Progressive Rock

Speaking of horns, someone once told me they auditioned a heap of speakers using The Black Album by Metallica. The best speakers were the Klipsch RF-7 and apparently they were better than a lot more expensive audiophile speakers. But of course these speakers would be lacking a whole lot of refinement for other genres of music.

Agithos, I had heard about the Klipsch RF-7s and auditioned them LOUD. The horn tweeters sounded more live than my Energys, but not enough to warrant the additional expense. Which again, brings me back to my point of "diminishing returns". However, they did sound more refined than I had expected. In fact I read where alot of Klipsch fans where disappointed and complaining that this speaker was a "sell out", sounded to high end, etc..

In the 70's i listented to a lot of prog (still do to a lesser extent now) and the best system i assembled for that was vinyl based with a pair of old Klipsch Cornwalls. The dynamic responce of the horns was great for rock music. I have to admit i had them set up terribly for overall accuracy (stuffed perfectly into the corners to get all the bass i could) but i can still remember a couple of tunes on the Genesis live album (afterglow being one of them) where i could feel bass more than hear it. When you consider that colisium pa's provided the sonic reference point accuracy wasn't really all that big of an issue anyway.

My Dunlavys rock (my vandersteens didn;t) but they don't have quite the dynamics of the horns nor the bass thump of a 15. There is a distinct difference between a speaker hitting a low note with accuracy and moving a lot of air with that note. It's moving the air that provides the impact, thus the multi folded 18 in subs in live rock shows. My Dunlavys have a 10 in driver that will get into the 30 hz range pretty solidly but they don't hit you in the chest doing it. I think that is where some of the accurate speakers work well for more controlled music like jazz where they may seem to fall apart for rock (or big orchestral works). Trying to get the viseral impact from a speaker not designed to provide it usually results in everything being played too loud and the overall result suffering.

Yes9 says "The reason I asks is that I attended the Home Entertainment show last month in NYC. And not one of the rooms I visited were playing rock of any kind - and they did not seem receptive to taking request - especially at the volume I would need to hear before plunking down oh say $12,000 for a pair of speakers. "

You should have visited my room (Sonic Spirits - rm 1018)! We were more than happy playing CDs brought by visitors or playing requests if we had something someone wanted to hear. Off the top of my head, we played the following pretty frequently during the show:

Prodigy - "Firestarter"
Billy Idol - "Rebel Yell"
Steppenwolf - "Magic Carpet Ride"
The Clash - "London Calling"
Van Halen - "You Really Got Me"
The Who - "Pinball Wizard"
Jeff Beck - "Goodbye Porkpie Hat"
Stevie Ray Vaughn - "Tin Pan Alley" and "Pride and Joy"
Eric Johnson - "Cliffs of Dover"

Rock CDs brought by visitors included stuff by U2, Traffic, the Doors, Rush, Yes, CCR, Hendrix...

And we didn't have any issues with turning up the volume at a vistor's request... :-)

Porcupine tree....that's all I have to say. this band, to describe them in words as my roommate said the other day: "they got everything I love about music into a single band"
for those not familiar with the band (especially those of you who just heard in absentia and deadwing) go check the rest of Wilson's catalog. STeve is very prolific, he's got tons of projects out there and all of them are amazing. some examples:
Blackfield
IEM
Bass communion "ghosts on magnetic tapes"
No-man "returning Jesus" and "together we're strangers".

So he was the guy behind Blackfield too? I have only heard Blackfield and Porcupine Tree by listening to some internet streaming prog rock stations

Bumping up this prog rock thread, especially in light of "The Musical Box" playing in Baltimore next week.

So he was the guy behind Blackfield too? I have only heard Blackfield and Porcupine Tree by listening to some internet streaming prog rock stations

The "Blackfield" cd is a must have - it has excellent sonics, and the music is all excellent.

If you like Porcupine Tree and Pink Floyd check out a new British band called Pure Reason Revolution. Their new disc "The Dark Third" is my personal album of the year and has phenomenal sonics as well.

Ken Golden
The Laser's Edge

Kartracer,
I just saw The Musical Box at the Tower Theater in Philadelphia on October the 20th. Aside from enjoying them, I use them as my reference in upgrading and tuning my system. You may also be interested in this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/6064022.stm
Sorry that the link didn't paste as intended but is worth the look. Matt.....

I use Porcupine Tree's Voyage 34 (the reissue sucks BTW) as a demo at CES and other audio shows that we do (like the recent RMAF). I also demo with ELP's first LP (pink Island edition...), Boards of Canada, Infinity Project (Mystical Experiences) and a lot more- all on LP.

The idea that a system should be built around that is a different matter- in fact the system cannot be built around *any* type of music- rather it must be awesome with *all* types of music! On this I am emphatic; if a system is good with one type of music and not another then something about it sucks and needs fixing.

What defines progressive aprt from classic. I listen to 99% rock from eagles, Aerosmith, Seeger, Fleetwood Mac, Who, and such more modern groups like, Everclear, Train, Cold Play (their CDs area terrible Mix), Nicleback (don't have any CDs as they sound very compressed). My system is built around Vandersteen 2CE sigs. When i bought speakers it was between those and some Maggie 1.6s. While the Maggies seemed to be very tonally accurate, they did not have the punch that the Vandys had. I thought that the Vandys would sound better on the type of music that I listen to so I chose them.

'The Billboard Guide to Progressive Music' authored by Bradley Smith. Billboard books, an imprint of Watson-Guptill publications, New York. 1997.

Believe it or not, I paid 25 cents for it, in one of those bargain bins at a local drug store, London Drugs.

Anyways, for the true progressive fan, it is indispensable. There is so much info on bands, albums, studios, etc. It has in depth overviews, key recordings, 100 classic recordings, different prog. music styles, top space recordings, best sounding recordings, etc. It will even tell you how to obtain the music. All is in easy alphabetical order.

While I am not necessarily the biggest prog. fan, I am a huge Floyd fan. This book opens up and exposes you to so many other bands, you really had (me anyways) no idea how big and popular a genre it is.

Here is a sample from the 100 classic recordings: (in no particular order)
Pink Floyd, Animals
Emerald Web, Traces of Time
Jethro Tull, Thick as a Brick
King Crimson, Lizard
Throbbing Gristle, D.O.A.

The best recorded: (in no particular order)
Yes, Fragile
Genesis, Wind and Wuthering
Massacre, Killing Time
Jethro Tull, Thick as a Brick

Just thought some might find this interesting.