Peter Hammill
Any Peter Hammill/Van Der Graaf Generator fans out there?
Peter Hammill is one of those guys that I have some serious problems with stylistically, and that I find sort of embarrassing, in that most of his albums I won't play around other people, but I find him intriguing enough that I own virtually everything album he's put out, which is something close to one a year since 1969.
He's got this overblown Shakespearean vocal delivery and a very distinctive way of constructing instrumental parts, including his route to prog, which seems to be taking a somewhat abrasive riff in, say, 5/8 and repeating it over and over.
This doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement, but a lot of his stuff is really strikingly beautiful and/or tough as nails, and the lyrics are consistently thoughtful if sometimes (especially in the 70s) on the pretentious side.
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