Month: August 2016

West Coast, some recent albums

West Coast has been described as well-crafted, soft-focused music mainly made and played in California. Or: California soft rock with some jazz elements thrown in. Also labeled as Yacht Rock, it’s relaxing and perfectly for a lazy sunday morning. Because most of it doesn’t qualify as melodic rock we cover it only marginally on this website.

West Coast was especially popular from the mid 1970s to the mid 1980s. You can find out more about relevant artists and albums in this detailed Encyclopedia of West Coast Music. Or listening to this top 100 songs.

Most music that becomes a genre never really disappears. That’s also true for West Coast. There are still quite a few bands making West Coast music. Here we present some of them.… Read the rest

Pomp Rock, a sub genre overview

Oxford Dictionaries defines Pomp Rock as: “A genre of rock music, especially prevalent in the late 1970s and early 1980s, typically characterized by prominent keyboards and drums and heavy use of guitar effects, often regarded as bombastic or grandiose in its delivery.” Earliest use is attributed to British weekly pop/rock music newspaper Melody Maker in the 1970s.

The term was used mainly by the British music press to identify Symphonic/Progressive Rock played by American bands. In the US these bands usually were labeled as AOR.

Thus Pomp Rock is a sub genre of Symphonic/Progressive Rock. Kansas and Styx are the best known representatives, but there are a lot of more obscure bands that are also well worth checking out.

Missing link beween Symphonic Rock and Adult Oriented Rock

Before we elaborate on that, it’s interesting to note that Pomp Rock in a way is a missing link between Symphonic/Progressive Rock and AOR.… Read the rest

Adult Oriented Rock (AOR), a brief genre overview

Adult oriented rock (AOR) is a music genre that is characterized by a rich, layered sound, slick production and a heavy reliance on pop/rock hooks (rateyourmusic.com). This genre had its heyday in the early 1980s, but luckily it never really left since.

The genre most defining bands are Journey, Foreigner, Toto and Survivor.

Journey‘s 7th studio album Escape (1981) is essential.

Foreigner‘s 4th one, fittingly called 4, that came out in the same year as Journey‘s Escape is another essential AOR album, as is its successor Agent Provocator.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS82LDXPqnM&index=4&list=PLlna-50p3WXtojzyekRcTMEx9lkIgSwQt

Toto‘s 4th album Toto IV (1982), not only proofs that at least some AOR bands at a certain point in time were not awfully inventive in the naming of their albums, but is also a true classic in the genre, that’s a perfect link between the sheer perfection and melodic quality of West Coast music and the power of Rock (courtesy of Steve Lukather).… Read the rest