Bruce Springsteen's prog leanings

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you "Jungleland" — wherein Bruce Springsteen goes prog.

That’s right, I said it. Bruce Springsteen, blue-collar hero of meat and potatoes rock and roll, comes up with one of his most beloved songs, featuring multiple distinct sections, abrupt tempo shifts, long instrumental passages, unexpected modulations and an overtly melodramatic storyline. In other words, prog.

Oh, sure, it wouldn’t seem to have a lot in common with ELP or King Crimson, musically. And lyrically it’s got nothing in common with Yes since the lyrics are, you know, comprehensible. ("Mountains come out  of the sky and they stand there" — and that ain't cherrypicking, that's from their most popular song.)

But it’s not far off from what Genesis was doing its last few years with Peter Gabriel—in fact, given the radically different backgrounds of its creators, it really is like the American cousin of Selling England by the Pound’s “Battle of Epping Forest.”

Both take scenarios thoroughly steeped in their own local mythologies—Robin Hood’s old stomping grounds as a setting for a gang war versus the New Jersey Turnpike and a more mundane urban street scene—and craft a relatively straightforward narrative around them, both shot through with violence and ending in death. (SPOILERS!)

There are more than a few differences, of course: for one thing, Peter Gabriel’s lyrics play up the absurdity for comedic effect, and the variety of voices he utilizes only emphasizes that. Springsteen, in contrast, is aiming for high tragedy, complete with heartbreaking catharsis.

But even the names—the Magic Rat and the Maximum Lawman, Liquid Len and Bob the Nob—are of a piece. Both feature slower, softer instrumental intros which burst into uptempo rock and roll. (Well…something kind of approaching some sort of rock and rollian, rock and rollesque approximation, in the case of Genesis.) Both feature prominent keyboard parts as the dominant instrument overall, but “Jungleland” makes outstanding use of Clarence Clemons’ saxophone for its long, arduously composed and recorded solo, the most memorable part of the song—no small feat, given the gorgeous piano and violin intro, or the fine guitar solo, whereas ace Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett was, as all too often, relegated to textures (at which he was exceptional) and mixed too low.

And coincidence that the only time Springsteen released a song like this was in 1975, during the height of prog, when it was pretty much the most popular genre going at the time? And he wouldn’t do anything even remotely approaching it for 35 more years? Nay, I say—I say thee nay.

Which isn’t to say "Jungleland"'s not great, of course. ‘cuz it is, and I say that as someone who admits he’s got a fondness for prog. In fact, one of the big differences between the two songs is their relative quality: "Jungleland" succeeds in everything it tries to do, whereas "Epping Forest" is, as almost all the musicians involved admit, more than a bit of a mess: musically overly busy, even by prog standards, and massively overstuffed lyrically; comparing it to the same albums "Cinema Show" or "Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" make clear how powerful these ingredients can be when mixed in the proper proportions...which they aren't here.

“Jungleland” is epic and sprawling and gorgeous and ambitious and moving and sums up the entire Born to Run album perfectly. It’s the last gasp of a tenacious young kid willing, happy, desperate to try anything, to toss the kitchen sink and anything else he can find into the pot, hoping to discover the ideal medium for his message. He’d find it when recording his next album, and things would pretty much forever be far more stripped down and direct. So enjoy this last gasp of Bruce Springsteen figuring out who he is.  Once he figures that out for sure, things might get even better, maybe, but there’s nothing quite like the rush of a young artist exploding into full promise.

the greatest drum fill in rock history

One of the things that I've learned over the past few weeks is that some people are apparently unaware of the single greatest drum fill in rock and roll history.

It's played by Doctor William Scott Bruford, aka Bill Bruford, formerly of Earthworks, formerly of King Crimson, fomerly of Bruford Levin Upper Extremities, formerly of Anderson Bruford Wakeman and Howe, formerly of Bruford, formerly of UK, formerly of Genesis (touring only), formerly of Yes.  And indeed this is a Yes song, a little-remembered ditty by them known as "Roundabout."

The fill in question occurs at 6:28 of the original recording, but here is it, semi-isolated for your listening pleasure. (I've chosen the version that's got Chris Squire's thunderous bass, and a little bit of Jon Anderson's vocals, for context, but there's also a version that's just Bill Bruford and, yes, entire days have gone by where I've just played his isolated tracks on repeat and so what if I do?)

The clip embedded should start seven measures before the fill, at 6:20. The fill itself lasts for one measure, so you can be prepared for the greatness, which begins at the 6:33 mark.

Here's what la partie de batterie inégalée sounds like without the bass (more or less):

There are at least two different transcriptions of this fill currently online. One looks like this:

while the other like this:

You'll note both agree on the first eight 16th notes, but then diverge as to what he does with the second half of the fill. While I find the first version more aesthetically appealing, the second version sound more correct to me, if still not quite accurate: I think it's correct in its number of bass drum notes, but I think Bruford used two different floor toms, where it only notates one. On the other hand, I've listened to the fill at half speed a dozen times and could never have even made a stab at notating this myself, so I'm probably wrong too and massive props to those devoted and erudite scholars.

Here's the thing that makes this fill so astonishing. First of all, it just is: it's technically difficult, it fits the music, it kicks the music into an even higher gear, and it sounds cool as fuck. But much or most or all of that could be said for so many other drum fills, so why this one? Because while technically difficult, it's far from the most difficult: there are oodles and boodles of fills by jazz and metal drummers which would make this seem rudimentary.

Two main reasons. The first is that it was improvised—unlike many other difficult fills which are planned, written, practiced ahead of time, this is jazz devotee Bill Bruford we're discussing, so this fill was, as with most of his fills, totally spur of the moment, played for that take and that take only, and never repeated. It just came to him as the measure approached, or maybe didn't even, maybe his limbs just took over and that's what happened.

The other thing is that this fill doesn't really sound like Bill Bruford, per se. I mean, it obviously does, and not just because he's playing it. But it's not as typical a fill as, say, the one he plays in the eighth measure of the song:

 

or the brief one shortly before the greatest ever:

I've always loved this other fill, incidentally. It's so short, it's almost like he refuses to do a typical rock fill, just tossing this unexpected bomb off casually, with the crash coming in on the 4 of the bar, rather than the 1 of the next measure, as is far more typical and would therefore be expected. As Bruford once said:

"Surprise, attack, understate, or overstate, but whatever you do, avoid the two cardinal sins of being either boring or predictable."

("And when in doubt, roll.")

But the main fill, the fill we're talking about, doesn't really sound like him. It's not like when Ringo swings a fill, as was his style, even during songs with a straight feel. It's not like a Bonham triplet, which are always awesome. It's not like when Collins plays double-speed at the end of a fill, as he so often did. It's not like when Tony Thompson would end a fill with an accented snare on the 4 at the end of a fill, before crashing on the subsequent 1. It's not like Steve Gadd's fill that kicks "Chuck E.'s in Love" out of the bridge and back into the song, which is so badass and so tasty but quite stylistically typical of Gadd in every way (including being badass and tasty). Those are all awesome and part and parcel of those awesome drummers' awesome styles.

But this ain't that. This fill is atypical of Bruford, it's a one-off, which sounds like nothing he'd ever do again, even as timbrally it sounds so clearly Bruford. Put all those factors together and you've got the single greatest fill in rock history, on a song which has been played to death for 50 years, and yet somehow it still skates by unnoticed.

[For the record, the greatest drum intro ever is, of course, on the Temptations classic "Ain't Too Proud to Beg," played by one of the Funk Brothers drummers—in this case, apparently, Uriel Jones (and not the also amazing Pistol Allen or Benny Benjamin). Unbelievably versatile, musical, tasteful and kickass, it easily beats out, in my mind, also phenomenal intros by the likes of Charles Connor, Ringo Starr, John Bonham, Stevie Wonder, Steve Gadd, Stewart Copeland, Phil Collins, Jeff Porcaro, Larry Mullen Jr, Dave Grohl and so many other brilliant drummers.]

RIP Neil Peart

One of the giants of drumming died today. Apparently Rush drummer Neil Peart had been fighting brain cancer for years and told next to no one. Which is about as Neil Peart a thing as I can imagine.

There have been few big-name drummers who cared more or thought more deeply about drums and drumming than Peart. He may not have had the ability to make odd time signatures swing as effortlessly as Phil Collins, nor Bill Bruford's restless desire to never, ever repeat himself—to name two of the three other major prog rock drummers of the 70s—but no one ever strove for perfection like Peart. He'd spend months writing and rewriting and tweaking and honing and finally recording his parts, wondering if a flam here would be more effective or perhaps a ruff would work better or maybe it should simply be played as clean straight notes. And, of course, once the final part was settled, he'd meticulously recreate it night after night in concert, live, with tens of thousands of adoring eyes on him, and tens of thousands of adoring ears listening to every ghost note, every hi-hat bark, every perfect 32nd note paradiddlediddle.

And Peart, notorious perfectionist owner of staggering technical abilities, every one of which he worked relentlessly at, was open about how often he made mistakes. And, sure, he was almost certainly the only one who ever noticed them, but that's not entirely the point: the point is, he did notice them. And whereas a Collins would think, well, that sucks, but the show must go on, and push it out of his mind, and a Bruford would think, well, that didn't work but was really quite interesting, I wonder if there's anything to be learned from that, Peart would obsess over it, determined to do better next time. And the time after. And the time after.

And few professional musicians have ever dedicated themselves to reinventing their technique as late in their career as he did in the 90s, studying with master instructor Freddie Gruber, and changing up his approach to the drums—an idea which would have have been, was, beyond absurd to the generations of drummers would have given their left splash cymbal to have had half Peart's original technique.

But when I think of Neil Peart's drumming, I don't think of the title track to 2112, or the beloved instrumentals like "YYZ" or "La Villa Strangiato," I think about "Spirit of Radio," both because it's one of his finest lyrics, and most of all, because of the sense of humor and obvious love for music that comes through in every measure.

There are places where he seems to almost anticipate the gospel chops of the next century in his (perhaps Steve Gadd-inspired) linear fills, and it changes time signatures more often than most drummers change their socks, but it's the places where for measures on end he plays...the bass drum. Just unadorned quarter notes on the kick drum. The kind of thing he could have played after one lesson as a kid. Hell, the kind of thing he could have played before taking a single lesson. But it was right for the music, so monster drummer Neil Peart—who wrote the part—played the simplest thing possible. What's more, besotted (as the rest of the band was, along with pretty much everyone in the world was) at the time by the Police (and in Peart's case specifically the playing of the band's utterly dissimilar Stewart Copeland), he goes into...reggae. About as un-prog-like a musical style as is imaginable. But it felt right, it fit the song, so into reggae they went, by god.

Sure, there are those other parts where it goes into 7/4, 'cuz hey, that too fit. (And most amusing of all, when the song leaves 7/4 and goes back into 4/4, that's actually the measure which feels wonkiest, as the beat is displaced, ala "Sunshine of Your Love" or "Bell Bottom Blues." A tricksy bagginses, that Peart.)

The world has moved on. And we're unlikely to see the likes of a prog god like Neil Peart ever achieve mass popularity again. So pour one out for the reclusive percussionist, even though he'd probably hate it.

Owner of a Lonely Heart

I am amazed by this video. Amazed that it took me nearly 40 years to witness its majestic awfulness. Amazed that this was made by the same band at roughly the same time as the other video they did for the same song—a video that would be (justifiably) played to death by MTV. Amazed that they decided to cut away from Trevor Rabin just as he's about to sing the echo to the title in the chorus. Amazed by the comments it's engendered:

That looks like something a junior-high school band did for their drummer's aunt's public access cable TV show.

"MOVE YOURSELF."
Hardly moves

The ratio of awesome music to awkward visuals is staggering

No parrot has been harmed in the making of this video, several stylists and visual artists died during production though.

The setting sucks. Was the whole budget spent on the parrots?

Mom! Dad's singing in the living room again.

The singer even looks like he rushed from his summer job at the Thrifty Drug ice cream counter and forgot to take his nametag off.

If you mute it, the singer appears to be a daytime kids TV presenter talking over educational concepts for the kids who were too ill to go to school.

When every contestant in the "world's least cool man" competition wins!

Holy shit this is bad. They must have felt amazing in the studio: "look Trevor Horn is making us sound like the future". And then they made this.

Good god that’s awful. I couldn’t get through the whole thing but assume the sand worm from Beetlejuice came along and ate all of them.

Now I know why so many serial killers like prog rock

I mean...just look at this thing. Are any of those comments wrong? Or even unfair?

(Okay, this one may be a little unfair. But funny!)

I feel sorry for their lonely hut. Someone should move in.

Follow You, Follow Me

I was reading a discussion the other day about who the greatest prog keyboardist of the 70s was: Keith Emerson or Rick Wakeman? And what about Patrick Moraz? Where does he fit in?

I don't nearly enough about keyboards or Emerson to have any kind of an educated opinion. I know I certain prefer both Wakeman's and Moraz's playing, given that Close to the Edge is absolutely one of my favorite albums ever, and Fragile's not far behind, and for that matter, I have recently come to appreciate Relayer despite the fact that Bill Bruford doesn't play on it, but he didn't play on the two albums he made with Moraz and I like those too. Meanwhile, I've never had much desire to hear any ELP beyond what was frequently on the radio and didn't even enjoy that handful of tunes all that much.

Still, there's no question that when it comes to technique, Wakeman, Emerson and Moraz stand head and shoulders above the other most famous prog keyboardists, Tony Banks and Rick Wright, and that's assuming you even consider Pink Floyd a prog band. (You should.) Both are certainly fine players, but neither come close to the kind of technical excellence so freely displayed by Wakeman and Emerson.

And yet. For all their unquestioned chops, and for all I adore Close to the Edge and it and Fragile have enriched my life, I have never heard Rick Wakeman play anything as lovely, as melodious, as absolutely perfect for its setting as the solo Banks plays from 2:49-3:10, never mind Keith Emerson.

And we haven't even touched about the stuff he wrote with Genesis—which is to say, most of Genesis' output. (That's at least a slight exaggeration. Sometimes he only co-wrote stuff.) But, I mean, "Cinema Show"? "Apocalypse in 9/8"? "After the Ordeal"? I mean.

So. Best keyboardist? By most criteria, Banks isn't even close to being in the running. But I would surely pick just about anything he ever wrote with Genesis over not only just about anything ever written by Wakeman or Emerson, I'd pick just about anything he's ever written over just about everything written by those guys.

(Full disclosure: Rick Wakeman seems like he's been pretty much one of the coolest guys on the planet since at least Hunky Dory.)

RIP John Wetton

First Chris Squire, then Greg Lake and now John Wetton. The list of great prog bassists from the 70s is getting mighty short. (Mike Rutherford and Roger Waters, you guys take care of yourselves, hear?)

Wetton had an interesting career. After being in perhaps King Crimson's finest lineup—with sincere apologies to the early 80s version—he toured with Roxy Music and then joined the big at the time but seemingly now virtually forgotten Uriah Heep, before forming prog supergroup UK with old Crimson bandmate Bill Bruford. When that didn't pay off with the kind of financial windfall many were expecting, he tried again, this time with Yes guitarist Steve Howe, Yes and Buggles keyboardist Geoff Downes and of course prog rock's answer to Buddy Rich, Carl Palmer. And boom: the money finally rolled in.

It wasn't really prog, of course, more like AOR pop rock, and that's fine; there's never too much catchy music around. But it was easy to forget just what a fine musician Wetton was when he was playing material as catchy but unchallenging to someone as proficient as he. So to remember him, we're going with this odd one-off supergroup, combining Steve Hackett, guitarist for almost all of the best Genesis albums, Ian McDonald, a member of the first King Crimson incarnation, later founding member of Foreigner, and the writer of this song, Chester Thompson, former drummer for Weather Report and Frank Zappa and, of course, touring drummer for Genesis, and Wetton himself.

Kayleigh/Lavender

Despite this being apparently the largest crowd Marillion ever appeared in front of, I'd never seen this footage before. The size of audience is staggering for just about any act, but for a second or third generation prog rock band? Crazy. But what's also notable is just how much the crowd clearly knows and loves the material—and their enthusiasm is extra impressive, given that it appears to be a hot sunny summer day and the audience looks to be absolutely baking—don't even try to count the number of cases of serious sunburn. I suspect the medical tent, if there was one available, was packed.

The next thing that hits is is just what a shitty frontman Fish is here. He's got the de rigueur 80s accouterments, with the Bowie/Gabriel/Adam Ant painted face, the Springsteen/Knopfler headband, the t-shirt with the arms cutoff, despite the fact that he's not exactly sporting a Springsteen/Sting-like physique, to put it mildly. (As the owner of a similar spare tire, I'm at least somewhat sympathetic.) But rather than putting on a show, ala Springsteen or Fish's spirit animal Peter Gabriel, he just sorta...bobs and weaves slightly, like a punch drunk fighter just trying to pick up one last paycheck on a lousy undercard. More than anything, his moves seriously resemble an earnest high school student aiming for immortality at the year end talent show.

What's more, it looks—and, sadly, sounds—as though his monitor goes a bit on the fritz during "Lavender,"as he seems to start having some problems hearing himself. As he's already avoiding some of the highest notes in "Kayleigh," this is unfortunate.

And yet the thing is, the strength of Steve Rothery's guitar lines and Ian Mosley powerful, intricate and yet tasteful drumming, combined with the sheer quality of the material carries the day.

Who told you so, dilly, dilly, who told you so? 
'Twas my own heart, dilly, dilly, that told me so.

Roundabout

In case you ever wondered what classic rockers sound like when they're asleep.

If you made it all the way through all 27 minutes of that without falling asleep yourself, you're a far stronger (or more caffeinated) person than I.

Two Sides of Peter Banks

Oh, 1970s—I do love you so.

Reason #293788: please to consider Two Sides of Peter Banks, a 1973 solo album by the late Peter Banks, the original guitarist for Yes, before he was booted aside in favor of Steve Howe. It's a lovely instrumental collection, with contributions from the like of Phil Collins and Steve Hackett, then both of Genesis, and John Wetton, then of King Crimson. Check out this, "The White Horse Vale: On the Hill/Lord of the Dragon," the LP's second track: note the Ye Olde Englishe track name and subtitles. Check the lute-like guitaring. It's pretty and engaging...and then 0:49 rolls around.

Fonky! Even Merrie Olde Englande couldn't escape the inexorable pull of the wah-wah in the early 1970s. It rears its funked-out head, like a badass pastoral Putin in a gritty urban environment, then drops back, but its presence is never fully forgotten, its magnetism too damn strong.

But we're not done! Wait until 2:57! Why, if that ain't a powerfully familiar damn riff—a riff Banks always claimed he himself had written. And the accompanying guitar cries, the volume fading up and down—a hallmark of his successor—shows that he may have gotten passed over by the band he helped create, but he wasn't going quiet.