Passion Plays

The Rolling Stone readers’ poll on the 10 Best Prog Rock Albums of the 70’s has it all: songs of symphonic length, self-indulgent morality plays, virtuosity, technical wizardry – and absolutely no dancing.

And yes, I had most of these albums.

Prog rock was big in 70’s; probably too big.  So it’s curious that only 5 bands scooped up all 10 spots (2 each for Rush and Genesis, with the grand prize going to Pink Floyd with 4).  Or maybe not, because the albums listed were huge.

Definitely not:  ELP, Focus and Mike Oldfield didn’t age as well.

I might have swapped out Floyd’s Animals for Jethro Tull’s A Passion Play, though.  Tull’s sense of humour with the “Story of the hare that lost his spectacles” bit was kinda funny.  And let’s face it, Animals was hard work.