Tarkus: Emerson Lake and Palmer: Amazon.ca: Music

1. Medley: Tarkus - Eruption/Stones Of Years/Iconoclast/Mass/Manticore/Battlefield/Aquatarkus

2. Jeremy Bender

3. Bitches Crystal

4. The Only Way (Hymn)

5. Infinite Space (Conclusion)

6. A Time And A Place

7. Are You Ready Eddy?

Suggested Tags from Similar Products

(What's this?)

Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)

emerson lake and palmer(1)

Customer Reviews

There are no customer reviews yet on Amazon.ca

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

Share your experience with this product with others

Create your own review

Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com ^(beta)

Amazon.com: 4.0 out of 5 stars (23 customer reviews)

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Are You Ready, Eddy?, Aug 25 2007

By Thomas K. Emanuel "Music Fan & a Half" - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Tarkus (Audio CD)

When it comes to Emerson Lake & Palmer, one of two pieces is usually voted the band's pinnacle of achievement: "Karn Evil 9" from 1973's BRAIN SALAD SURGERY or the titular suite from 1971's TARKUS. And if "Karn Evil 9" is one of my top candidates for Best Prog Work Ever, "Tarkus" is a monolithic achievement nevertheless, one of the first sidelong epics in the annals of progressive rock, and one of its greatest.

Flying high on Keith Emerson's savage keyboards, grounded by Carl Palmer's seismic drumming, embroidered with Greg Lake's dour vocals and complementary bass licks, "Tarkus" alternates peaks of the loftiest beauty with storms of the basest profanity. There's a plot in Lake's overblown lyrics somewhere - I think it has to do with war, and the armadillo-tank on the LP cover, and something about a manticore as well - but lyrics have never been all that important in prog. They sound profound, and that's all that matters. The suite is partitioned into seven movements, but it's often difficult, amidst the hail of screaming organ solos and percussive whiplash, to discern where one ends and another begins. Besides, I listen to "Tarkus" as a whole, a mammoth example of everything good (and bad) about prog rock, so it's rather pointless to focus on the individual parts. It's a monster, to be sure, some of the most intricate, bloodthirstily confrontational music of the rock era.

Two prog workouts ("Bitches Crystal", "A Time & a Place"), a pair of goofy throwaways ("Jeremy Bender", "Are You Ready Eddy?"), and a bipartite mini-epic ("The Only Way (Hymn)"/"Infinite Space(Conclusion)") flesh out the remainder of the disc. After a behemothic opening like the title cut, the rest of TARKUS should be an anticlimax, and in many ways it is. But if it doesn't achieve the demented grandeur of Side I, Side II allows the band to calm down, stretch out, and defuse their self-conscious pomposity a bit. "The Only Way (Hymn)"/"Infinite Space (Conclusion)" in particular is great, featuring ecclesiastical organ, blazing bass figures, and a couple melodies "borrowed" from Bach.

If 70s prog ever needed a "poster band", there would be few acts better qualified to fill that role than ELP. By the same token, TARKUS plays about as near a 70s prog "poster album" as any album possibly could.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars what a great listen, May 2 2007

By B. E Jackson - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Tarkus (Audio CD)

Emerson, Lake and Palmer once again gives the world another satisfying listen. Again, the keyboards are everywhere, just like on the debut. This time, though, they sort of changed gears and gave us some shorter and catchier tunes on Side 2.

The first half of the album is one GIANT medley of keyboards. It's really surprising to me how, even before I got into lengthy prog pieces and jams, I was STILL able to enjoy this song. It's because the band knows how to make their jams melodic and interesting. That was something they did very well back in the day.

It's a shame most people ignore the shorter songs on the second side of the album. There's some good stuff there, and entirely worth hearing if you're a fan of the band.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The definitive prog-rock album, Jun 6 2008

By John D. Mcglynn - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Tarkus (Audio CD)

I should start this review by pointing out that I am reviewing this album based on the K2HD AND the MFSL versions that I own & NOT the one for sale from SHOUT Factory. I consider the two versions cited to be definitive examples of the state-of-the-art recording, at their respective times and that we do not need to dwell upon their respective audiophile tweakish differences - on which I could expound, boringly & probably boorishly for hours.

What I would like to say about this album, and most notably the title "track", is that this is probably Emerson's most "complete" work, to date (since I haven't heard his soon to be released KEB album due in July 2008). Keith's Piano Concerto was a work from the heart, which I feel will stand the test of time, but TARKUS (the suite) is a truly thematically complete work, from a man whom his own band-mates, of many years, accuse of "... never finishing anything...". It is impossible to categorize - it's not rock, it's not jazz, it's not classical - it's Emerson, with a fair shake of the highly talented Mr. Palmer for flavor (I'm not including Mr. Lake as I feel that this piece stands alone as an extremely powerful instrumental piece). From the furious intro of Eruption to the sombre and unsettling Battlefield, this piece moves me like few pieces of music in my 50+ years have done. I recently found out that it has been arranged for trombone and orchestra and will likely be picked up by other major orchestras for arrangement. THIS is what struck me most as an adolescent when I first picked up and heard this album - the title track was so HUGE in sound - it needed an orchestra. This arrangement - by a 3 piece band - still sounds like a full orchestra, even 37 years ago. This is a must have for any true music lover.

By the way, most of the other material is darned good, too - even the "throw-away" tracks like "Jeremy Bender" and "Are You Ready Eddy".

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 23 reviews 4.0 out of 5 stars