| # | Artist | Song (click to play) | Album | Year | CD label |
| 1 | Jean-Luc Ponty | Cosmic Messenger | Cosmic Messenger | 1978 | Atlantic |
| Jean-Luc has quite an illustriuous career with dozens of albums as band-leader. In the prog world, he is also known as having been part of many of Frank Zappa's projects and Mahahvishnu Orchestra. My favorite era of JLP's material starts in 1975 with "Aurora" and goes up to 1980's "Civilized Evil". Bits of JLP's music is often heard in the television and radio media. If you have never heard a complete JLP album, when you first listen to it, you most certainly will say "Oh, yeah - I've heard that before!". JLP always has top-notch musicians in his bands, which have included: Allan Holdsworth, Scott Henderson, Daryl Stuermer, and dozens of others. | |||||
| 2 | Pulsar | Halloween part 1 (excerpt) | Halloween | 1977 | Musea |
| This is Pulsar's third release and considered by many to be their best. The sound is crisp and refined with analog synths, mellotron, acoustic and electric guitar, flute,... Vocals are in English. | |||||
| 3 | Moving Gelatine Plates | Moving Theme | The World of Genius Hans | 1972 | Musea |
| MGP, with 2 albums, win the award for the least appealing album covers of the French prog scene. If these guys never caught on, it is probably because when people come across their albums in the store they look at it, say blech! and then put it back. They released 2 albums, of which this is the second. Between the 2 Musea CD re-issues, the entire post-MGP album _Moving_ (1980) is included as bonus tracks. I had some problems finding this CD issue, even though most Musea CD's are easy to find. I think it may be OOP now. Supposedly, MGP were very influencial to subsequent French prog bands to follow. The music is very original with lots of surprises. | |||||
| 4 | Lard Free | Warinobaril | Lard Free | 1973 | Spalax |
| I find it pretty hard to think of anything to compare these guys to. It has elements of electronic music with destructive guitar. Heldon is probably the closest. | |||||
| 5 | Spheroe | Pu Ping Song | Spheroe | 1975 | Musea |
| Spheroe is a fairly typical mid-70's fusion band. It is pretty decent guitar-led melodic fusion, but, not particularly original. It seems that there is a song for just about every human activity, so why not a song for "Pu-Ping"? ;-) | |||||
| 6 | Carpe Diem | Publiphobie | En Regardant Passer Le Temps | 1975 | Musea |
| An absolute classic French prog album. It is mostly instrumental. The expected instrumentation of keyboards, bass, guitar, & drums, is augmented with soprano sax and flute. Oftentimes sax annoys me, but, soprano sax sounds quite nice. The sound is very reminiscent of Ange, but, without the over-the-top vocals. | |||||