Ian Anderson named the “pompous” prog-rock bands he liked most
Prog-rock is a bit daft, let’s all be honest. Even as a fan of the genre, I can’t sit here and honestly say that there isn’t an ounce of ridiculousness about the genre.
After a fateful afternoon as a teenager where a family friend introduced me to Yes and Frank Zappa, I was instantly lost to a world of high fantasy and piss jokes. That was it; my entire adolescence, reframed by the sheer audacity of the musicianship and creativity that I’d been exposed to. It wasn’t going to help me make any friends at school, but I frankly couldn’t care less, because I had my silly little music to keep me happy.
And yet, the further down this rabbit hole I ventured, the more I began to realise how the artists I was discovering, and their fanbases, weren’t always having fun with the genre. In fact, they were deadly serious. Songs about prancing through forests with elves were no joke to real prog fans, and nor were the complex polyrhythms and sprawling multi-part opuses. This was elitist music, and if you weren’t going to take it seriously, then you weren’t going to be welcome here.
The thing is, that’s how a lot of people perceive prog rock from the outside, but in actuality, it’s far more nuanced than this, and there are certainly plenty of acts who knew how to have fun with the more ludicrous aspects of their craft while others were spending their time stroking their chins.
One such example is Jethro Tull, who, under the leadership of Ian Anderson, were not only one of the most formidable prog groups of the 1970s, but were also highly aware of their surroundings in the genre, and knew exactly how to poke fun at the sheer eccentricity of the rest of the scene.
Speaking to Something Else in 2014, the frontman and flautist named two groups in particular who were certainly capable of showing off when it came to flexing their musical muscles, but who were also mature enough to realise that what they were doing was as peculiar as it was spectacular.
“Back then, when we were doing Thick As A Brick, bands like Yes and Emerson, Lake and Palmer were already gaining a reputation for being a little pompous and showing off with their music,” he said of his contemporaries. “I think that was OK. The reality is that certain members of Yes were quite humorous about it; they could laugh at themselves — as, indeed, Emerson Lake and Palmer privately laughed amongst themselves about themselves.”
He went on to claim that the members of these groups would also know how to joke with Anderson as well, and that they would all constantly mock each other for playing up to the stereotypes of the genre and ultimately spoofing all of the elements that others might have considered off-kilter.
He added, “I personally think the world is a better place for having Emerson, Lake, and Palmer and Yes, because their music was quite elevated. Great tunes, and some innovative playing, but, of course, it was, to many people, a bit excessive.”
Anderson may well have known just how daft prog rock was, but at least he wasn’t alone in knowing it, and thank goodness they never sacrificed that part of their being.
