Wondrous Stories – 33 Artists That Shaped the Prog Rock Era
Wondrous Stories – 33 Artists That Shaped the Prog Rock Era could just have easily been called Wondrous Stories – A Beginners Guide to Prog Rock; or Wondrous Stories – Prog Rock by Numbers; or even less charitably Wondrous Stories – A Cynical Attempt to Cash-in on the Recent Prog Rock Resurgence.
Some might think the latter title unfair. I certainly would, as this double CD makes no claims to being the last word in progressive rock compilations, or even one for the seasoned prog aficionado. In fact, I wish I’d never typed it now, but my delete key’s playing up so I can’t ryub ti tout…
Wondrous Stories – An Exercise in Prog Rock Predictability would be completely unfair, however. Unfair and wrong. As even though the artists included on here are fairly typical, some of the song choices aren’t.
Take for instance the Yes track, ‘Wondrous Stories’. One has to wonder whether it was picked simply to give the compilation a punchy title. Granted, they’re not going to put twenty minutes of ‘Close to the Edge’ on here, but surely they could’ve found something better from the glory days of Fragile or The Yes Album, more representative of the band’s space-prog sound. Of course, licensing issues may also have played a part here, but let’s gloss over that factor, as it threatens to ruin my entire argument.
Aphrodite’s Child is another case in point. If we’re going with safe bets, surely ‘Magic Mirror’ or ‘Rain and Tears’ would’ve been the expected choice, but here we have the excellent ‘The Four Horsemen’, taken from their third album, the biblically epic 666. A brave choice and one we should salute the compiler for. As also with the inclusion of Collosseum’s ‘The Kettle’, Gong’s ‘Perfect Mystery’, and the occasional less prominent act, such as Kansas and Mountain.
What we shouldn’t be saluting the compiler for is the digging up of Rush’s godawful ‘The Spirit of Radio’ and Marillion’s ‘Kayleigh’. I have to admit I’ve not listened to any Marillion, but would the radio-friendly toss that is ‘Kayleigh’ – a song I unfortunately remember from its original release and soft-focus MOR video – really be how Fish and co. would want themselves introduced to the prog tentative/curious audience that this compilation seems to be aimed at? A word of advice, if you find yourself listening to the aforementioned ‘Kayleigh’ and feel the urge to hold your lighter aloft whilst swaying, why not empty the fluid over yourself and strike a match. It’ll be a good deal less painful in the long run.
Which brings us to business as usual, pretty much everything else on here, which ticks the predictability box for both artist and track, even if the running order seems to have been arranged by someone in a desperate hurry to be elsewhere. As this is only a review copy, the finished arrangement may be subject to change, but Marillion’s ‘Kayleigh’, followed by Procol Harum’s ‘Whiter Shade of Pale’, followed by Renaissance’s ‘Northern Lights’, followed by the The Moody Blues ‘Nights in White Satin’, is as disorientating as that last sentence.
Expect to hear Jethro Tull’s ‘Living in the Past’, Supertramp’s ‘Crime of the Century’, Hawkwind’s ‘Silver Machine’ and Rick Wakeman’s ‘Catherine of Aragorn’. Atomic Rooster’s ‘Tomorrow Night’, Emerson, Lake and Palmer’s ‘Fanfare for the Common Man’, the Edgar Winter Group’s ‘Frankenstein’ and Peter Gabriel’s ‘Solsbury Hill’ are also here, rubbing the shoulders of inevitability with the aforementioned Moody and Harum tracks.
All good stuff, if as familiar as a drunken weekend in Blackpool. Which is exactly what Wondrous Stories aims for. It’s not meant for the weathered prog vet; those that can name, off the top of their head, every band Bill Bruford has ever been in, or listen to a Jade Warrior album without slipping into a coma. At least, I hope it’s not. Universal’s excellent Time Machine – A Vertigo Retrospective is a much better bet for that.
Instead, Wondrous Stories – 33 Artists That Shaped the Prog Rock Era is a nice and easy jump-off point for anybody whose dander has been tickled by the recent revival of 70′s prog and is looking for a base station from which to delve a little deeper. FFS it even has a specially commissioned Roger Dean cover.
Wondrous Stories – 33 Artists That Shaped the Prog Rock Era is released by a Universal Music and available from Amazon.co.uk
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The advert on telly mentions ‘Focus’ and clearly plays a snatch of ‘Hocus Pocus’….which is not on the album?
Hi Rob. The review copy I was sent didn’t contain ‘Hocus Pocus’, but a reviewer at Amazon claims it’s on the second disc before Peter Gabriel’s ‘Solsbury Hill’. It also has a different cover, listing other artists that don’t appear. As far as I know I was sent the finished version, but there seems to have been a fuck up somewhere along the line as to what’s being advertised, and what you’re getting for your hard-earned.
I have the album, the ordering has changed from your copy and it does indeed have focus hocus pocus as track 1 of dusc 2. Great album too
I have a European original copy, and Solsbury Hill is the 1st song on disc 2. Hocus Pocus is the 3 rd song on the 2nd disc. I’m told there’s also a deluxe 4-CD version of the album.
It all seems to have been a very confusing launch, with ‘Hocus Pocus’ added at the last minute to cash in on its use in the Nike World Cup ad. God knows how many different versions there are out there now.
There is indeed a 4-disc version though, which I think digs a little deeper into the grounds of progressive rock and doesn’t just rely on the universally known single releases.
The 4 disk and 2 disk have totally different tracks according to the Amazon listings, I attempted to go through and cross reference but could only find 4 songs in common between them and then I give up (so it could be a bit more of a cross over).
Very odd, I’m thinking of getting both as £30 for 6 CDs isn’t that bad…