AOR: The Journal

Unknown Soldier · 07-19-2015, 11:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OccultHawk

Are you sure this isn't a prog thread?

A lot of the releases upto around 1977 were prog influenced, but a lot of the featured bands listed here were making the transition to a more obvious AOR sound so most of the proggy stuff you'll see will be at the beginning of this journal and then mostly fade out, which is why we started this journal in 1975 and not just 1977 or 1978.

Trollheart · 07-19-2015, 02:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OccultHawk

Are you sure this isn't a prog thread?

No. This is a prog thread!

http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ive-metal.html

Unknown Soldier · 07-19-2015, 02:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trollheart

No. This is a prog thread!

http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ive-metal.html

......... and its full of boring old Genesis albums.

Trollheart · 07-19-2015, 05:02 PM

Only one Genesis so far, but they're coming... mostly it's full of boring Beefheart and Zappa!

OccultHawk · 07-19-2015, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Unknown Soldier

A lot of the releases upto around 1977 were prog influenced, but a lot of the featured bands listed here were making the transition to a more obvious AOR sound so most of the proggy stuff you'll see will be at the beginning of this journal and then mostly fade out, which is why we started this journal in 1975 and not just 1977 or 1978.

Good copy. I'm sorry if my comment was a little snarky.

Unknown Soldier · 07-20-2015, 03:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OccultHawk

Good copy. I'm sorry if my comment was a little snarky.

No problem, say what you want and thanks for viewing.

William_the_Bloody · 07-20-2015, 07:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Unknown Soldier

So what will the parameters of the journal be? Very simple and that is the best 10 AOR albums each year from 1975 to somewhere in the 1990s. Initially though 1975-1977 will be a combined listing as the genre was in its early days at this time.

How have we decided to do this top 10 album list? We'll each select what we feel are the best AOR albums each year, which will probably be around 15-25 albums in total. We'll then take a vote each with the best album getting the highest points and working down to the weakest which will get just one point. The two of us will then combine our points which will give us our top 10 and the rest will be eliminated.

So how will each year's listing work? We'll each review five albums each within the year listing and look to get a review or two out weekly, so it will be a long project.

How have we qualified which albums are on here? The trickiest part without a doubt, as we disagreed initially on which bands should be in and which bands should be out. In the end the deciding factor was what was the actual core sound of the band? For example bands like Steely Dan, The Doobie Brothers, The Eagles, Chicago and Fleetwood Mac amongst many others were eliminated despite the fact that they were all highly influential on AOR, as in the end we felt that the core sound of these bands was in something else such as jazz rock, soft rock, blues rock, country rock, yacht rock, R&B, soul, pop or even a combination of those styles rather than in what would become known as AOR. Some of these bands of course would later steer into an AOR direction, which will of course qualify them when the time comes. A number of progressive rock bands were eliminated as well, which put a lot of those great early Kansas albums out of the window.

So who did this leave us with? Bands like Journey, Boston or Toto that despite having roots elsewhere mostly dropped those roots or as in the case of Journey adopted an AOR line when new members joined the band. Any band that was considered pomp rock and some borderline AOR/progressive rock bands also made the list and of course anything that was pure AOR from the word go.

@ OccultHawk Yes it means that as well.

Fu)k! Your like George RR Martin, everyone's waiting for you to finish Winds of Winter (Pounding Decibels) and you go off and start another f'n side project

Unknown Soldier · 07-21-2015, 10:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by William_the_Bloody

Fu)k! Your like George RR Martin, everyone's waiting for you to finish Winds of Winter (Pounding Decibels) and you go off and start another f'n side project

Well it's going to take me a damn sight longer to finishing Pounding Decibels than it will be for George RR Martin to finish A Song of Ice and Fire.

Anteater · 07-25-2015, 04:58 PM

07. Eddie Money - Eddie Money (1977)

Former NYPD trainee Eddie Money started out like many young and aspiring rock stars did: he learned his chops, shifted careers then moved to California to seek his fortunes. Multiple night club showings and one big dollar contract with Columbia Records later, classic rock staples like 'Two Tickets To Paradise' and 'Baby Hold On' took the summer of '77 by storm and became part of the first "wave" of what would later be called AOR. This term in relation to Eddie Money refers to both the radio format he was slotted in AND the sound that would come to define his career (and the career of many others). But the real million dollar question is: was the Money man's self-titled any good beyond the singles?

To these ears, that answer is a resounding yes. While many of the other American AOR bands featured so far (and who have yet to be featured) had their roots in progressive rock or what often gets called "art" rock, Eddie was just a good 'ol rock n roller with a touch of Motown in his tunesmith kit. While that sandpapery voice isn't particularly suited to the brand of theatrical melodicism that defined the Queens and Styxes of the world, Money's soulful pipes burn with real flourish on the punchy 'Don't Worry' and the bluesy, thundering closer 'Gamblin' Man'. This was the sound of mainstream rock n' roll in the late 70's, and it wasn't a bad place to be.

The biggest piece of praise I can give Eddie's self-titled is that its consistent even beyond the obvious singles, and its influence upon AOR is a far easier thing to hear as opposed to, say, Starcastle. The fact that the legendary Bruce Botnick produced it probably didn't hurt either!

Eddie would later become far more "arena rock" oriented as the 80's zeitgeist arrived on the scene, but you can already hear the pieces of what makes AOR such a fun and accessible genre with albums like this one serving as the foundation that paved the way for all the top dollar stuff that was to come. I could certainly think of lesser starting places.

Unknown Soldier · 07-28-2015, 03:12 PM

06. Angel - Angel (1975)

Angel were an east coast American band that were quickly branded as a kind of divine and angelic answer to the mighty Kiss, largely due to their affinity with the colour white. The band had actually been discovered by Gene Simmons of Kiss of all people who needless to say was a fan of the band. Marketing wise that Kiss connection was initially well used, as Kiss were of course one of the hottest properties in rock marketing around this time and selling out arenas wherever they went. Therefore image wise Angel would mostly dress in white, which was in stark contrast to their more daring east coast neighbours Kiss, who donned their famous black-dominated garb, but despite these links between the two bands this was where the similarities between the two ended.

As a band Angel went well beyond the basic confines of the good time rock & roll of the Kiss sound and its accompanying theatrics, and in turn gave us an interesting and sometimes deep-feeling amalgamation of AOR, progressive rock and melodic metal all merged together and then all topped off with the dominant keyboard sound of the band. The resulting product was one of the purest AOR releases so far on this listing as the essential ingredients for AOR are there in abundance, which for me come in the shape of energetic and epic rock.

The album cover in hindsight also now feels very AOR, rather than the metal or progressive guise that it could’ve passed for back then. Critics weren’t quite sure what to make of them either and as was often the case when this kind of thing happened preferred to just slam them critically. Also one of their biggest detractors was a certain Frank Zappa who in true Zappa style, made them a subject of one of his songs “Punky’s Whips” where he derided their girly looking appearance.

This their debut album was literally head and shoulders above the rest of their discography and serves to show just how close metal and AOR actually were, as we’ve already discovered with the thin line as well between both progressive rock and the early rising of AOR at this time, it seems like all these styles along with others were a perfect fit for what would become AOR.

Angel were fronted by vocalist Frank DiMino and the talented Geoff Giuffria on keyboards/mellotron, along with the Queen-ish guitar sound of Punky Meadows, all giving us an album that is littered with some great early melodic songs. These include tracks like “Tower” “Long Time” and “Broken Dreams” all full of proggy twists and swirling heavy keyboards, making these tracks instant standouts. In hindsight "Tower" just sounds like very early essential AOR, where the band sing about swords and epic knight adventures, almost pre-empting the epic song matter of say "Hydra" by Toto. "Long Time" is classic 1970s fare with its melodic shifts and any number of bands would've been proud to have a song like this and there's even a hint of Led Zeppelin about it as well. "Broken Dreams" is another accomplished track that sounds like a couple of different songs rolled into one. The classic sounding “Mariner” smacks of being an epic and its soft ballady tones pre-empts the type of songs that great AOR bands would excel at. Finally the likely Kiss comparison is mostly heard on “Rock and Rollers” which actually ends up as being the odd man out on this album musically and sits below the aforementioned songs in terms of quality, before the album closes out with a keyboard based theme track.

This album is a great collection of songs for anybody that likes re-visiting or discovering melodic gems from the 1970s, from a band that unknowingly drafted one of the earliest AOR examples. After their debut album and undoubtedly from considerable record label pressure, the band embarked on a less than interesting career on their following albums and their best success came with their fourth album White Hot which did garner some success.

Interestingly the band later incorporated key AOR artists like Fergie Frederiksen and Ricky Phillips into their line-up, but sadly for Angel it was to no avail and core band members Frank DiMino and Geoff Giuffria would finally go onto other projects. Overall Angel failed to scale any great heights and along with the diminishing quality in their output they finally called it quits around the 1980 period.

07-19-2015, 05:02 PM	#14 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,970	Only one Genesis so far, but they're coming... mostly it's full of boring Beefheart and Zappa! __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018