Abel Ganz (6)

Amon Ra (2)

Anathema (11)

Anubis (5)

Arena (9)

Astra (2)

 

Balloon Astronomy (1)

Big Big Train (12)

Bobel (1)

Bruce Soord & Jonas Renkse (1)

 

Colin Masson (4)

Credo (3)

Crippled Black Phoenix (10)

Crystal Palace (8)

 

Daal  (7)

 

Earthstone (1)

Echolyn (9)

Eurhybia (1)

Explorers Club (2)

 

Final Conflict (6)

Fish (10)

Five-O-One AM (1)

The Flower Kings (13)

Flying Colours (3)

Frost* (3)

 

Galahad (9)

Gazpacho (10)

Grace (4)

 

Homesick for Space (2)

Hostsonaten (8)

 

IQ (12)

Islands (4)

It Bites (5)

Izz (9)

 

Jadis (9)

John Wesley (7)

 

Karmakanic (5)

 

Light (1)

Like Wendy (6)

 

Magenta (7)

Marillion (18)

Mars Volta (6)

Mick Pointer Band (1)

 

Nad Sylvan (5)

Naryan (1)

 

This is a work in progress which promises to be quite a long list of Neo-Prog artists, so I'll be adding one letter of the alphabet to the list at a time. 

Manuel wrote: I voted It Bites. I don't think The Flower Kings, Spock's Beard and Transatlantic are neo prog though.

I agree, neither are Echolyn

Astra: Heavy Psych Retro Space Rockers, what do you think is Neo Prog about them???

(they can't be further away)

 

 

Agree BIG TIME!!!

It would seem, based upon this sample, that virtually every recent prog artist is a Neo Prog artist (which one could certainly make a case for)! I was expecting a list more conforming to that of PA's database (though I have disagreements with some of those assignations, as well).

P.S. My favorite Neo Prog bands are (in some kind of order): 

Collage

Mystery

Airbag

Edison's Children

Wobbler

Nine Stones Close

The Psychedelic Ensemble

Believe

Quidam

Silhouette

Magenta

though my favorite Neo Prog album is Tony Patterson's Equations of Meaning

I like Marillion, but for me this is between Saga and Spock's Beard. I went with Saga as I REALLY like them and feel they are painfully underrated on here.

In the interest of full disclosure, there are a few *cough* several *hard cough* bands on this list that I haven't heard yet.

There's been some healthy debate on this thread over what constitutes a genuine Neo-Prog band, and that's half the fun of being a member of ProgArchives, where differing opinions are always welcome. From my own personal point of view, I generally  think of Neo-Prog (or new prog) as any Progressive Rock band that formed from the early 1980's onwards, following the classic era of Prog-Rock during the 1970's.

 

I'm not exactly new to the world of Prog-Rock - I'm 60 years old and I've been buying albums since the early 1970's. More recently, I worked as chief music editor for 3 years for the independently-run You Tube Music website, where it was part of my job to decide which genre an artist belonged in. The site no longer exists, having run out of funding in 2015, but I've now built up my own personal Artists & Albums database, with over 16,000 artists and over 80,000 album covers.

 

Below is ProgArchives definition of Neo-Prog:-

Neither are Astra, Saga and Solstice.

And especially not The Mars Volta.

You're certainly entitled to view things the way you want to. However, I personally go by both the progarchives and wikipedia definition of neo prog. I would never view a band like djam karet or ozric tentacles or any band who is avant gardish or non symphonic derived as neo but I guess we all use the term in different ways. Some people use the term progressive rock in a very literal way too but I don't. If I did then jazz would always have to change and progress and so would every other genre. For me it's just a sound and the same thing with neo as opposed to a time frame. I agree that our differences are what make this place interesting.

 

I'm not new to the world of prog, having been born in the 1950's, but my own personal view is that Neo-Prog generally applies to any Progressive Rock band formed after the 1970's. When putting this poll together, my thinking was it was better to include as many bands as possible associated with the Neo-Prog  genre, rather than leave out an important band if it was debateable whether or not they belonged in the Neo-Prog category.

 

 If I'd missed any artists out because I was unsure whether they belonged in a Neo-Prog poll, then I can't edit them in later as an afterthought.

 

Thanks for your support, Logan. At least someone agrees with me.

You're certainly entitled to view things the way you want to. However, I personally go by both the progarchives and wikipedia definition of neo prog. I would never view a band like djam karet or ozric tentacles or any band who is avant gardish or non symphonic derived as neo but I guess we all use the term in different ways. Some people use the term progressive rock in a very literal way too but I don't. If I did then jazz would always have to change and progress and so would every other genre. For me it's just a sound and the same thing with neo as opposed to a time frame. I agree that our differences are what make this place interesting.

the Op does not have a clue what neo-prog is (well, it seems he knows the PA definition but he is right and the rest of us are wrong).

no vote , although i know and like most bands in the poll.

^ is the close-minded remark refer to me? Was I the rude one?

How does this poll and the OP using his own definition of "neo-prog" make any sense? He's read the PA definition of the genre but chooses to ignore it. Is re-inventing the wheel here necessary? The PA definition makes a lot of sense, explains the neo-prog sound clearly and so on. But all of a sudden it does not matter.

 

Thanks Yesesis. I've had similar support from Logan too on my definition of Neo-Prog, which I'd generally define as any modern-day Progressive Rock bands who've emerged from the early 1980's onwards, as opposed to classic Progressive Rock from the 1970's era. 

 

 I'd rather be criticised for including too many bands in my poll instead of excluding a debateable Neo-Prog artist that someone may have potentially voted for.

 

By the way, I don't know if it's the done thing to vote in one's own poll, but if I WAS going to cast a vote, then my vote would go to Porcupine Tree.

No problem bud. And yeah go ahead and vote, people usually do vote in their own polls.

Well, that's not the standard definition of neo. You can search online and see for yourself. I'm not trying to rub your nose in it but you are in the minority in your opinion of what you think neo prog is. Nothing wrong with being an outlier though. Maybe everyone else(including myself)will change our opinions to conform to yours. You never know. ;)

Also, I didn't say you were new necessarily just that maybe you only recently discovered the prog underground or maybe only recently came across the term "neo prog." The term has been around a while and most on here see it in reference to a certain rather specific musical scene/movement that happened in the eighties which was predominately an English one.

 

The problem with this view is that it only makes sense if there are only two subgenres of Prog: Classic Prog and Neo-Prog. But with the subgenres we have in PA, it makes more sense to categorise new prog according to the type of music. And note that Neo-Prog is a type of music and not just a time period.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This.

That is all

See: http://somethingelsereviews.com/2013/02/26/something-else-interview-steven-wilson-on-classic-1970s-sounds-progs-rebirth-and-his-amazing-new-album/" rel="nofollow - http://somethingelsereviews.com/2013/02/26/something-else-interview-steven-wilson-on-classic-1970s-sounds-progs-rebirth-and-his-amazing-new-album/

Of course by neo-progger, the interviewer may not have been referring to a style of Prog, but simply calling Wilson a musician creating new prog (by the way, New Prog or Nu Prog is also considered by some to be a subgenre of Prog).

I am not trying to define anything differently, in fact the definitions we got here on PA are fine, I got no complaint. And if there is a genre that does not need to be redefined, it's neo-prog. As it is defined on this site, I don't think anyone can improve on that.

What bothered me was not that Paul uses his own genre definitions, it's that he ignores ours (for no particular reason). Does his definition make better sense? No, if you ask me. Since the early 80s, progressive music has expanded, evolved, became more diverse to be simply labeled as "neo-prog"? Then how can anyone explain the sound of GYBE, Pain of Salvation, Sigur Ros, Gojira and many others. Neo-prog? Is it all neoprog?!

I've seen other names for genres as well, new prog included. I've seen alternative prog somewhere; that does not mean we have to change anything, for now. A change needs to be an improvement on what was before, otherwise what's the point?

I'm a big fan if IQ and so would nearly always vote for them as I did here.

Yes as is being discussed there are clearly a lot of bands that are not neo prog.

The eighties bands that defined neo -prog are

IQ

Marillion

Twelth Night

Pallas

Pendragon

there weren't that many

latterly I would say the likes of Comedy Of Errors and Magenta have kept the movement bubbling along nicely. 

In general I don't see it as particularly adventurous or innovative and I don't care actually. It's less about technicality (in fact it shies away from that) and more about lyrics , songs and creating an atmosphere. I don't see it as even being a variant of symphonic prog particularly as often the bands estu complexity for a relatively straightforward approach. The apocalypse section of Suppers Ready often features in the longer tracks but a simplified version . I remember Grendel being referred to amusingly as 'Apocalypse in Four Four' by some smart arsed critic!

Weird poll. 

IQ of the neos, Echolyn overall. 

oh man, you're good with words, you could convince me an apple is an orange or something.

I'm not good with words, I lack the patience to write long argumentative posts.

Next time I will follow my instinct and ignore a thread and poll like this one. But this is what happens when a poll makes no sense (to me) and just looking at the bands in it I got a headache... well, kinda...

 

Porcupine Tree gets my vote too.  Having listened to the Mars Volta again on YouTube a few moments ago, I stand by my decision to include them in the poll. Chronologically, not only are they a modern, relatively new prog (or Neo-Prog) band, but musically and stylistically, they also SOUND (to me) like a Neo-Prog band, but that's only my own personal opinion and everyone has a right to respectfully disagree with me.

 

Who would have thought my latest music blog would turn out to be even more controversial than my political blogs - again!

there are many other bands on the list that I like more than Marillion

but I won't call them Neo... 

I get it!   You meant Neo in it's literal sense.   Me?  I was contemplating IQ, Pendragon, Arena,  and Marillion as Neo Sounding.   Still I vote for Porcupine Tree.  I also like Big Big Train.  

From the more traditional NEO lineup  Pendragon

echolyn - not Neo Prog

Transatlantic - not Neo Prog

Spock's Beard - not Neo Prog

From the listed bands that actually are Neo Prog: IQ

(Although Yuka & Chronoship are my favorite Neo band...)

omphaloskepsis wrote: I get it!   You meant Neo in it's literal sense.   Me?  I was contemplating IQ, Pendragon, Arena,  and Marillion as Neo Sounding.   Still I vote for Porcupine Tree.  I also like Big Big Train.

so putting 4 decades of music into one genre makes sense to you? Or is it you don't know how diverse prog has got throughout this time?

Please consider the tough task collabs have discussing which sub-genre fits best to each band. Putting all those bands inside the Neo-Prog bag is like disrespecting all that work. Anathema, The Flower Kings, The Mars Volta etc are not Neo, irrespective of whether they are old or new.

 

I love Neo-Prog and I'm not disrespecting the artists at all and I don't think it's an anathema to describe Anathema as Neo-Prog.

 

 

It's the collaborators you are disrespecting and all their work, this is what Gerinski is saying.

As for Anathema, they started as a death/doom band, gave up the growls, but not the doom, and starting with Judgement (1999) they've been playing progressive rock - call them experimental/post metal, as defined here on PA, or alternative prog, even crossover prog. But neo-prog? No way!

Not quite sure that Porcupine Tree  and Anathema should be considered Neo-Prog, but then its not a term I'm keen on tbh.

 

I've always considered Anathema and Porcupine Tree to be Neo-Prog, and I couldn't possibly consider leaving Porcupine Tree out of my poll as they were the band I voted for.

 

Obviously, we all have our own definitions of what is and isn't Neo-Prog, and if every member here posted their own poll of what they regarded as the 22 most important bands in the Neo-Prog genre, I'm sure we'd all come up with different lists.

 

In the first line of Porcupine Tree's biography on ProgArchives it says, "PORCUPINE TREE are incredibly hard to describe because their music doesn't fit into any one genre." ............ The same thing goes for many other bands too. Being labelled "Neo-Prog" isn't a single exclusive genre, but just one of several genres that a band may be categorised as. For instance, the Mars Volta, mentioned in an earlier post are described as "Heavy Prog" on ProgArchives, which is a perfectly good description of their music, but they can ALSO be described as Neo-Prog too, from the point-of-view that it's relatively new (or neo) Progressive Rock.

 

 

It's funny you should say that because I was thinking the same thing too, but then if I HAD done that, then I would have missed out on having an interesting and informative debate on what is and isn't Neo-Prog.

 

 I'd much rather be criticised for including too many bands in my poll than be criticised for omitting someone's favourite band from the poll.

Are you trolling us or something? Looks like it.

You are the only one with your own definition of the neo-prog genre. How many people have told you a lot of bands in your poll are not neo-prog? Or their opinion does not matter, only yours.

And no, there would not be different lists, some users know more neo-prog bands than others (I say neo-prog as defined on PA, as do many others).

This absolutely.

Yes that would have made more sense.

 

You deserve a Hamlet cigar for that Shakespearean post.

Agree.

Imagine this scenario but apply it to neo prog:

Mother: That's not orange juice you're drinking. It's grapefruit juice.

Logan wrote: The Saga album I found most enjoyable is the self-titled, which came out in 1978.

Great one, and pretty bold at the time to make such a robotic prog record.

chopper wrote: Manuel wrote: I voted It Bites. I don't think The Flower Kings, Spock's Beard and Transatlantic are neo prog though. I agree, neither are Echolyn

Nor Saga.

I don't mind what's "really neo-prog". Genre labels are overrated.

Best from the list are Porcupine Tree. Also I like some Echolyn & Saga.

^ Still, neoprog has a distinctive era and sound which a band like the Tangent does not reflect.  Labels are overrated but useful.

My favorite Saga album is definitely Silent Knight. But all of their first three are really good imo, better than their 4th which is usually picked as their best.

 

I included Astra in my poll because they're one of my favourite modern (or neo) Progressive Rock bands.

 

In retrospect, I wish I'd included Mostly Autumn in my poll too for the same reason as above.

 

I agree!

 

 

harrumph  

I guess it's not just politicians who double down. 

No way is PT a neo prog band by any stretch of the imagination. 

Ok, I've decided that I'm the one who decides what this neo-prog is and what it is not. And so my decision is that anything released after and including A Trick of the Tail is neo-prog and stuff.

Right on man, it's your poll, no regrets. It's not like you included ELP or classic Genesis, or something like that. So nothing that's clearly wrong with it, just people being a little nitpicky. You're handling it well though.

 

Thanks for your support.  I'm relatively new to this site, having been here less than a month, and until I posted this poll, I didn't realise quite how seriously PA members take their music genres here, although it's been a fun debate.

I can always count on this place for a good laugh. However, I will say that I've read that "a trick of the tail" was possibly the inspiration for much of the neo prog sound. So maybe it was proto neo? Same thing with Saga maybe.

Good, that's exactly how it was intended. And yeah maybe, that makes sense to me.

I've also heard that their "and then there were three" album was the first neo prog album and I'm sure it was listened to but in my opinion early Saga was probably closer to what the neo prog bands were about to explore. I think even early 80's Rush could have been an influence to be honest. It's one of those things where you would have to hear the bands themselves say exactly who they listened to or what they were influenced by exactly to know for sure. I do think that neo prog bands were influenced by more than just prog though. I think they also were cognizant of the punk and new wave scenes going on even if they didn't sound much(or anything)like them.

Hard to beat early Saga. And yeah they had to have at least been aware of the punk and new scenes going on at the time, if not a little bit influenced by them.

The point is that the architects of 'neo prog' (the likes of Martin Orford , Clive Nolan and Mark Kelly) took a lot of inspiration from this as it was an accessible prog album and that is where they saw the genre going. ie away from technical driven instrumental heavy prog about abstract subjects to a more song based approach with more grounded lyrics.

They decided what it was in the eighties and there is a clear acceptance of this in a lot of the music stylings. The 90's saw a new wave of symphonic prog coming initially from Sweden where the likes of Par Lindh and Roine Stolte formed the 'Art Rock Society'. Their intention was to bring back the full on symph sound .This is not my opinion it's just a fact. 'Neo' has it's own thing and not recognising that is a mistake as otherwise it's just an inferior form of symph. PT and Anethama are obviously also not connected to neo either although I love them all the same!

 

Yes, Neo-Prog to me is more of a generational term, meaning any Progressive Rock band that formed from the 1980's onwards. Marillion & IQ are currently level in the poll with 11 votes each. I've never been a fan of Marillion, but I'll definitely be checking out the music of IQ, seeing as they've been rated so highly in this poll. Thanks for everyone's contributions to this poll and thread. It feels wonderful to be part of a music community again after the demise of my You Tube Music site in 2015.  

Psychedelic Paul wrote: [QUOTE=someone_else]Marillion & IQ are currently level in the poll with 11 votes each

No they're not, I've just put IQ in their rightful position (although I love most of Marillion's output too!)

 

They're now level in the poll with 12 votes each.

Psychedelic Paul wrote: Based on the results of this poll, I'll definitely be checking out the music of IQ, having never listened to them before. I just hope they don't sound like Marillion.

 

No they don't and it might be controversial to say it but I think they are better musicians. Mike Holmes is a great guitarist especially and Tim Esau and John Jowitt ( the only 2 bass players the band ever had) easily beat Pete Trewavas . Vocally I do like Steve Hogarth a lot although Pete Nicholls can trawl the depths of darkness better than anyone. Of course in the early days they lacked the presence and personality of a certain Mr Dick and that is the main (and possibly only) reason Marillion got ahead of the neo game.  (IMO) 

Psychedelic Paul wrote: It's good to know IQ sound nothing like Marillion.  I still haven't listened to all of Porcupine Tree's albums. I have three PT studio albums in my CD collection:- "Lightbulb Sun", "In Absentia" & "Deadwing"; one live album "Warsawa"; and one superb 2-CD compilation "Stars Die".

 

Those are all good ones to have. Fear Of A Blank Planet is absolutely essential PT and I think you would like Stupid Dream (more song based) so I would go to those next. After that Signify is a bit of a 'wildcard' entry but also has some strong material.

Psychedelic Paul wrote: I'd like to buy all of Porcupine Tree's albums on CD eventually, if I can find them at a bargain price.

 

yeah they are one of those bands you want to 'complete'