Obscure MMJ influences

[rincon]

I am reintroducing myself to vinyl and have a collection of my own, plus what my brother and father left me after they died, numbering about 2,000 albums. Today I listened to Crime of the Century by Supertramp. Never would I have thought on my own they had anything in common with MMJ. During Asylum I started to notice some melodic similarities. The instrumentation is very different, but the chord changes(?), I am not a musician, and song structure was very reminiscent of some MMJ songs. The ones that came to mind were X-MAS Curtain, O is the One that is Real, and Gideon. I would bet if you asked Jim he would admit he was a fan and it somehow entered the mix of music swirling in his head, something I doubt any of us could really comprehend. There must be many more bands not previously identified as influences that one could point to.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (with Supertramp's Asylum)