Kansas Fans - Where are you!

[FooserPaul]

Official Website: www.kansasband.com
Fans Site: www.kansasfans.com

CoWS:
[youtube=425,350]CB17uWuBrL0[/youtube]

PoKR: (Point of Know Return)

[youtube=425,350]60A1yKc2hi4[/youtube]

Mysteries and Mayhem

[youtube=425,350]Sbdsg4vCs-w[/youtube]

All I wanted

[youtube=425,350]rQnltsBiwHM[/youtube]

Stand beside me

[youtube=425,350]-N4n12twiOU[/youtube]

 

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[RGINN]

All they are now is dust in the wind.

 

[spartacus53]

No doubt they were good, but I was never into pop rock groups.. Don't get me wrong, I know much of their work, I just didn't buy their albums

 

[Produce Guy]

I really liked their live LP they did back in the late '70's or early '80's,I can't remember,but I know I played it allot.

 

[Dano Sverige]

Only ever knew "wayward son"...great song though.

 

[thrillathahunt]

Actually Spart, Kansas' musical style would best fit into the catagory of "Art Rock" (Not to be confused with Rock Art ) an intrinsically album-based form which takes advantage of the format's capacity for longer more complex composition's and extended instrumental explorations, something not found in "pop rock".

In my opinion Kansas just kept getting better and better from their beginning in 1974. By 1986 with the "Power" album I thought they had their best song yet in "All I wanted".

 

[FooserPaul]

Actually Spart, Kansas' musical style would best fit into the catagory of "Art Rock" (Not to be confused with Rock Art ) an intrinsically album-based form which takes advantage of the format's capacity for longer more complex composition's and extended instrumental explorations, something not found in "pop rock".

In my opinion Kansas just kept getting better and better from their beginning in 1974. By 1986 with the "Power" album I thought they had their best song yet in "All I wanted".

Isn't Art Rock like David Bowe - Roxy Music: Art rock is a term describing a subgenre of rock music that tends to have "experimental or avant-garde influences" and emphasizes "novel sonic texture."Art rock is an "intrinsically album-based" form, which takes "advantage of the format's capacity for longer, more complex compositions and extended instrumental explorations."The Golden Age of Rock lectures define art rock as "a piece of music in the rock idiom that appeals more intellectually or musically; that is, not formulated along pop lines for mass consumption." The lectures note that it is "...usually somewhat experimental, using a long structure with several themes like classical music" or "a suite of individual songs." Art rock "almost always features keyboards more than guitar." As well, art rock is "not so much for dancing as for listening and it often tells a story or there is a philosophical theme to the lyrics.

I belive that kansas fit more into the Progressive Rock Genre (ProgRock):

Progressive rock (also referred to as prog rock or prog) is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility."John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of the 1960s as much as take its rightful place beside the modern classical music of Stravinsky and Bartók."Progressive rock bands pushed "rock's technical and compositional boundaries" by going beyond the standard rock or popular verse-chorus-based song structures. The Oxford Companion to Music states that progressive rock bands "...explored extended musical structures which involved intricate instrumental patterns and textures and often esoteric subject matter."Additionally, the arrangements often incorporated elements drawn from classical, jazz, and world music. Instrumentals were common, while songs with lyrics were sometimes conceptual, abstract, or based in fantasy. Progressive rock bands sometimes used "concept albums that made unified statements, usually telling an epic story or tackling a grand overarching theme."Progressive rock developed from late 1960s psychedelic rock, as part of a wide-ranging tendency in rock music of this era to draw inspiration from ever more diverse influences. The term was initially applied to the music of bands such as Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull and Emerson, Lake & Palmer,reaching its peak of popularity in the mid 1970s.

Precursors

Allmusic cites Bob Dylan's poetry, The Mothers of Invention's Freak Out! (1966) and The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) as the "earliest rumblings of progressive and art rock", while progressiverock.com cites the last as its "starting point", although earlier albums such as Rubber Soul and Revolver had begun incorporating Eastern music and instruments not common in rock music. This would later evolve to other progressive-rock acts such as Yes and King Crimson, Rush, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Gentle Giant and Queen. The Beach Boys' concept album Pet Sounds (1966) and Jefferson Airplane's second album Surrealistic Pillow (1967) were both big influences for many progressive rock bands.

From the mid-1960s The Left Banke, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys had pioneered the inclusion of harpsichords, wind and string sections on their recordings to produce a form of Baroque rock and can be heard in singles like Procol Harum's "A Whiter Shade of Pale" (1967), with its Bach inspired introduction. Freak Out!, released in 1966, had been a mixture of progressive rock, garage rock and avant-garde layered sounds. In the same year, the band "1-2-3", later renamed Clouds, began experimenting with song structure, improvisation, and multi-layered arrangements. In March of that year, The Byrds released "Eight Miles High", a pioneering psychedelic rock single with lead guitar heavily influenced by the jazz soloing style of John Coltrane. Later that year, The Who released "A Quick One While He's Away", the first example of the rock opera form, and considered by some to have been the first prog epic.

In 1967, Jeff Beck released the single "Beck's Bolero", inspired by Maurice Ravel's Bolero, and, later that year, Procol Harum released the Bach-influenced single "A Whiter Shade of Pale". Also in 1967, the Moody Blues released Days of Future Passed, combining classical-inspired orchestral music with traditional rock instrumentation and song structures. Pink Floyd's first album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, contained the nearly ten-minute improvisational psychedelic instrumental "Interstellar Overdrive".

By the late 1960s, many rock bands had begun incorporating instruments from classical and Eastern music, as well as experimenting with improvisation and lengthier compositions. East of Eden, for example, used Eastern harmonics and instruments such as a sumerian saxophone on the album Mercator Projected in 1969. Some, such as the UK's Soft Machine, began to experiment with blends of rock and jazz. By the end of the decade, other bands, such as Deep Purple and The Nice, had also recorded classical-influenced albums with full orchestras: Concerto for Group and Orchestra and Five Bridges. This use of classical music would crystallise in the '70s with Amon Düül's orchestral score on Made in Germany (1975), Pink Floyd's Atom Heart Mother (1970), and several works of Frank Zappa.

Early bands

Pink Floyd playing "Dark Side of the Moon" at Earls Court, 1973
Bands formed by the end of the 1960s included The Moody Blues (1964), Pink Floyd (1965), Soft Machine (1966), Barclay James Harvest (1966), Gong (1967), Genesis (1967), Jethro Tull (1967), The Nice (1967), The United States of America (1967), Van der Graaf Generator (1967), Yes (1968), Caravan (1968), King Crimson (1969), Supertramp (1969) and Gentle Giant (1969).[13]

Although many of these bands were from the UK, the genre was growing popular elsewhere in continental Europe. Triumvirat led Germany's significant progressive rock movement, while Tangerine Dream, Faust, Can and Neu! led the related Berlin School and Krautrock movements. Italian progressive rock is an important sub-genre led by PFM, Le Orme, and Banco, all of which gained significant international recognition. Other notable Italian bands include New Trolls, Area, Goblin, Museo Rosenbach, Il Balletto di Bronzo, Maxophone and Locanda Delle Fate.

Focus and Trace formed in the Netherlands, France produced Ange, Gong, and Magma, the Quebec-based Harmonium were one of the first significant North American progressive bands, and Greece saw the debut of Aphrodite's Child led by electronic music pioneer Vangelis. Spain produced numerous prog groups, including Triana. Scandinavia was represented by Norwegian band Popol Vuh, Swedish band Kaipa, and Finnish band Wigwam.

Peak in popularity and decline

Yes performing in Indianapolis in 1977
Progressive rock's popularity peaked in the mid-1970s, when prog artists regularly topped reader polls in mainstream popular music magazines in Britain and America, and albums like Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells topped the charts.

By this time, several North American progressive rock bands had been formed. Kansas, which had actually existed in one form or another since 1971, became one of the most commercially successful of all progressive rock bands. Likewise, Electric Light Orchestra, who formed in 1970 as a progressive offshoot of "The Beatles sound", saw their greatest success during the mid-1970s. Pop star Todd Rundgren moved into prog with his new band, Utopia. Toronto's Rush, who were formed in 1968, became a major band, with a string of hit albums extending from the mid-1970s to the present. In Japan, Osamu Kitajima's 1974 progressive rock album Benzaiten, featuring Haruomi Hosono, utilized electronic music instruments such as a synthesizer and drum machine.[

 

[thrillathahunt]

Their last two albums were different than earlier ones. Different band members....different sound. In my opinion Kansas was a much better band with the 1985-1989 group. (They are still together with most of the original group)I quess you could argue this point endlessly...kind of like trying to put AC/DC in a catagory, hard rock or heavy metal. Some will voice opinions either way.