Emerson, Lake, and Palmer - Emerson, Lake, and Palmer

Emerson, Lake, and Palmer
Emerson, Lake, and Palmer

Rhino, 1970

Keith Emerson - organ, piano, Moog synth
Greg Lake - vocals, bass, guitar
Carl Palmer - drums, percussion

1. The Barbarian
2. Take a Pebble
3. Knife Edge
4. The Three Fates: Clotho/Lachesis/Atropos
5. Tank
6. Lucky Man

This one's a classic album by a legendary band. Very rarely is a debut album as powerful as this one. The album kicks off with a full-band instrumental, The Barbarian. It has some great fuzzed-out riffs from Lake and some great playing from Emerson. The next one, Take a Pebble is meant as a showcase for Lake, with wistful vocals, poetic lyrics, and a lengthy acoustic guitar solo in the middle. Emerson gets his licks in too with excellent piano work. The next track, Knife Edge is an aggressive song that rocks as much as anything can rock. Lake's voice is a cannon on this one, and Emerson rips out organ solos that would make Jon Lord proud. Next is Emerson's showcase, The Three Fates. It features three sections: organ, piano solo, and piano trio. Next is Tank, another full-band instrumental. This one was seemingly meant to showcase Palmer, with heavily aggressive drumming and a drum solo section. The album ends with the hit single, Lucky Man. They put on a great performance to close out a strong album. This is a good place to start with ELP, and while each album in their main sequence had at least one track better than anything on this one (with the exception of one album), this one's a very strong album, especially considering it was their first.