Various Artists – Progression (A Progressive Rock Anthology)

Thirty years ago, someone in some department at record label PolyGram TV decided that what the world needed (or the UK at least) was a CD compilation of prog rock songs. Prog rock (or progressive rock to give it its full title) was born out of the late 60s psych scene. It was characterised by lyrics that were designed to tell stories (or concepts), taking inspiration from fantasy along with extended soloing (designed to show off the musical prowess of the player involved), outlandish costumes and ever more elaborate stage sets. The album covers were works of art in themselves and the LPs become ever more overblown with double and even triple albums being released. It all came crashing down by 1976 but prog never really went away with bands such as Marillion and arguably Radiohead taking the genre on after its heyday. What is forgotten is that even though prog was (in)famous for its LPs, many bands in the genre actually released singles. 

Back to the aforementioned compilation. What the compiler of that CD had looked to do was produce a compilation of singles by a number of these prog bands. What I didn’t realise until years later is that some of these singles were the bands biggest hits, others were not. What I have done here in an update of this CD is to only include the biggest UK hit from each band during the heyday of the prog rock era. That is the years 1971-1976 but you will notice that some of these singles pre and post date this. To qualify, the single had to be released after the starting point of prog, which (as far as I am concerned) was the release of ‘In The Court of the Crimson King’ by King Crimson which came out on 10th October 1969. The band in question also needed to have a genuine top 40 hit in the UK. There were more prog bands than I have included here who released singles but none of them was actually a hit, so they don’t count. 

One last point. Like other genres, the scope of what is prog is quite wide. Some of the artists on the list might not be considered progressive now (or that progressive then), but many were on the progressive labels set up by the record companies in the late 60s to be the home of bands not considered pop. Some prog rock was not that far removed from rock, jazz or the blues so the boundaries can be a little blurred. Prog folk and other versions of prog were considered. Essentially, anything where the artists is progressing from what went before was fair game e.g. Kraftwerk. 

Witches Promise – Jethro Tull (No.4 – Jan 1970 (1))

Sympathy – Rare Bird (No.27 – Feb 1970)

Who Do You Love? – Juicy Lucy (No.14 – Mar 1970)

Question – The Moody Blues (No.2 – May 1970 (2))

Love Like A Man – Ten Years After (No.10 – Jun 1970)

Paranoid – Black Sabbath (No.4 – Aug 1970)

Black Night – Deep Purple (No.2 – Aug 1970)

The Witch – The Rattles (No.8 – Oct 1970)

I Hear You Knocking – Dave Edmunds (No.1 – Nov 1970)

Apache Drop Out – Edgar Broughton Band (No.33 – Mar 1971 (3))

Jig-A-Jig – East of Eden (No.7 – Apr 1971)

In My Own Time – Family (No.4 – Jul 1971)

Devil’s Answer – Atomic Rooster (No.4 – Jul 1971)

Backstreet Luv – Curved Air (No.4 – Aug 1971)

Tokoloshe Man – John Kongos (No.4 – Nov 1971 (4))

Hold Your Head Up – Argent (No.5 – Mar 1972)

Lady Eleanor – Lindisfarne (No.3 – May 1972)

Silver Machine – Hawkwind (No.3 – Jul 1972)

10538 Overture – Electric Light Orchestra (No.9 – Jul 1972 (5))

Standing In The Road – Blackfoot Sue (No.4 – Aug 1972)

Whiskey In The Jar – Thin Lizzie (No.6 – Jan 1973)

Fanfare For The Common Man – Emerson, Lake & Palmer (No.2 – Jun 1977)

Virginia Plain – Roxy Music (No.4 – Aug 1972 (6))

Sylvia – Focus (No.4 – Jan 1973)

All Because Of You – Geordie (No.6 – Mar 1973)

One & One Is One – Medicine Head (No.3 – May 1973)

Radar Love – Golden Earring (No.7 – Dec 1973)

I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe) – Genesis (No.21 – Apr 1974 (7))

Seven Seas Of Rhye – Queen (No.10 – Mar 1974 (9))

Down Down – Status Quo (No.1 – Dec 1974)

Autobahn – Kraftwerk (No.11 – May 1975 (9))

Delilah (Live) – The Sensational Alex Harvey Band (No.7 – Jul 1975)

Pandora’s Box – Procol Harum (No.16 – Aug 1975 (10))

Portsmouth – Mike Oldfield (No.3 – Apr 1976)

Blinded By The Light – Manfred Mann’s Earth Band (No.6 – Aug 1976 (11))

Wonderous Stories – Yes (No.7 – Sep 1977)

Northern Lights – Renaissance (No.10 – Jul 1978)

1. This isn’t Jehtro Tull’s biggest hit. That was ‘Living In The Past’ that came out in May 1969 and is just before the self imposed cut off point for this compilation. 
2. The Moody Blues did have a number 1 hit in December 1964 with the distantly not prog, ‘Go Now’.
3. This entered the charts three times but its highest placing came on the third and last time. 
4. John Kongos had another hit with ‘He’s Gonna Step on You Again’ which also reached number 4 in May 1971. 
5. Not their biggest hit but it was the only one ELO had when Roy Wood was in the band which is arguably their progressive period. 
6. Like ELO, this was not Roxy Music’s biggest hit but I would argue that they stopped being progressive once Brian Eno left the band. 
7. Once again, this was not the bands biggest hit but the only one when they were at the most progressive. This was before Peter Gabriel and Steve Hackett left. 
8. Queen had a number one with the very pro ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. However, I chose this song as it was the only hit single from the bands first two albums, when they were at their most progressive. 
9. Kraftwerk’s only hit during the 1970s which is arguably their most progressive period, before other bands and technology caught up to what they were doing later in the decade.
10. Procol Harum had two bigger hits than this, but they came up before the progressive era.
11. Manfred Mann’s Earth Band had another number 6 hit with ‘Davy’s On The Road Again’. I went with ‘Blinded By The Light’ as it is a lot more prog, especially the full length LP version. 

Disc 1

1. Jig-A-Jig – East of Eden
2. Living In The Past – Jethro Tull
3. Who Do You Love? – Juicy Lucy
4. Love Like A Man – Ten Years After
5. The Witch – The Rattles
6. Paranoid – Black Sabbath
7. Black Night – Deep Purple
8. Apache Drop Out – Edgar Broughton Band
9. Question – The Moody Blues
10. Sympathy – Rare Bird
11. Devil’s Answer – Atomic Rooster
12. Backstreet Luv – Curved Air
13. I Hear You Knocking – Dave Edmunds
14. In My Own Time – Family
15. Tokoloshe Man – John Kongos
16. Silver Machine – Hawkwind
17. Hold Your Head Up – Argent
18. Standing In The Road – Blackfoot Sue

Side 2

1. Whiskey In The Jar – Thin Lizzie
2. 10538 Overture – Electric Light Orchestra
3. Fanfare For The Common Man – Emerson, Lake & Palmer
4. Lady Eleanor – Lindisfarne
5. Virginia Plain – Roxy Music
6. Sylvia – Focus
7. I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe) – Genesis
8. All Because Of You – Geordie
9. Radar Love – Golden Earring
10. One & One Is One – Medicine Head
11. Autobahn – Kraftwerk
12. Seven Seas Of Rhye – Queen
13. Down Down – Status Quo
14. Pandora’s Box – Procul Harum
15. Delilah (Live) – The Sensational Alex Harvey Band
16. Portsmouth – Mike Oldfield
17. Blinded By The Light – Manfred Mann’s Earth Band
18. Wonderous Stories – Yes
19. Northern Lights – Renaissance

I wanted to use the original artwork of the compilation used back in 1993, but I could not find one of sufficient quality on line so I made my own, adapting a compilation that had been produced by Classic Rock magazine. 

One or more of these version were not available on Spotify.