with the band.

So you see, they got around and their influence was felt in all parts of Rock music.

Tonight's track comes off their first album, The Thoughts Of Emerlist Davjack. The album title is a take-off on all the band members names; Keith Emerson (Emer), Davy O'List (List), Brian Davison (Dav) and Lee Jackson (Jack). Rondo is an 8 minute instrumental that takes off on Dave Brubeck and Vivaldi and tosses in a whole music library along for the ride.

It was the start of what would be a very much traveled road.

(Camel - became one of the more influential bands of the Prog genre)

(it'll be over soon - I promise)
As Pop music began splintering in the million different directions, one of the genres to emerge in the late 1960's through the mid-1970's (or still going in some circles) became known as Progressive or Prog-Rock. Some of the bands were commercial successes (like Yes, eventually Genesis and Emerson, Lake & Palmer among others), but a lot of them achieved moderate success but a bigger influence on other bands. One of those was certainly Camel who, like Caravan and Soft Machine, came out of the Canterbury area of the UK. Camel had been around in various forms since 1964, but it wasn't until 1971 that they achieved their sound (and their name) and their audience came along with them. Even though they influenced a lot of bands from the period, they themselves were greatly influenced by bands like Supersister, the Dutch Prog band who utilized pretty much the same instrumental lineup.

Initially, their first album didn't register with audiences and it wasn't until they changed record labels (from MCA to Deram) and released Mirage in 1974 that they finally clicked. And it's a track off that album we're featuring tonight. Nimrodel is a nine minute opus that, in classic Prog form, weaves in and out of various settings and extended solos. It became a staple of FM Underground programming for a few years and established Camel as a popular band in the U.S. and they spent several months touring from coast to coast and back again in order to achieve that goal (following ELO's lead of non-stop touring, and see where it got them!). They have had a steady popularity ever since, despite several personnel changes and various hiatuses over the years, they are still together.

In retrospect, listening to Camel today I can see why some people initially dismissed the Prog movement as a lot of pretense. There was that "Demons and Wizards" element to much of the subject matter which was a little bit much and lyrics were not a lot of these bands strong points. Primarily, they were instrumental bands that played tight and proficient and there was a lot of virtuosity to go around.

Camel were a great band and were wonderful to see live, and Mirage was a breakthrough album for them. Their musical abilities overshadowed whatever shortcomings they had in their song writing skills during a time when listening to music was, on occasion, an out of body experience.

(Soft Machine - 1972 bore no resemblance to 1967)

By 1972 Soft Machine had undergone so many personnel and musical changes they really weren't the same band that opened for Jimi Hendrix in 1968. Most of the founding members had left. David Allen had been long gone, moving to France and forming Gong. Robert Wyatt had left and formed Matching Mole (which, if you twist it around a little bit, means Soft Machine in French), Kevin Ayers went solo and was enjoying a healthy success.

All in all, the wildly surreal parts of Soft Machine had gone and the hardcore prog/Experimental Jazz parts stayed. It took some getting used to and the band changed so much over the period of 1970-1973 that a lot of their old fan base left, but were replaced by a new one. Soft Machine by this time had blazed a trail in that area between what was later to be known as Progressive (or Prog-Rock) and Experimental and a lot of musicians were influenced by it. Taking the Free Jazz elements and applying them to rock riffs making a new genre that would be prevalent in the early to mid 1970's. And there was no looking back.

This concert, recorded at the Paris Theatre in 1972 comes about at the end of their stay with CBS Records (Soft Machine 3-7) and right in the middle of their free form/extended solo, instrumental period.

Not for all tastes, but from a historic point of view, crucial in what developed into an enduring genre.

(Darryl Way's Wolf - Wonderful reputation, excellent live, but didn't translate to sales)

I can't begin to tell you how many bands throughout the history of Rock started off with the best of reputations, incredible musicianship and fantastic live performances but never clicked with the record buying public. Darryl Way's Wolf were just such a band. Formed in 1972 by Darry Way after the dissolution of Curved Air (a band which may sound familiar to some as an early Stewart Copeland of Police Fame stop-off). he was joined by Ian Moseley, Ian Etheridge and Dek Massacar to form a widely respected but commercially failed band. From 1973-until late 1974, they recorded several albums which were very well received by the critics, but not so much by the public. The band folded and its members went off to several other bands, including Caravan, Soft Machine and later on Marillion.

But tonight's concert is a rare one. It's from the BBC Transcription Service as part of their Stereo Spectacular Series and features a set by Darry Way's Wolf, recorded at their peak in 1973.

Enjoy.