Imagine you've been working at a radio station for a year now. For the most part you've just been helping out other hosts with their shows--and yes, that includes doing the coffee runs. However, you've just been given your own radio show to host where you'll be bringing prog to the masses. As much as you would like to play ten epics, well... you can't. The station still needs to air commercials and all that, so for your show you'll need ten songs that:

-Will interest the regular listeners of the station. You can decide what the radio station plays regularly (classic rock, hard rock, music from 'x' country only etc.)

-The songs must be 5 minutes or less for the most part. (Can be a few seconds over)

-You may have one longer song in your radio show, at most 7 minutes long. Again, it has to interest your audience.

-You can have songs with a bit of swearing in it, as it'll be edited out. If swearing is the whole song, probably not a great choice.

For example, a station that plays at heaviest Metallica and lightest The Rolling Stones:

-Devin Townsend--The Fluke (LONG SONG)

-Voivod--Into My Hypercube

-Pink Floyd--Have a Cigar

-Jethro Tull--Overhang

-Genesis--I Know What I Like

-The Mars Volta--L'via L'viaquez (single version)

-Rush--YYZ

-Tool--Sober

-Devin Townsend--Bend it Like Bender!

-Rush--Spirit of Radio

It's surprisingly difficult!

Lucky Man

From The Beginning

Still You Turn Me On

and all of the early Moody Blues songs.

Jethro Tull - Living In The Past

ELP - Fanfare For The Common Man

Muse - Take a Bow

Aphrodites Child - The Four Horseman

Big Big Train - Make Some Noise

IQ - Through The Corridors

Kayak - Royal Bed Bouncer

Yes - Wonderous Stories

my seven minute track 

Edgar Winter Group - Frankenstein

In the order I would play them

Frost* - Numbers

Steven Wilson - Hand Cannot Erase

Flying Colors - Bombs Away

Rush - Time and Motion

Yes - Life on a Film Set

TSO - Mozart and Memories

Dream Theater - Hell's Kitchen

It Bites - Fahrenheit

311 - Sometimes Jacks Rule the Realm (actual song is only 5 minutes)

Toto - Great Expectations (7 minute track)

I tried to pick some underappreciated/lesser known songs

Caravan: Golf Girl

Yes: Roundabout

King Crimson: I Talk To the Wind

Rush: Circumstances

Genesis: Timetable

Wigwam: Losing Hold

Jehtro Tull: Alive & Well & Living In

Magma: Kobaia

Family: Mellowing Grey

I think there are more than one over five minutes, but who cares...

Something like this:

Caravan - Hello Hello (#7 version)

Can - Mother Sky (the 6:41 Cannibalism-edit for the my one longer song)

Neu! - Neuschnee

Amon Düül II - Archangels Thunderbird

Earth and Fire - Song of the Marching Children (single edit)

Pink Floyd - Embryo (1970-studio version from Picnic - A Breath of Fresh Air)

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - Road Train

Trees - Murdoch

Genesis - Counting Out Time

Faust - The Sad Skinhead

King Crimson - Cat Food (the most Syd Barret-era Pink Floyd song ever)

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - Beginner's Luck

Peter Gabriel - Solsbury Hill

Pink Floyd - Not Now John

Pink Floyd - Wut's... Uh the Deal

Pink Floyd - The Gold It's in the...

Riverside - #Addicted

Riverside - Lost (Why Should I Be Frightened by a Hat?)

Queen - Killer Queen

Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights

Yes - Long Distance Runaround

Supersister - Radio

Renaissance - Nothern Lights

Camel - Never Let Go (single version)

Jethro Tull - Living in the Past

Barclay James Harvest - Child of the Universe (single version)

Mike Oldfield - To France

From 1970 - 1982. I posted only songs that were released as singles and not obscure songs.
I left out Moody Blues, Genesis, Caravan, Pink Floyd, Eloy, because I could only post 10 songs.

Yes - Roundabout  (duh)

ELP - Lucky Man (as I've said.. the ONLY pop song in history you can break your wrist air drumming to. Micky tested.. Micky approved)

Tull - Locomotive Breath

I considered what prog music (and prog bands) actually has been played on radio (considering many of the selections by other posters have never been played on the radio, or at least not since the mid-70s, and have at least a hint of commercial appeal):

Yes - Roundabout (radio singles edit)

ELP - Karn Evil 9: 1st Impression, Part 2

Rush - Anthem

Pink Floyd - Run Like Hell

Kansas - The Wall

Supertramp - Bloody Well Right

King Crimson - The Night Watch

Genesis - The Carpet Crawlers

Alan Parsons Project - Time

Karn Evil 9 was played to death on American and Canadian airwaves, and I believe that most sentient posters here recognize and have heard the songs on the radio from the list I posted. I've never really listened to Kansas at all, but evidently the album Leftoverture went 6x platinum around the world, indicating that even knuckle-dragging dolts from your country bought the album. 

Otherwise, I don't give a damn about your feelings of insignificance, cry about your inadequacies elsewhere.

Yes - Time & a Word

Genesis - Dance on a Volcano (a little over 5 min.)

Renaissance - Carpet of the Sun

Tull - Teacher

King Crimson - Three of a Prefect pair

Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights

Frank Zappa - I'm the Slime

Moody Blues- The Story in your Eyes

ELP - Karn Evil 9 1st Imp. Pt 2

Didn't work. I just got "access denied." 

"Radio-friendly" might be stretching it since I'm not sure what kind of station would be playing them, but here are some prog songs not-yet-mentioned that I find to be pretty easy on the ears:

Caravan - The Dog, The Dog, He's At It Again

Gracious - Blue Skies and Alibis

Pink Floyd - Summer '68

Renaissance - Kiev (over 7 minutes, but who cares; just cut out the piano intro and you're good)

T2 - J.L.T.

Wallenstein-I Can't Lose

Rush-Best I Can

Wishbone Ash-Blowin' Free

ELP-From The Beginning

all that come to mind for now

Furthermore, nobody I know have ever heard of King Crimson or Anathema.

Mostly people know Owner of a Lonely Heart and Dust in the Wind, so they can be considered huge hits.

But the band that really everybody on this planet knows and have scored huge hits with proggy songs are still Queen (Bohemian Rhapsody, Innuendo, Who Wants to Live Forever, Killer Queen).
And maybe Pink Floyd or Led Zeppelin (but most people know only 1 or 2 songs by these bands).

;)

But then I remembered that the radio edit cut out quite a chunk, so I don't think that counts.

In no particular order, here are my top ten accessible, radio-friendly prog songs:

1. Arena - Enemy Without

2. Echolyn - Winterthru

3. ELO - Can't Get It Out of My Head

4. The Flower Kings - Vox Humana

5. Galahad - Julie Anne

6. Genesis - Follow You Follow Me

7. IQ - One Fatal Mistake

8. Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)

9. Marillion - Dry Land

10. Pain of Salvation - Second Love

2. Owner Of A Lonely Heart - Yes

3. Kayleigh - Marillion

4. Elephant Talk - King Crimson

5. From The Flame - Leprous

Barclay James Harvest - Hymn

Camel - Your Love is Stranger Than Mine

ELP - I Believe in Father Christmas

The Moody Blues - Nights in White Satin

Mike Oldfield with Maggie Reilly - Moonlight Shadow

Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall

Procol Harum - A Whiter Shade of Pale

Renaissance - Northern Lights

updated list:

Pendragon - Starfish and The Moon

Muse - Verona

Southern Empire - Hold On To Me

Big Big Train - Alive

IZZ - Don't Panic

Isobar - Elves are go!

It Bites - This Is England

Lonely Robot - A Model Life

Frost* - Pocket Sun

The Mute Gods - Tardigrades Will Inherit The Earth

Echolyn - A Short Essay

Arena - Friday's Dream

The Flower Kings - Underdog

Spock's Beard - Waste Away

Porcupine Tree - Trains

Focus - Sylvia

Uriah Heep - The Wizard

Gentle Giant - Two Weeks In Spain

Banco - Traccia 2

Hopefully there's nothing wrong with instrumentals since three of mine here are. Also I almost picked number one by Gentle Giant and June by Spock's Beard but didn't think they were really prog enough.

Here's another list:

Tony Banks - Water out of Wine

Sylvan - Worlds Apart

Supertramp - Logical Song

Peter Hammill - Just Good Friends

Steve Hackett - Hoping Love Will Last

Tori Amos - Crucify

Grobschnitt - Snowflakes

Camel - West Berlin

Kraftwerk - Taschenrechner

Irmin Schmidt - Roll On Euphrates

Hi,

And all of these were played, and then some, on Guy Guden's show way back when ... I still have over 300 hours of his stuff all the way from 1974 to 1980, and many of these were "staples" of the show.

And yes, they were played on radio by many folks, and Guy was not the only one that did not give acahoot about the commercial side of things, and many of the artists have appreciated his dedication to the music, and it shows in the hundreds of ID's and promos for the show. FM radio was better than we gave it credit for, up until early 1980's when the great Corporate Rape took place in America. (... they bought all the FM stations so they were no longer independent!) I think it was Texaco, that bought out the Santa Barbara station ... don't quote me on it.

Hi,

Without trying to sound mean, all of DE's list was played on the FM band in Santa Barbara and LA, for sure. The problem might be that in Podunk, TN you will never here any of it, because of too much Country Music, or something like it. 

You might not even be aware of it, but in the 70's several bands in LA sued the top radio stations because their material was not being played, and they won the thing, though many of the stations merely put up a couple of hours per week for some of these bands, many of which that were a part of the Penelope Spheeris specials. But there were, in LA several stations that played a lot of "imports" as so much of this stuff was known then (Genesis was all "imports" until SEBTP in terms of the release times!).

Even though Santa Barbara is not a major market like LA, I can post a quick list of Space Pirate Radio material for 1975/1976/1977/1978 and 1979 ... even though that listing of mine is likely to not even be half the number of bands ... and it will give you a much better idea of how much of this stuff was well known in the LA area, and places like Moby Disk sold this stuff and the "imports" ... and did really well at least through much of the 1980's when the distribution of these changed somewhat and stuff was available in America. 

By then, I think many of these bands had gotten "beyond" the radio thing, and things like TD and KS that were more "eccentric" were not heard much, but I can tell you that Guy played them all ... in their entirety, too!

"Accessibility" for radio, was a joke ... and Guy used to post some of the insults and jibes he took for being so adamant about all these things, and he never got credit for getting many bands on the air that he should ... including Average White Band (introduced with a spoof on the radio bosses! "it will never be a hit!"), Supertramp, Golden Earring, Gentle Giant, Roxy Music, Peter Hammill/VdGG, Nektar, TD, KS and so many more ... impossible to list them all! 

And the music itself, just about did not need radio after 1985 ... many did it on their own, including the likes of Marillion that got the fan club to pay for their studio time for at least 2 albums, that helped them stay alive ... as sales took off! Not to mention a certain SW that started a band in his garage on his own and sold cassettes, until one day the suits began knocking his door down because it was selling BIG!

^ Didn't come across as particularly mean to me. You can do far worse. Except you skipped the part where I called myself an idiot. But that's not really mean either. 

Anyway Guy Guden and his Space Pirate Radio didn't exist in my part of the world in the time of my formative years. I know he's still at it. I've never been a radio person though. We traded music, created our own clubs, and INTRODUCED leftfield music to each other. Something I haven't stopped doing.

Hi,

Not exactly on topic ... but Guy's show has never been for a "radio person" at all. And this was one of the parts that he took a lot of flack for. The show is, was, a lot more of a conceptual mix, way back when about all European music ONLY, and now, it is by far the best mix of music with the listing of artists encompassing over 70 years ... and in many ways the ONLY really "progressive" show out there that is not tied to a silly definition and sound.

So it all depends on what one feels is "radio-friendly", because in many ways that means ... a format, and a sound that is recognizable to everyone's ears. I am not sure that the folks responding are aware of the massive difference in that concept, but the OP is not, I don't think, interested in "different" ... it's looking for stuff that he will play when he gets in front of a microphone, I guess! 

Hi,

Guy always credited these Pirate stations and it was loud and clear on his original promos and id's. "they played the music you couldn't hear". I would think that the word "Space" was added to it as a way to bring about a new form and feeling. But in many ways, nowadays, when compared to the amount of "progressive" stuff in shows out there, Guy's show is still the ultimate "Pirate Radio", when most of the other shows are too recognizable, sound similar and often the same, as a lot of stuff out there.

In this sense, Guy's show is not predictable at all!