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Intstrumenal rock suggestions

#24
Godspeed You Black Emperor


Animals as Leaders




Do Make Say Think


Durutti Column


Brian Eno


Sunno)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Earth


...and the wildcard bonus of an awful lot of good jazz


*Plus the other stuff the guy recommending Don Caballero said.
 
#31
Thanks for all the input. It shows how hard it can be to find music like I described. Dregs, Beck, Animals as Leaders and damn near every 70's fusion band are fantastic but not really a musical backdrop.

PDXBassdad nailed it with Red Sparowes. I need to listen to everything on your list. Is there some genre label you would associate with this?

I remember hearing Return to Forever for the first time, probably in 1973 or 1974. Stanley blew my socks off. Saw them on PBS on a 1/2 hour Sound Stage show. I proceeded to eat up every fusion album I could find. After many years the only album that really stuck with me was Weather Report Mysterious Traveler. It was a soundscape. Alphonse Johnson, and all the players, left so much open space and just inferred things. It is more of telling a story or musically describing a feeling. It is hard for me to put in words. Its the way I prefer Kind of Blue to jazz where a million notes are played.

Although not guitar focused, Charles Lloyd and the Marvels hits this territory as well.
 
#32
The general genre that I gave examples for is post-rock, though that can be a pretty wide range of styles with some being more driving/mathy and others being more atmospheric.

Muddslide listed some of the huge hitters in the genre. I would also add God is an Astronaut.
 
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#33
thetaxmiser said:
the only album that really stuck with me was Weather Report Mysterious Traveler. It was a soundscape. Alphonse Johnson, and all the players, left so much open space and just inferred things. It is more of telling a story or musically describing a feeling. It is hard for me to put in words. Its the way I prefer Kind of Blue to jazz where a million notes are played.
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Based on the above, I would strongly urge OP to check out Mick Karn, both in his solo albums

and his work with JBK

(slight digression: I think every TB member should become familiar with Mick Karn's work!)


Also check out Jon Hassel,

and some of Bill Laswell's work ...although you need to be very selective as A) he has a huge catalog, and B) some of that catalog is I believe the complete antithesis of what you describe above. Maybe start with Material's Seven Souls album:
 
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#34
Spacecase said:
And while you're dumpster diving, don't overlook Jeff Beck.
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How is Jeff Beck in the dumpster? Nevertheless, his stuff, while being eternal, is just what the OP stated he wasn't looking for.

Muddslide said:
...forgot Explosions in the Sky, Godspeed You!Black Emperor, 5ive Style, Heroic Doses and Dif Juz...
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Dif Juz, absolutely, although they may not be as 'rocked out' as the band that taxmiser referenced . Very unique, though. Sort of like if the Cocteau Twins went on a free-form jazz odyssey(well, maybe not really jazz)...



Now for something different...yeah, they usually had vocals, but as they were part of the late 60's SF scene, they did plenty of long instrumental explorations in the middle of their tunes. This, however, is an actual instrumental, based loosely on Brubeck's "Take Five", and features amazing guitar interplay from Cipollina and Duncan, a forerunner of what Television did a decade later:


Speaking of Verlaine, here's his whole album of moody instrumentals...

and a sort-of follow up...


Although he gets relegated to the jazz genre, the Gabor Szabo rabbit hole is worth checking out, there's much more going on, almost psychedelic...


Here's wild card; although he headed up Japan's answer to the Ventures(The Bunnys)in the 60's, Terauchi put this album out in 1972 that is anything but orthodox surf music...
 
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#38
Michedelic said:
How is Jeff Beck in the dumpster? Nevertheless, his stuff, while being eternal, is just what the OP stated he wasn't looking for.
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"Dumpster diving" was not meant to reflect badly on Jeff Beck or anyone's taste in music. The term is often used to mean deep investigation, and I meant it to apply to the OP's efforts to find what he's after.

Regarding the OP's request, I will admit that I didn't go to Spotify to check out "Quasi Bonsai." I don't have an account, nor do I wish to apply for one. That said, not everything in Beck's catalog is fusion. Beck's Bolero was the first tune that came to mind.
 
#39
Spacecase said:
"Dumpster diving" was not meant to reflect badly on Jeff Beck or anyone's taste in music. The term is often used to mean deep investigation, and I meant it to apply to the OP's efforts to find what he's after.

Regarding the OP's request, I will admit that I didn't go to Spotify to check out "Quasi Bonsai." I don't have an account, nor do I wish to apply for one. That said, not everything in Beck's catalog is fusion. Beck's Bolero was the first tune that came to mind.
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All you'd have to do is go to Youtube to check on new artists; it's a lot quicker. But as far as Beck's vast catalog, and general perception of him as an artist is concerned, mention him and 'instrumental' in the same sentence, and his funk/fusion/techno/world stuff is what comes to mind. Before "Blow By Blow" he only recorded a small handful of instro's: 'Bolero', 'Greensleeves', 'Rice Pudding', 'Girl From Mill Valley', 'Raynes Park' and 'Highways'.
 

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