CR> First off, I think the opening is a nod to Zeppelin's "Stairway..."
 
 SR> No, not really.  Both are just trying to capture a fairly mediaeval
 SR> sound, and both do...well, okay at it.
 CR> Medieval?  Well, we'll disagree again.
Well, please keep in mind that I say both are *trying* to capture that. 
For "Grendel" the reason is obvious -- the song is supposed to evoke a 
mediaeval feel because it's based on a mediaeval epic.  (Whether you 
want to call the 8th century "mediaeval" is up to you, but I'll go with 
it for now.)  In the case of "Stairway to Heaven", much on that album 
seems to have and/or desire influence from J.R.R. Tolkien and similar 
works, which again tries to conjure (pun intended) a mediaeval feel.
In both cases, the opening is more a folk-musickified, 
psuedo-Renaissance sound than anything like true mediaeval, but in any 
case I think the important thing is that neither imitates the other, 
they both simply try to imitate the same thing and this creates a 
similar sound.
 
 CR> The overall form of the song is a nod to "Supper's Ready" 
 SR> Again, I disagree.  There's no equivalent of "Willow Farm", for
 SR> example, nor of "How Dare I Be So Beautiful?" or "As Sure As Eggs Is
 SR> Eggs".  About the only similarity is the closing section, which isn't
 SR> even the  equivalent of the closing section of SR.
 CR> "Supper's Ready" has separate themes; "Grendel" has separate themes.
 CR> That's what I meant.  You can't disagree with that similarity.
No, but I can certainly deny that this implies any influence whatsoever. 
After all, the "separate themes" matter is one of the very defining 
characteristics of Prog.
 
 CR> Then there's Rothery's guitar
 CR> which, to me, has a thinner Hackett sound.  It gets *very* Hackett
 CR> like from 7:00 through 9:00 minutes into it.
 
 SR> This I can see.
 CR> No way -- you agree?! :-)
Good point.  I'd better go listen to it again and find some way to 
disagree with it. :-)
NP: "Roundabout" (if you have to ask what band or album, get off the 
echo NOW!)
 
... For sale: Parachute. Used once, never opened, small stain.
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