Pictures at an Exhibition

This is a very interesting album. I liked it but it wasn't anything amazing. I wish I was there.

Enjoyable, though nothing jumped out at me as being great.

Цей концертник памʼятався мені набагато кращим, ніж виявився, коли вчора я його переслухав. Багато якихось гуфі моментів, хз. При всій повазі до ЕЛП, тут буде двійка.

this is some noodly prog bullshit (positive)

Ok now I get some of the hate for prog rock back then. This was not great. At least it was short.

This is exactly what I expected an ELP live album to be; lots of keyboard soloing and symphonic-influenced prog rock. It was a pretty enjoyable experience, I say as someone who already likes ELP quite a bit. Yes, they are probably the most pretentious band in existence, but they are very talented and their songs are actually surprisingly engaging, so they're still a band I rather like. I can't say this is their best work, however, though it does keep it's songs to bite-size lengths.

This album is ranked #36 of 37 albums for 1971. Other 1971 albums rated by me:
Led Zeppelin IV(1/37)-5
Who's Next(5/37)-5
Sticky Fingers(6/37)-4
Pearl(7/37)-5
L. A. Woman(8/37)-3
Maggot Brain(9/37)-4
Electric Warrior(11/37)-3
Imagine(14/37)-4
Fela Kuti Live!(15/37)-4
Nilsson Schmilsson(16/37)-4
Coat of Many Colors(18/37)-5
At Fillmore East(19/37)-4
Surf's Up(22/37)-4
Every Picture Tells A Story(25/37)-4
Songs of Love and Hate(29/38)-5
Tago Mago(33/37)-4
Histoire de Melody Nelson(35/37)-1

The two star rating is mostly out of spite and because i needed a reason to stop listening to this.

eh exatamente o que se propos a ser: uma adaptação de música clássica feita por uma banda de prog.
o que não é horrível. mas também tá longe de ser bom. ou minimamente interessante.

Ok, one good thing about listening to this album: I will never again confuse Emerson Lake and Palmer with Crosby Stills Nash and Young.

That’s they only good thing though, because I still really dislike prog rock.

This album is bad, I think? It’s kind of hard to tell. It has so many weird ideas and I’m not entirely sure I can say which ones work or don’t. It’s an interesting listen at least. I wasn’t bored at all during it. At times I was amused and even had fun. But at the same time, there’s long stretches of weird repetitive organ nonsense. I don’t think I’d ever listen to it again. But it also ends with Nutrocker, which is just so out of left field and delightful in bad ways

Do you have kids? Were you once a kid? Either way, you probably can know an example of a kid who always seems to bring out the worst in other kids - that kid who shows up and somehow every other kid forgets everything they ever knew about how to behave. Maybe you can even think of an adult example. Anyway, "Live Recording" is that kid for Progressive Rock. These two should never be allowed together.

Is this a fun and silly idea? Absolutely! I'd even go so far as to say it was absolutely great that they performed it... but they didn't need to commit to the bit this hard. Let this be one of those legendary things your band did while it gallivanted around the world in the heyday of rock & roll.

The “Pictures at an Exhibition” concert by Emerson, Lake & Palmer must have been impressive. I imagine how the band interacted with the audience while Keith Emerson pulled out all the stops on his organ. It’s easy to picture the musicians communicating with each other through glances during the more densely arranged passages. The atmosphere in the hall might have ranged from intense tension at the beginning to euphoria at the end of “Blues Variation” to relaxed excitement before “Nutrocker". The problem is: none of that is truly captured in the recording. So if you weren’t there (e.g., because you were born after 1971), the only basis for evaluation is the audio tracks - and they are spectacular in places. However, there are certainly some taxing passages as well, the worst of which comes right at the beginning with the fairly faithful recitation of the source material. I’d even go so far as to say that the band doesn’t really loosen up until after the aforementioned “Blues Variation” - and from there on, the album is genuinely fun.
How do you rate something like this? On the one hand, the second half is really great; on the other hand, in my view, Emerson, Lake & Palmer actually missed the chance to create an undisputed legend because of the way they structured the setlist. But perhaps that’s also due to the source material, which doesn’t exactly come across as appealing at first glance either. I’ll give it - albeit a very narrow - 5 stars.

Not bad.

If a Prog Rock Super Group isn’t Super does ft make it better? No. No it doesn’t.

What an awful gig to subject yourself to.

Very much wanky, noodly prog. Utterly tedious. Fucking weird. Jarringly inconsistent.

1.5 rounded up.

I mean, it's a bit bizzare but I feel like all classical music is a bit like that. It's very interesting though, because it's pretty hard to play stuff like this, let alone reinvent and add lyrics to it. This is also a great piece by Mussorgsky. I liked this, and considering that there isn't any classical pieces on this list, I'll take it.

It’s a shame—my wife plays pieces from *Pictures at an Exhibition* on the piano. Although I didn’t really connect with piano music at first—especially not with the sometimes rather gloomy Ukrainian composers—I ended up really liking some of the pieces after listening to them several times. So I was curious to see how ELP would handle them. I recognized the “Promenades,” but unfortunately not the rest. I was particularly disappointed by “The Old Castle.” The only thing I really liked was the piece, “Nutrocker.” 3/5

1.55

I wasn't really digging this album in the beginning. It's kind of a lot to take in and find a groove with. There are moments that go hard in a good way, but some of it is just not a smooth adaptation IMO. I think it's solid in The Great Gates of Kiev. Overall, I thought the album was okay.

Ok so I'm not a prog rock guy, but I kind of thought this would be cool. It's not. Granted this is probably not the ideal way to hear ELP at length for the first time, but it's one of those things where they were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should (Insert Jeff Goldblum gif here).