Plain truth (Gentle Giant) (LP 2607 - 2608)

Gentle Giant  Acquiring The Taste (CD, Vertigo Records, 1971) ****  

Gentle Giant  Octopus (CD, Vertigo Records, 1972) ****  

Genre: Prog rock 

Places I remember: HMV (Oxford St)

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Wreck (Acquiring The Taste)

Gear costume: Knots (Octopus); The Boys In The Band (Octopus) 

Active compensatory factors: I'm not sure why I don't own more albums by Gentle Giant. Both of these albums are brilliant.

By now, regular readers of Goo Goo will know how much I love the prog genre, both the older bands like Gentle Giant, through to modern equivalents like Pineapple Thief, Katatonia, Porcupine Tree, and Anathema. The playful experimentation with form and instruments is perfect for my fevered brain.

In many ways Gentle Giant are the perfect prog band. At times barking mad, impenetrable, musical, they try everything, while still retaining melody and pop hooks.

Acquiring The Taste was their second album, Octopus their fourth. Both display all of the band's strengths - playful, intelligent, and switching effortlessly between styles in the same song. Knots is a good example. It twists and turns and creates knotty problems and then resolves them.

Founding member Ray Shulman (bass) says that "(Octopus) was probably our best album, with the exception, perhaps of Acquiring the Taste. We started with the idea of writing a song about each member of the band. Having a concept in mind was a good starting point for writing". I would heartily agree.

Where do they all belong? More to come if I ever find them anywhere, preferably on vinyl.