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Supertramp – Are they underrated?

post #1 of 11
12/4/10 at 10:47am
Thread Starter 

I have a pretty mixed bag of musical preferences from Classical through pop, rock, R &B, disco, heavy metal, punk, reggae, new wave etc.

 

I keep coming back to Supertramp with stand out tracks like, School, Crime of The Century, Even in The Quietest Moments, My Kind of Lady, Fools Overture,  Bloody Well Right, & Hide in Your Shell.

 

I’ve also just listened to the Roger Hodgson live album ‘Take the long way home’ recorded in Montral, Canada.  His solo interpretation of track like ‘School’ provides for a fascinatingly  different perspective.

 

And yet, when you look at the top 200 albums or singles they don’t appear to feature anywhere. 

 

Also great to listen to on Headphones, especially their Live in Paris album.

 

Any thoughts guys?

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post #2 of 11
12/4/10 at 4:07pm
When I was in high school, I loved Supertramp. But I became very disappointed in them after seeing them live. It was all on tape. I could have stayed home and heard the same thing by just playing the album. Today, I still kind of like the goofy "art rock" engineering, but I can't abide the high pinched sounding vocals any more.

The odd thing is that back in the late 70s, I thought "art rock" was good and disco was horrible. But now, I've come to think that art rock is neither art nor rock, and a good funk groove is a lot more interesting than a hatful of phasey studio tricks. I guess one's tastes change as they grow older and get exposed to more kinds of music.
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post #3 of 11
12/4/10 at 6:42pm

Interesting bigshot - my experience kind of mirrors yours, liking Supertramp for at least one album, but now finding them very clumsy and not possible to like even on one of my 70s nostalgia waves.  Disco/RnB/Funk, which I always enjoyed at the time, however has lasted the distance with me. Give me some Parliament, Earth Wind and Fire or Chic and immediately I am in nostalgia (and musical) heaven.

 

So IMO, answering the question - no Supertramp aren't underrated, but they were once overrated.

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post #4 of 11
12/4/10 at 9:24pm
  •  
  • These are all IMO all classic progressive/art rock albums from the seventies. Not far behind many Yes/Genesis albums, maybe a touch more melodic and mainstream like. 
  • I believe these recordings has partways inspired many bands later on and all four albums today still, somehow, sounds timeless and are great recordings compared to what is being relased nowadays.
  • By the the way, the "Paris Live album" still one of the best sounding rock live recordings/releases
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post #5 of 11
12/8/10 at 8:56pm

I love Supertramp, and I am a hardcore metalhead. there's something about bands of those days......regular_smile%20.gif

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post #6 of 11
12/8/10 at 10:00pm

I only have two of their albums, Crime and Breakfast. When Breakfast came out I would hear them all the time on FM rock stations. Fast forward, there were just too many really good bands from back then. And Supertramp can easily get lost in the shuffle.

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post #7 of 11
12/9/10 at 7:35pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by wuwhere View Post

I only have two of their albums, Crime and Breakfast. When Breakfast came out I would hear them all the time on FM rock stations. Fast forward, there were just too many really good bands from back then. And Supertramp can easily get lost in the shuffle.


Yes,  a great band.  I would say underated in the sense of many of the deeper cuts on their albums were overlooked by many since their top hits certainly got tons of airplay.  But yes, so many great bands back then.  The 70's were the cream of the crop for great music of all decades IMHO.
 

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post #8 of 11
12/10/10 at 6:46am
The seventies was probably the ugliest decade with horrible unkempt hair and mutton chop sideburns, olive green shag carpeting and harvest gold appliances, and plastic everything. Having lived through the seventies, I feel qualified to say that it was far from the cream of the 20th century musically speaking. In fact, it was a severe letdown from the excitement of the sixties, and when the 80s came along with new wave and punk, it was like a blast of fresh air in a room full of farts. I'd be hard pressed to pick the real cream decade, but the 30s (jazz and swing) or the 50s (rock n roll and modern jazz) would probably be the top contenders.
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post #9 of 11
12/10/10 at 7:31pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by bigshot View Post

The seventies was probably the ugliest decade with horrible unkempt hair and mutton chop sideburns, olive green shag carpeting and harvest gold appliances, and plastic everything. Having lived through the seventies, I feel qualified to say that it was far from the cream of the 20th century musically speaking. In fact, it was a severe letdown from the excitement of the sixties, and when the 80s came along with new wave and punk, it was like a blast of fresh air in a room full of farts. I'd be hard pressed to pick the real cream decade, but the 30s (jazz and swing) or the 50s (rock n roll and modern jazz) would probably be the top contenders.

Please tell me your post is a tongue in cheek joke, right???  I'll give you 50's jazz but you are way off base with rock. 

 

70's:  The epic era of FM rock radio never resisting or daring or being restricted from playing a cut no matter how deep into the record.

Quadrophenia, The Wall, the peak of Pink Floyd, Zeppelin, Genesis, Tull, Springsteen and the Who (just to name a few), birth of Rush, Van Halen and Aerosmith.  There were no walls around the music or producers or record companies trying to "box" all of the music or put constraints on it.  Creativity was at an all-time high and it was not about the money.

 

80's: Big hair crappy rock ballad one-hit wonder bands and many (but not all) of the same 70's bands fading quickly trying to hang on to glory (Genesis, Yes).  Gave us U2 and REM but nothing else.

 

Please tell me you're joking....

 


Edited by Spyro - 12/10/10 at 7:37pm
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post #10 of 11
12/10/10 at 10:52pm
50s rock and roll, not rock. Two very different things. One is raw and electric, the other is bloated and redundant. The 50s had dozens of types of great music. By the 70s it had boiled down to one overbooked mess of rehash.

The 80s was a time for tearing down the pretentiousness and routine and get back to stripped down, aggressive music again. Ultimately it failed, but you can't fault them for trying.
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post #11 of 11
1/25/12 at 11:16pm

I only have this  to say about SUPERTRAMP!!

I loved them then...I love them NOW!!

 

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