How good is prog?

Pareto Principle - also known as the 80/20 rule - paraphrased - 80% of what people like in Prog comes from 20% of the Prog Bands.

 

Path of Least Resistance - application of this is two fold - 1) bands take the path of least resistance in producing music so that more people will like it and 2) fans take the path of least resistance in appreciating music - ie they listen to stuff that is similar to stuff they already like and will disregard anything that takes "effort".

 

The Dreaded Fourth Album Principle - each band is only allowed to produce three albums that sound similar, after that they must produce something completely different. Failure to do so will attract stagnation and lack of original ideas criticisms. Compliance ensures the complete alienation of the entire fanbase - therefore (given a 10 album career) 60% of Prog albums are crap.

 

The Obligatory Live Album Syndrome - Live albums cannot replicate the complexities of the studio album, so are therefore crap and those that can defeat the object of being "live" - ergo all live albums are crap (30%)

 

The Masterpiece Effect - another two fold effect depending on whether the masterpiece is so regarded at the time of release, or was posthumously awarded at some later date - either way the result is generally the same - all else that follows is crap.

 

The Magnus Opus Postulate - a little known phenomena that is an extrapolation of observations regarding Masterpieces, in that once having produced the Magnus Opus, all other works pale by comparison (including those released before the MO) and are thus "crap"

 

The Unrealistic Expectation Effect - having produced a masterpiece, the follow-up is generally a disappointing anti-climax, and is thus "crap"

 

Parsimony or (Occam's Razor paraphrased) - once you've eliminated/collected/heard all the stuff you do like, everything else is stuff you don't like, so must be crap. Assuming that the average (Prog fan) CD collection is around 4,000 albums then the remaining 20,000 albums in the database are crap - ie 80%

 

then we have a few localised forum specific principles:

 

1989 Principle - if everything you like was recorded before a specific arbitrary date, then everything recorded after said date is crap. (actual figures unknown - too tedious to calculate - let's assume 50%)

 

The Knucklehead Principle - if it's metal then it's crap and since metal accounts for ~18% of the bands listed, then 20% of Prog must be crap.

 

The Only True Genre Principle - if all the bands you like are in one subgenre, then all other subgenres are crap. (actual figures unknown - it depends on the subgenre(s) involved - let's assume 18 full-prog subgenres and an equal distribution - so ~95% are crap)

 

The 1337 Principle - boils down to anything simple and accessible is crap - applies to 70% of everything.

 

 

...so if you put all those values into a spreadsheet, go and make a cup of coffee, then finally give up trying to make sense of it all and make a wild stab at the result the undeniable conclusion would be that 100% of Prog is crap since all these factors are mutually inclusive. A result which is patently false since you evidently like some Prog. So there must be some form of natural logarithm involved, (since they are inherently part of any viable formula) and possibly an inverse square law since that is a natural consequence of applying calculus to any predictable phenomena, and that given the bias demographic involved in collating this data then Kurtosis risk will indubitably produce a skewed distribution the results are more likely to be the diametric opposite of any rational estimate, so the answer is 0%.

 

QED

 

/edit: Damn -- I failed to take into account the Marillion Contingency and Magma Mythology.