The Shark introduces artists whose prolificness, talent, creativity, and trajectory stand out among the rest, reason why he call them "Gods in Music."

This is a guide to the massive discography of The Legendary Pink Dots and his enigmatic founder Edward Ka-Spel, which spans for over 400+ recordings with a unique and distinctive dark and apocalyptic music style.

With Understanding Comes Appreciation To put it simple for those who are not familiar with the musician and his music, Miles Davis is a...

The Shark ranks the tip of the iceberg of his colossal library (100,00+ songs) while unveiling top-notch and under-the-radar recommendations.

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Composed for nine instruments (2x pianos, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, snare drum, triangle, tam-tam and xylophone), Béla Bartók’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion certainly packs a punch. Written in 1937 and premiered in 1938 by Bartók and his second wife Ditta on piano and percussionists Fritz Schiesser and Philipp Rühig, the sonata was received very well by critics and audiences. The piece received its US premiere in 1940, with Di

With Understanding Comes Appreciation 2112 achieved a triple feat: 1) it saved Rush's career. It was like Rush was at the plate with two out and two strikes on them and with 2112 they hit a homerun, and the rest is history, 2) it showed artistic integrity (after all it is a record that "doubles the bet" of its predecessor, incorporating even more elements of progressive rock) and 3) it was a major contribution to a sub-genre (that is, prog rock) that seemed to be in decline

With Understanding Comes Appreciation From start to end, this album is an absolute killer. Every single second is just excellent, the listener cannot lose his attention on the music. Last one with Robert Wyatt, Third is by far Soft Machine's best offering. With four pieces of approximately 20 minutes each, mainly instrumental, the musicians push back the frontiers of space modal jazz-rock and avant-garde far beyond. Hard to believe this is the same band who released their fi

With Understanding Comes Appreciation The composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein said of one passage, "That page is sixty years old, but it's never been topped for sophisticated handling of primitive rhythms...", and of the work as a whole, "...it's also got the best dissonances anyone ever thought up, and the best asymmetries and polytonalities and polyrhythms and whatever else you care to name." Oks, first things first specially for the sake of new comers. The Rite of Spr

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Lots of jazz guitarists have veered into the world of rock and roll on occasion, but the number of "raised on the blues" rockers who have had the boulders to step into the high-falutin' domain of jazz-rock fusion can be counted on one hand. Most of us weren't sure it could be done at all until Tommy Bolin spun everyone's head around with his phenomenal work on Billy Cobham's "Spectrum" in 1973. I have no idea if that had anything to do w

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Mr. Edgard Varèse 188 Sullivan St. New York, New York Dear Sir: Perhaps you might remember me from my stupid phone call last January, if not, my name again is Frank Zappa Jr. I am 16 years old... that might explain partly my disturbing you last winter. The reason for my letter at this time is that I am visiting relatives in Baltimore and as long as I am on the East Coast I hope I can get to see you. It might seem strange but ever since I

With Understanding Comes Appreciation In just a few short years, Peter Hammill’s Van Der Graaf Generator project had evolved from a de facto solo effort (“The Aerosol Grey Machine”) to an early progressive rock band (“The Least We Can Do Is Wave To Each Other”) and then up another few notches to one of the most innovative and boundary pushing pioneers within the prog world on “H To He Who Am The Only One.” And as if the world were coming to end in the foreseeable future, this

With Understanding Comes Appreciation The one word virtually everyone can agree on in any discussion of the work of composer John Zorn is...

With Understanding Comes Appreciation One of the most prolific careers in music history, is the career of one-of-a-kind genius, Frank...

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Gargantua & Pantagruel come to life! The entire classic era oeuvre of the British progressive rock titans Gentle Giant, founded by the three Schulman brothers in 1970, is indeed the perfect musical embodiment of the cheerful Rabelaisian spirit, colorful and picturesque as a fancy miniature from a manuscript, brought to life by the moving nature of the sound. Founded on the wreck of an unsuccessful and now totally forgotten soul-influenced

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Sounds and impacts only like itself, like no-one before or after. An attempt to achieve in 80 minutes a mystery trip from light to darkness and return. Three months recording with sessions often lasting up to 16 hours a day. Telepathic improvisation leading to instant compositions. Shamanic avant-funk trance. Unrestrained ecstasy and weirdness. Beauty and violation of any sense of beauty. Fear danger chaos mystery magic lost and found. Ja

With Understanding Comes Appreciation The first time I listened to Tom Waits, which was randomly from a radio station btw, I thought that I had missed a song or an album made by one of my fav artists of all-time; the peerless, a blues belter straight out of the school of Howlin' Wolf, a cat who breathed and bathed in the free jazz of Eric Dolphy and Ornette Coleman, a painter and sculptor by nature, a rock and roll titan as leader and frontman; the one and only Captain Beefhe

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Some of the words that arguably describe better this gem might be elegant, sophisticated, intimate, melancholic, spiritual, playful, desert, warm, and mysterious, which also sports majestically chamber jazz, avant-garde classical music, klezmer and modern composition. For a man who's arguably got 90% of his reputation (at this point, in 1996) through making noisy, abrasive, inaccessible, and chaotic music, this masterpiece is quite the op

With Understanding Comes Appreciation “Fast and bulbous! That's right, The Mascara Snake, fast and bulbous! Also, a tin teardrop! Bulbous also tapered? That's right” —Pena, Track 15. I wanted to start with this quote, because it is a classic dialog among fans, which shows a sort of camaraderie and a “sense of belonging” when you start exchanging this apparently “nonsense," specially with another unknown fan. Knowing the latter, somehow says that you are “special” and “belong”

With Understanding Comes Appreciation Tony Williams' Emergency is flavored with post-bop and jazz-instrument elements, which pushed into new territory, creating dense, adventurous and unpredictable soundscapes; Miles Davis’ Silent Way is the signature of his electric era; nuanced with trumpet jazz and avant-garde, dig deep into the heart of the ethereal groove —dark, smoky, and ashen; while Frank Zappa’s Hot Rats is the album which fully fuses compositional sophistication of