Kansas

Marc M · 1st Born Joined: 13 Jul 2008 Posts: 10 Location: France

Hi,
I thought why not creating a Kansas thread if some forum users like the band ?!

To follow Valensian's and Bad Horsie's posts about Kansas in the "About Users" section :

Ah. "The Pinnacle"... one of my top favourite Kansas songs ever... It seems it never became a stage favourite. Yet, It's absolutely great. There are excellent progressive songs on "Masque", and good rockers too, but the album seems to be pretty underrated.
Other favourites of mine that might not be the most obvious ones are :
- "All the World", from the same album.
- "Hopelessly Human" and "Nobody Home" from POK-R
- "Angels Have Fallen" from Monolith
- "Inside Of Me", "Rainmaker" and "The Bells Of St James" from the very underrated "In the Spirit Of Things"
- "Myriad", "Look At the Time", "Distant Vision", "The Coming Dawn" and" "Byzantium" from "Somewhere to Elsewhere" in 2000

Thinking of some of the first songs I listed, it makes me think that, sometimes, Steve Walsh (and not only Livgren) has come up with a great long progressive song, before he decided to do mainly more straightforward hard rock music. He came back to some more progressive stuff lately, I think. I didn't like so much "Glossolalia" (which is pretty progressive, even fairly complex, but not enough melodic to my taste), but the third one "Shadowman" is really melodic & sometimes proggy.

That's a pity that Steve Walsh's voice has declined a lot during the last 16 years or so... I saw Kansas live back in 2005 or 2006, for the first time and he wasn't in great shape again... Well, even on the studio albums from the late 80's and 90's, his voice is very husky... and he's got a hard time reaching the high notes. Billy Greer has got a very similar voice and support him well, though.
What many people forget though is, as you mentioned it, that Steve Walsh used to be a GREAT keyboard player... He's playing real virtuoso stuff a lot on the early albums. Kerry Livgren was more a good guitar player and a decent keyboard player, more of an arranger/composer. That was great to have those two musicians who could play keyboards on stage. Most progressive rock bands suffered ore or less, in the live context, from having just one keyboard player.
Cheers - Marc

Merçeauroix · Admin Joined: 06 May 2007 Posts: 205 Location: The Moon

I love Kansas. Along with Kayak, they're the only progresive rock bands I like and two of my very favourite bands.

My favourite album is In The Spirit of Things. Steve's vocal perfomances are amazing, better than ever. Plus Steve Morse's incredible guitar work. WOW. Power is great too... but In The Spirit of Things has this one song called RAINMAKER, which alone itself makes the album great already.

It's interesting that some Queen fans find cool both artists as different as Valensia and Kansas. Not that they have something in common (Which they could have, of course. But at first sight it doesn't seem so) but it's interesting. My band's drummer loves Kansas and Valensia too. And Queen, of course.

Anyway, good to see that people apreciate such an underrated band as Kansas.

Cheers,
Hor
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Mother Nature, sow the seeds
Mother Nation bleeds

Valensian · Lion Joined: 14 Jul 2007 Posts: 98

Marc M · 1st Born Joined: 13 Jul 2008 Posts: 10 Location: France

Diegus · Ready To Roar Joined: 27 Oct 2008 Posts: 30

SOMEONE SAID KANSAS?!?!!??!

WHOOOOO!?!??!?

What a band OMFFFFFG!

Have a few Drum covers of my own in my Youtube account, named DiegusIcarus, if you wanna check.

Nevertheless, as opposed to the admin's, my card's on Point of Know Return, i think.

I was in Chile in 2005 or 6 when Kansas came for the Viña del mar concert... but i didn't know them!! Sad

Greets. Phil (L)