Fanboyism in progressive rock

There is simply way too much fanboyism in prog rock circles, and here I don't mean things like just liking every single thing your favourite band releases because sometimes that is a defensible opinion.

Yeah, I know that "fanboy" originally meant "completist", but here I use the word in the newer sense where it describes a kind of snob who only really likes a specific work/series/genre/artist/publisher and will hence go to ridiculous lengths to explain its alleged superiority to everything else.  "Fan" is an abbrevation of "fanatic", after all. This often happens from an ignorant position because the person in question has limited exposure to stuff outside the narrow niche of interests in question. If I sound harsh here, I should inform here that this criticism is also directed at myself because until around roughly a year ago (or even less, depending on the definitions) I used to be pretty bad about having a ridiculously narrow field of interest and not giving stuff outside it much of a chance.

This isn't the same as just liking some genres and artists more than others. No, the litmus test is that whenever a fanboy or fangirl ever gets into something outside his/her field of interest, it's either excused as a guilty pleasure or just because it has some connection to whatever it is that he/she actually happens to like, either by having inspired "approved" material or involving some of the same people. For example, a Star Wars fanboy would watch The Bridge on the River Kwai because Alec Guinness is in it and The Dam Busters because George Lucas said it inspired the space battles in Star Wars, but not bother with other WW2 movies because they don't have anything to do with Star Wars.

Now, what does all this have to do with progressive rock?

Well, I've noticed this kind of attitude much more often in fans of progressive rock than of any other type of music. Depressingly frequent manifestations of this include:

People insisting that other sub-genres of rock'n'roll don't have proficient musicianship or ambitious concepts at all.

Treating progressiveness or stylistic complexity as something that's good in itself rather than as a means to an end.

Endless nitpicking over what's "really" progressive and what isn't, which starts to look like an excuse to dismiss artists and albums out of hand if they don't live up to some arbitrary and possibly revisionistic standard of what progression really is.

Whenever someone doesn't like progressive rock, it's treated as a sign of either some malicious conspiracy or stupidity on part of whatever group of people that's perceived as not appreciating progressive rock enough.

Only really liking music from other genres (e. g. jazz, metal) on the condition of how much it resembles (or is influential to) progressive rock.

In general having a very "sacred cow" attitude to artists and albums that are seen as classics of the genre.

I'm not saying that all of us are like that, it might be 50/50 or one of those vocal minorities everyone talks about but all those hoary clichés I just listed sure as hell pop up a lot around these parts. It's bad enough that rock'n'roll fandom often lapses into dogmatism and overtly nostalgic reverence for the past when it's supposed to be irreverent and iconoclastic and not holding anything sacred... but when fans of a sub-genre that stands for thinking even further outside the box show this many symptoms of having a really narrow perspective, I think we need to take a good look at ourselves.

For example, let's take the stuff about musical proficiency: It's not just that craftsmanship is being exalted for its own sense (and as much as I know this is a stereotype, it can result in some lifelessly formal music) but that it looks like a lot of the time it's implicit that the only valid standard of good musicianship whatsoever is whatever (the person using the term judges) works within a progressive rock paradigm. To go back to the stuff I mentioned about this also being aimed at myself, I can point to that thread I made a long time ago that applauded Neil Young for having a song that sounded vaguely like King Crimson. From my current perspective, of course, that thread looks ridiculous. Apples and oranges, isn't that what they say?

Yeah, I know that all hardcore fans of a genre or members of a subculture can be like this but in my experience this is a more common problem in prog-rock fandom than with metalheads or punk rockers, who both have a (often undeserved) reputation for being a bunch of genre chauvinists!

Nice blog.  I'm not perfect either, so I'll see how some of your theories apply to me.

People insisting that other sub-genres of rock'n'roll don't have proficient musicianship or ambitious concepts at all.

I definitely see this alot, but have seen it also applied to other genres (metal and jazz) as well.  The longer I have been listening to music and play music (I play bass), the less I care about the technicality of the music and I also learn that in just about any genre there are musicians that could play circles around  some of my biggest influences. 

Treating progressiveness or stylistic complexity as something that's good in itself rather than as a means to an end.

That pretty much sums up why I can go from loving Dream Theater one week and hating them the next.

Endless nitpicking over what's "really" progressive and what isn't, which starts to look like an excuse to dismiss artists and albums out of hand if they don't live up to some arbitrary and possibly revisionistic standard of what progression really is.

I tend to mainly nitpick when it comes to what bands are included on prog archives.  At the end of the day, it isn't my decision who makes it, and I won't get too upset either way.  Heck, I'd consider the Beastie Boys to be rather progressive, but wouldn't put them on this site, and hell would freeze over before this happens anyway.

Whenever someone doesn't like progressive rock, it's treated as a sign of either some malicious conspiracy or stupidity on part of whatever group of people that's perceived as not appreciating progressive rock enough.

Most so-called progressive bands (as classified by PA) aren't for everyone.  I know there are some genres of music that I can't fully appreciate (country, polka, a good amount of punk, ...), and I wouldn't expect my intelligence to be questioned by fans of those genres, so why should I do so to them??

Only really liking music from other genres (e. g. jazz, metal) on the condition of how much it resembles (or is influential to) progressive rock.

This will attract me to certain artists initially, but may only hold my interest for so long.

In general having a very "sacred cow" attitude to artists and albums that are seen as classics of the genre.

I tend to hold some of my favorite artists close to my heart, but am willing to hear out others opinions before I get overly protective of them.  As long as a criticism of a band isn't a personal attack on the artist or myself, I can let it slide.

Slartibartfast wrote: For me fanboy has always been about discovering a band and finding an irresistible need to add everything from the artist's catalog to you collection as soon as possible, then having to get whatever's new right when it gets released.   So I guess the shoe doesn't really fit me as outlined in your initial post.

I  view "fanboyism" as essentially the same, yet also including a tendency in some affected individuals to promote that band over others to an obnoxious degree, even to the extent of declaring them "the best" in ridiculous comparisons.

It's in EVERY circle of music dude.

With music there will be fanboyism.
That simple

I have to agree with practically everything Toaster Mantis says here in his thread opener (and very eloquently to boot) The sort of callow immaturity he describes is endemic on most website forums.

Gonna quote from my own review of Five Bridges by the Nice (my, how ironically self-indulgent of me)

we cannot help but conclude with some irony, that those denizens of the 'rawk' world who pay lip service to libertarianism, experimentation and anti-establishment values can be, without fear of contradiction, some of the most conservative people on the planet.

Solution - Implement an age restriction to ensure it's just we boring old farts are able to disappear up our own crinkly backsides debating the allegorical custard references in Close to the Edge (or similar)

Youth is wasted on the young...

Toaster Mantis' eloquent rant on elitism among progressive rock fans struck a real chord with me.  The elitism, however, carries through to other musical territories as well.  Having rather varied and broad exposure to many different kinds of music and art, I can say with certainty that this kind of mentality pervades most of the arts. 

I do not know what "Prog" is? I do not want to know what "Prog" is and anyone who tries to tell me what "Prog" is will get a cold ear. It is all just simple Rock music to me. Get over it!

You want to see the fanboyism, that exists in dance music and DJ circles. It's intolerable and makes prog fanboyism look like reasonable opinion sharing.

JJLehto's assertion that it exists in all musical circles is very very true.

Nuke wrote: I left prog and became a metalhead of the obnoxiously arrogant sort when I was younger. It is true that metalheads are a bunch of genre chauvinists. Interestingly, lots of metalheads are also interested in classical music because they see it as a relevant genre, kind of like proggers except metalheads often bizarrly shun jazz. Anyways,I swear being a metal elitist for 2 years really helped me exand my musical ideas and so when I came back to prog (although deep down I still see metal as a superior genre) I actually had a far more open mind.

Yeah, that's pretty funny... might have something to do with the stereotype of metalheads as insufferable genre chauvinists not being quite as true as it might have been 20 years ago, by the way.

Though I can confirm that kind of metal purist does exist, I've actually met more people who mostly listened to metal than people who mostly listened to prog-rock who also were into all kinds of obscure folk singers and industrial noise bands.

This isn't a completely good thing, though, since it's been a bit of a fad for the last 10 years with bands awkwardly combining metal with completely unrelated genres in a really literal way which sometimes does result in some good music (e. g. Aarni, Fantômas) but just as often is because of that suspiciously affected open-mindedness deathrabbit rightfully castigated... which I must restate is actually more common in metal than in prog. Again, it is just as ubiquitious as overtly exclusive fanboyism and is probably related to it in some bizarre manner but it's kinda grating in those that pride themselves on eclecticism.

The people who are worst about these, however, are probably the "generically alternative" crowd as parodied by the RateYourMusic user Six_o_the-Clock.

Do I sound confused? Well, that's probably because I am. What I'm trying to say with this post is probably that the inclusive and the exclusive snob are two sides of the same coin and equally annoying. Indeed, I suspect that a lot of the suspiciously open-minded are fanboys trying too hard to go to the other extreme and might branch out for the wrong reasons, e. g. trying to project a sophisticated image (even just for themselves) rather than to understand different art than what they're familiar with.

I know that the golden mean is a cliché and not always true, but I guess that you have to do a balancing act in having to keep an open mind without being obnoxious or affected about it.

Hmm, my cliche is that I always disagree with the golden mean, and I must do so again. It isn't a balancing act. We have the inclusive snob and the exclusive snob, but one can be far more openminded than the most inclusive snob and still not be one. I do agree, however, that the fusing genres awkwardly into metal trend is not very good. I really get tired with the fact that any time a band puts non-metal sounds into their music, they are hailed as creative and original. I love the new cynic album. That album to me is a perfect example of being extremely openminded without being pretentious and/or low quality. It is actually more openminded than these hipster metal bands could be, because while they are often different for the sake of being different, cynic are different because they have to be for the sake of their music. I think this also applies to prog rock. When king crimson added the string section to their song epitaph, it wasn't because string sections were hip, it's because the song demanded a bigger, more epic sound. By the way, great link.  

rogerthat, going into music with no preconceived expectations is how I always approach new music. Even bands I am familiar with I still clear my mind before hitting play.