It was Classic Rock’s Geoff Barton who, in Sounds magazine years ago, first exclaimed the now famed line: ‘Pomp rock lives! Head for the hills!’ Which just about put that whole genre into perspective. Pomp was the child disowned by prog, and orphaned by AOR; the beast locked in the cellar, who got loose to terrorise the neighbourhood. Except that in the case of pomp rock we’re talking about a global neighbourhood, albeit one based principally in North America.
So what actually happened? Simple, really. American youth listened to the likes of Yes, Genesis, ELO and Queen, scratched their stubbly chins and thought: ‘Hmmm… We can make something of this. But it has to be radio-friendly, and it also has to have serious musical values. The result was that the a new crop of bands adopted the progressive tendencies of Britain’s finest bands of the early 1970s, and gave them a melodic sheen, and headed out to do battle. And it worked.
In Britain, though, pomp rock remained in the shadows, seen by many as hysterically self-important and nonsense. It was a cult thing, spread as much by careful whispers as through media attention. Consequently, record sales by these artists never really came even close to matching what was happening in the US – a situation not helped by the fact that they rarely ventured outside their own country. We did have some bands who emulated the US pompadours – Magnum, White Spirit and Saracen come to mind – but of these only Magnum achieved any real status, and that was only after changing to a more streamlined approach.
By the early 1980s, pomp had blown itself out. While the biggest names (such as Styx and Kansas) carried on regardless, the genre in general suffered a seizure. Since, bands like The Darkness having picked up the baton, appreciating the unwitting humour as much as anything. Pomp rock lives (again)! But don’t run away.
