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Pt. 2: Shark's Overall Ranking
The Shark continues to rank the tip of the iceberg of his massive library

Shark
Jan 2380 min read


Shark's Gods in Music: prolific, boundary pushers, stunning talent, uncompromising creativity, demanding bandleaders & seedbeds in music
The Shark introduces artists whose prolificness, talent, creativity, and trajectory stand out among the rest.

Shark
May 9, 202530 min read


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

Shark
Mar 13, 2025110 min read


Starring Rosi by Ash Ra Tempel: the definitive trip into cerebral space land
A light, carefree, and melodic shift for Ash Ra Tempel, Starring Rosi trades heavy space-rock for whimsical guitar work and Rosi Müller's ethereal, spoken-word poetry.

Shark
May 27, 20245 min read


Letzte Tage - Letzte Nächte by Popol Vuh: an ability to create music that's simultaneously delicate and powerful, detailed and expansive, earthbound in its origins and cosmic in its reach
A cosmic, guitar-driven masterpiece, which brilliantly fuses hypnotic krautrock energy with ethereal spiritual beauty.

Shark
Apr 7, 20246 min read


Per Un Amico by Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM): jaw dropping musical acrobatics with ease which never lose the pace of a sophisticated graceful poetic dance of sounds
Lush, pastoral Italian prog blends rich acoustic beauty with soaring, dramatic symphonic rock.

Shark
Apr 1, 20248 min read


Roxy Music by Roxy Music: from an art school project to the most adventurous rock band of the early '70s
A dazzling, chaotic fusion of 1950s pop glam, avant-garde electronics, and lounge-lizard crooning. A brilliant blueprint for art-rock.

Shark
Mar 31, 20248 min read


Solar Music Live by Grobschnitt: mandatory for space rock cadets and beyond
With Understanding Comes Appreciation If you are into Krautrock or guitar driven space rock, I've got a record for you: Solar Music Live by Grobschnitt. There is fantastic music to be heard here, believe me! The music from this live album is extremely strong and if ever you tend to like crying guitars sustained by an exceptional drumming, a powerful bass playing, and lots of atmospheric keyboards parts, this album is tailor-made to your ears. All the elements that make a succ

Shark
Mar 20, 20245 min read


Darwin! by Banco Del Mutuo Soccorso: passionate vocals, complex song structure, fantastic keyboards, tranquil moments and powerful passages
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The reason why Banco del Mutuo Soccorso so much deserves their status as an epitome of the best Italian prog of all times is the fact that its first three efforts are highly remarkable masterpieces in which complexity and beauty are taken to their maximum levels. All three together follow a coherent line of artistic ambition and consistent recreation of sonic potential. Along with PFM and Le Orme, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso (Banco), make up

Shark
Mar 12, 20248 min read


2112 by Rush: conjuring up the kind of sci-fi images and otherworldly magic that would later become the hallmark of the band
A thrilling, synth-charged prog rock masterpiece of rebellion and conceptual brilliance, fueled by Peart's epic lyrics.

Shark
Mar 11, 202415 min read


If I Could Do It All Over Again... by Caravan: a healthy dose of the psychedelic scene of the era, smooths things over with pop sensibilities and dresses it all up with progressive rock workouts
With Understanding Comes Appreciation As the 60s abruptly became the 70s, the psychedelia of the former era was transmogrifying into something more sophisticated. With the prog-rock explosive nature of 1969 occurring with bands like East Of Eden and King Crimson forever changing the rock history books, bands who came before who were more focused on the psychedelic pop aspects of the scene rather than the sophisticated compositions of what would develop suddenly found themselv

Shark
Mar 10, 202410 min read


Third by Soft Machine: an ambitious album, which push back the frontiers of space modal jazz-rock far beyond while defining the Canterbury Scene moving forward
A sprawling, hypnotic fusion of jazz, psych-rock, and tape loops. Bold, experimental, and mind-bending.

Shark
Mar 9, 202414 min read


Trilogy by Emerson, Lake & Palmer: everything has been carefully thought, arranged, and performed to perfection, a process that also included some form of sterilization
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Trilogy, ELP's fourth album, features the trio settling down in more crowd-pleasing pastures. Actually, the group was gaining in maturity what they lost in raw energy. Every track on this album has been carefully thought, arranged, and performed to perfection, a process that also included some form of sterilization. ELP had reached their peak and this album is a prove of that. The hard Modern/Romantic Russian Classical influence in Keith

Shark
Mar 7, 20248 min read


You by Gong: incarnates the perfect marriage of Canterbury jazz-rock whimsy, cosmic psychedelic guitar workouts and complex percussive accouterments
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The spacy province of Canterbury land was ruled by Daevid Allen-era Gong, and their You album is not only the definitive epitome of what Gong was all about, but also, the absolute apex in their musical career. This album, which completes the Radio Gnome Invisible Trilogy, encapsulates better than any other Gong record the perfect match between the band's ideology and spirit and the performers' sonic input. It is, to put it simply, their m

Shark
Mar 5, 20247 min read


Ocean by Eloy: worlds atomize and oceans evaporate in eternity on this epic record
With Understanding Comes Appreciation Eloy's masterpiece, period. Ocean delivers shivers on your spine with that spacey rhythm the band is so famous for. Each track here contains a "chapter" of the story of a marine city's birth, rise and decay, an apocalyptical epic journey through layers of synths and powerful guitar notes that make it a mesmerizing and at the same time accessible album. This is one of the legendary prog albums that must be considered in the whole history o

Shark
Feb 28, 20247 min read


The Raven That Refused to Sing (And Other Stories) by Steven Wilson: new prog-rock music in the vain of the 70's with top notch production can't go wrong
With Understanding Comes Appreciation As a fan of Steven Wilson I was at the time very excited to hear that his newest work was going to be an album in the vain of the 70's prog rock. First of all I love good ol' progressive rock (King Crimson, Camel, Yes etc.), and when I saw the lineup SW had behind him, I knew this was going to be something special. Well, I was right. It was the most shining gem of the year 2013. If you really start to think about it, it is the best progr

Shark
Feb 26, 202414 min read


Tales from Topographic Oceans by Yes: a four-suite, progressive, poetic tapestry depicting the human perception of time and memory
With Understanding Comes Appreciation This is Yes, and perhaps even prog-rock, at its finest. I truly appreciate this album for what it is: a prog-symphony in four movements. It is very much classical in design and composition. For those expecting more of Fragile or even Close to the Edge, you will be disappointed. For those who appreciate great classical music, be prepared to be blown away by perhaps one of the greatest masterpieces of music of our time. From the opening not

Shark
Feb 23, 202413 min read


Pawn Hearts by Van Der Graaf Generator: an album so sublime that it is one of the rare sonic portals into a truly alternative universe
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

Shark
Feb 22, 202417 min read


Minstrel in the Gallery by Jethro Tull: evoking the world of Shakespeare in its literate lyrics, Elizabethan imagery, and the mixture of rustic folk music and refined classical airs into their rock
With Understanding Comes Appreciation When you see the cover, you say: hey! This look like "Aqualung!" But will the inside be on par with the outside? Three years also separates "Minstrel..." from "Thick as a Brick." Could the Tull come anywhere near these masterpieces? The title of the album and the cover refer more to a traditional folkish collection of songs than anything else. The Tull completely mistified everybody: the critics (which they truely hate at this moment of t

Shark
Feb 21, 20248 min read


The Snow Goose by Camel: a beautiful fantasy that translates this moving tale of friendship, love, war and separation into a well structured sonic piece of music
With Understanding Comes Appreciation The last album I reviewed on this corner was Tanz der Lemminge by Amon Düül II, a very complex, challenging, elaborated, and definitely, an acquired-taste piece of music. This time, I'm going to review the opposite side of prog-rock music; a refined, sophisticated and delicate masterpiece, which works as an emotional transporter, bathed with plenty of sonic textures rather than experimentations. Any prog collection and beyond would not be

Shark
Feb 17, 20245 min read
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