The Arrogant Proggie

^ even some of those manufactured pop divas can sing with soul, ever heard Pink?  Girl has some pipes.










Edited by Atavachron - April 29 2009 at 02:47

The average indie, pop, metal, jazz, blues, country or whatever the hell genre fan is no more or less arrogant than the average 'prog' fan is going to be.
It's up to the individual to not jump on the bandwagon of others who make blanket statements about other music genres like such and actually think for themselves and start UNDERSTANDING other music and get off their f**kin' high horse of what they listen to as being superior. There is no reason to even subjectively believe what you listen to is somehow inferior. You're not a better person, no one is going to like you more, in fact most people are just going think you're an ass.
It's just easier to be a nice guy at the end of the day as I found out.
Someone likes pop music even if I don't? Cool.
Someone likes country even if I don't? Cool, they like it, it's all I care about it, as long as they are happy. No point in being an a****le and saying it's apparently inherently inferior to what you like.
Chances are, if you meet someone for the first time and instead of bashing their music taste and try to discover why they are different to you and what other things you have in common you'll achieve a lot more.
What makes this planet good is the diversity of cultures. It's cool to find out why others are so different. What isn't so cool is this drive to make them more and more the same by try to prove their culture is superior and then what happens is we lose the diversity.
Sure this is talking on a bigger scale then music of course, but one thing always leads to the next.

No one says you have to be necessarily open minded and have to like everything, because I sure don't like anything you shove in front of me, but what we should be aiming for is understanding you're not any better than the man next to you.

If people really are obsessed with listening to complex music, why even prog rock?
It's still rock music after all.
It doesn't even come a fraction of the way to being as complex as some of the contemporary classical music out there or even older periods.
So why stop at prog rock? It's so simple compared to what else is on offer in the classical world.

It's all relative isn't it?
We can deduce from this, at the top of the rung we have the classical snob/elitist

Classical snob looks down upon prog rock as music that tries to achieve a level of complexity but in reality is just so simple compared to what the classical snob likes.
The prog rock elitist fan looks down at the pop rock fan.
The pop rock fan might look down at music not made by real instruments.

If all I cared about was how complex the music had to be, I wouldn't even bother with prog rock/metal.

But fortunately how technical/complex music is doesn't matter to me, so I can safely listen to prog rock alongside rock alongside classical and alongside jazz. There is the odd pop rock song I can safely fit in there as something I like too.

I do not think proggies to be arrogant !

I think many of us go through that arrogant zombie prog pod person stage, but I think most of us have a broader appreciation of music in general, prog or otherwise.  But let's face it prog is not nearly as well known or appreciated by the average music fan as it used to be.  Correct me if I'm wrong.  (Wasn't that statement reasonably humble?)



Edited by Slartibartfast - April 29 2009 at 15:44

Petrovsk Mizinski wrote: The average indie, pop, metal, jazz, blues, country or whatever the hell genre fan is no more or less arrogant than the average 'prog' fan is going to be.

Then you're not familiar with how obsessed with superficial definitions of "authenticity" fans of folk music can get. Not all of them are like that, of course, otherwise Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds wouldn't be as popular as that, but do remember that far more booed at Bob Dylan for going electric than at Iron Maiden for using keyboards and that a lot of folk music labels have ridiculously strict standards for what they will sign based on how much the music conforms to some kind of abstract ideal of what "the originals" sound like, often neglecting some pretty good stuff in the process. This applies in particular to the "world music crowd".

Of course, rock purists can get pretty ridiculous too, with a lot of them denying that electronic music or just anything with synths is inherently worse than stuff without. As I said, this is nowhere as bad as in the folk scene but it's still there though I suspect it might be a case of jealousy because electronica is eclipsing rock's place as the most popular genre of music. If anything, progressive rock fans are on average definitely not as "close-minded" as a lot of other kinds of music fans probably because the entire idea of progressive rock is to combine rock music with unusual influences, which logically will get its fans to check out genres they usually wouldn't care that much about.

As for being seen as close-minded for preferring stuff that skews different from the norm, that's a pretty funny attitude and a perfect example of what I call suspicious openmindedness because "normal music" has to fit one of many "molds" that the stuff falling outside is harder to market (see David Byrne's rant about "world music") the further you get into the underground. I imagine that a lot of people, especially the ones into the avant/Rock In Opposition business, are here to get away from ordinary music.

I feel like adding, though, that Henry Plainview has a point about pop music not necessarily being bad. Over the last month I've been getting into gothic rock, and the brilliant thing about that particular genre is that it combines catchiness and a pop sensibility with icy sophistication.

I'm not going to say I'm a fan of classic rock, but I am a fan of scores of classic bands...there is a lot of classic rock that I cannot stand so when people assume I like classic rock because I like certain groups it kind of irks me...that aside

Lucent wrote: The reason I have a problem with pop music is they don't even try.

I think pop musicians actually do try, I just don't like what they crank out.  Punks really try hard not to try, which is inherently annoying. That really makes me want to stick a safety pin their cheeks for some odd reason...


Edited by Slartibartfast - April 29 2009 at 16:11

I have a confession to make, before I became a total prog freak I was a big Monkees fan.

 I was or still am a Monkees Fan. I watched the shows and have a couple of their singles but like Scott I would say casual these days but I still love Daydream Believer

Atavachron wrote: I find quality pop is among the most difficult to pull off well; ever tried just writing a good song?  It's an art and requires as much skill and natural talent as anything does.  Less is often more, indeed.

I agree. Most prog fans seem to underestimate the talent of making good pop songs. I understand if some people only likes complex and challenging music, but in my opinion music being simpler doesn't necessarily mean it is worst than the music you like or has less artistic value.


Edited by SgtPepper67 - April 29 2009 at 18:43