Emerson, Lake Pictures At An Exhibition Albums, CDs, Vinyl Records and LPs

Emerson, Lake - Pictures At An Exhibition

Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Pictures At An Exhibition

If there's one thing you've gotta give ELP, it's balls. Not only did they take one of the most staid standards from the annals of "serious" music and do it in an ampedup electronic version that must drive seconal freaks wild, but they added their own elaborations and improvisations and lyrics as well. Compared to this, the conceit and tastelessness involved in Jon Lord's Gemini Suite or the "Concerto For Rock Group and Orchestra" he and Deep Purple performed with the Royal Philharmonic were nothing, the modest work of quiet craftsmen. Emerson, Lake & Palmer are bombastic and tasteless and they probably know it, but tastelessness has never been far from the sense of fun at the
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core of rock & roll, or bombast either, these days.

Back in the days when people spent a lot of time sitting stiff-backed in drawing rooms and there were no child labor laws, Mussorgsky wrote a piano chart called "Pictures at an Exhibition," which was later rearranged for full orchestra by Maurice Ravel, whose smash hit "Bolero" was (comparatively) recently covered by Jeff Beck. "Pictures" is basically a series of short compositions meant to describe some paintings hanging in the Louvre, I believe, and back in the Kennedy Sixties before I got my sensibilities corrupted and attention span obliterated by the Beatles et al. it was one of my fave classical raves. If poor old Mussorgsky and Ravel can hear what Emerson, Lake & Palmer have done to their music, they are probably getting dry heaves in the Void; speaking strictly as a fan of M & R and heretofore certified disdainer of EL&P, however, I can say that I listened to it twice tonight, beating my fists on the floor and laughing, and I got my kicks.

The proceedings, recorded live in England, begin with Mussorgsky's basic and conjunctive theme, the "Promenade," played in a somewhat Bach-ic style, as if Keith Emerson were whacking away at the biggest pipe organ in the oldest church in Vienna. The "Gnomes" theme from the original work, here credited to give such where it's due to (Mussorgsky/Palmer), enters abruptly to whistles and yells from the audience, swizzled out on Emerson's mellotron or customized organ or whatever, with wah-wah counterpoint by Lake. After some strange, kinetic soloing, "Promenade" returns with lyrics by Lake: "Lead me from tortured dreams/Childhood themes of nights alone ... From seeds of confusion illusion's dark grasses have grown."

You said it, brother. Because from this point I begin to lose track of Mussorgsky and get caught up in the ELP furor for the rest of the side. Beginning with a Lake compo called "The Sage" that has about as much to do with "Pictures at an Exhibition" as ELP's lyrics do with the programmatic significance of the original piece, but it's vintage ELP anyway, except for one boring bit where Lake indulges himself in some gossamer Laurindo Almeida-isms.

Luckily, however, they don't last long. A minute later and we're hit in the face:

Emerson, Lake - Pictures At An Exhibition CDs • Vinyl Records • LPs • Music Albums

Emerson, Lake - Pictures At An Exhibition