Magic Purple Sunshine: July 2008

I've been trying to break down all these MPS albums into subgenres. I'm making a few educated guesses but when I haven't heard an album I'm mostly leaving off the subgenre. But the more MPS albums I listen to, the more inadequate seem the labels we usually use to listen to music.

I've been using Prog Jazz to describe what I think is one of the hallmark MPS sounds. It's a little electric, but not full-on fusion. It's a little groovy, but not full on funk. It's very European!

The MPS sound was built on jazz but became a real melting pot. Many of the albums listed here have more than one genre. Who can describe this stuff? There's Now Sound, which is like Easy Listening, except maybe groovier, in an Austin Powers sort of way. And that "now" was forty years ago. There's vocals, and there's big bands, sometimes jazzy and sometimes not. And sometimes MPS took it to church.

And the Black Forest became a melting pot. Those Brazilians! The sultry hot latin sound! Those sitar-loving hippies! Even some exotica! And then there were all the musicians from behind the old "iron curtain." Should I add a tag for that? I haven't listed much yet but there was even a whole line of MPS classical music.

If you disagree with one of my style tags, or can identify the sound of an album I haven't yet tagged, leave a comment!