Who is your favorite second tier prog band?

VdGG from that list.

Gandalff wrote: 1. Focus 2. Gentle Giant 3. Camel

Gentle Giant, Camel, "second tier" bands ?  Whatever you say, dude, Voted Gentle Giant, could have voted Camel also, Saga or Spock's Beard too...

Van der Graaf Generator.

second tier bands???


really, none of these from the list are second tier bands for me

GonG from the list from the planet GonG.  Closely followed by the Softies 

Edited by akamaisondufromage - February 13 2013 at 12:09

Camel. Maybe second tier in progland (and some 20 years ago I considered them also as much less than Genesis, Yes etc.) but in Moogtronia they are in the top 3 of favorite prog bands these days.

Edited by Moogtron III - February 13 2013 at 12:18

Melomaniac wrote: Gentle Giant, Camel, "second tier" bands ?  Whatever you say, dude, Voted Gentle Giant, could have voted Camel also, Saga or Spock's Beard too...

i still find it better to call it second tier then second rate, 

GG is the best band on the list IMO

Roland113 wrote: The Doctor wrote: ^^If you like RPI, then definitely Le Orme is a band worth checking out.  I'd start with Felona e Sorona; or Collage.  Contrappunti and Storia o Leggendo are also favorites of mine.  I like a lot of their stuff, but like a lot of RPI and other prog bands, they hit a bit of a low point in the 80's, and in this case with 1990's dreadful Orme.   I think they are considered part of the big 3 of RPI, along with PFM and Banco.  Thanks Doc,  I knew I had heard the band name before but couldn't place it.  Yeah, a quick search would have gotten me into the genre but 'where to start' and 'are they important' were the questions that I needed help with.  Thanks to Spotify, I'll be listening to Collage this afternoon. 'appreciate the help,

I would personally recommend for most proggers starting with Felona e Serona if available (I hate the English language version, by the way, but you might like it).  My favourite is Contrapppunti, but Uomo di Pezza is the one I would recommend secondly.  Collage is great too, but I put it a little below Uomo di Pezza, Felona e Serona and Contrappunti  i liked all of their 70s albums to some extent, as well as the first two released in this millennium.  It'd definitely a top tier band when it comes to Italian Symphonic Prog.  It was my first Italian Prog love.

Anyway, my vote from the list would be for Magma followed by Soft Machine, VdGG, Banco and Gong.  For other I might choose Can, Art Zoyd, Area or Popul Vuh if those were considered second tier bands.   Can is big, buy say Art Zoyd would probably be third tier in terms of popularity (Univers Zero would be bigger and I also love).