most important element in music/prog

Why is harmony so unloved? Melody is nothing unless you harmonise properly. Far more "progression" (both in the literal sense and the prog sense) is achieved through clever manipulation of harmonic structure and rhythm than through the "tune". Improvisation, which if I remember correctly was, and is, the basis for much prog, is driven by harmony (when was the last time you asked for the tune instead of the key/chords when jamming with a band).

Melody is lovely, yes, but progression in music has been achieved right back from Classical to Romantic and Romantic to 20th Century through new approaches to harmony and tonality. The development of motific ideas is used far more than the creation of one soaring melodic line. A "nice" melody is the by-product of functional harmony (the harmony allows you to predict the next note sub-consciously which when played makes the tune sound natural).

One can never explore melody in the way harmony allows for exploration, you can't really use a new interval . Surely then harmony has to be the most important? (Oh and rhythm as well if you're talking about Meshuggah)

An achingly beautiful melody is hard to beat (like Epitath, for example) but my main interest in prog is "mood" or atmosphere, really. There are so many examples of how the sound/sonics/atmosphere can really take the music to another level. The main tools? mellotron, strings, orchestrations, synths bit also certain rhythmic patterns on guitar, percussion etc.... The idea is to propel the listener into another realm , far from the prefabricated predictability of PAP/POP.

All I care about is if the music sounds good. I don't care why or how. So for that, I guess I'll just pick melody.