Early British Prog vs American. Discuss.

I really like Riley but it's really stretching it to call him prog. How about Tim Buckley in that case?  I am aware he is listed up here on PA but Buckley doesn't really have much to do with prog, again.  Though...this gets into the old progressive v/s prog debate.  Basically, I am saying Riley or Buckley just did what they wanted to as daring artists.  They weren't setting out to do something progressive.  That does not seem to be the case when you look at the early British prog.  It was organised around the elements commonly held up to be hallmarks of prog - no insistence on verse-chorus cycles, long instrumental sections, time signature changes.  And it is not just about symph prog - you can find these elements in VDGG or Gentle Giant too.  Indeed in the later KC albums (after ITCOTCK) which increasingly had very little to do with symph prog.  You can find these in other French, Italian and other European bands too. The American avant wave seemed to come about independent of this development and therefore didn't also adhere to these rules. 

The other point I would make is Beefheart, Zappa, Riley, Buckley et al operated virtually as self contained islands whereas prog rock in Europe could legitimately be regarded as a 'scene' or a cluster.   

I'll give you a rhetorical answer then: I've never considered Frank Zappa or Captain Beefheart to be prog artists and I don't regard Kansas as a Symphonic Prog band. 

My feelings are twofold. First that music does not exist in a vacuum and usually needs a catalyst, so I would point to Zappa/Beefheart. Secondly, that many of these artists did not have formal, or even informal musical training, like Mayo Thompson from the Red Crayola who was an art student, or Joe Byrd from the USoA, who was an electronics geek. So, much like punk that soon followed, many, but not all, of these artists imbibed in avant/experimentalism with no formal musical training needed, allowing these creative people be involved in music artistically. The psychedelic era, I'm sure, was also an influence. With Zappa and Beefheart, I feel that it was a movement or zeitgeist feeding back on itself and resulted in the Uncle Meat and Trout Mask albums which came out in 1969, but that's highly speculative on my part. And it seems after that, the mini explosion died off, except perhaps with The Residents emerging, as rogerthat stated earlier.

 

While I do not see Beefheart and Zappa as part of a movement I can certainly see them as inspiration for other artists of that time. They were definitely significant figures. There are certainly plenty of US artists experimenting at that time. I think the difference might be that bands in England jumped from that experimentation and involvement of elements to full blown prog pretty quickly in the late 60's while the US bands continued to experiment while still more rock, jazz & blues based. They didn't jump fully in until those Happy The Man, Kansas etc albums a few years later. Certainly loads of great music released in that era in the USA.

I’m more responding to the notion that Zappa and Beefheart came from nowhere. They didn’t, they came from somewhere. But they didn’t come from something that we typically recognise as prog rock. Their sound is more atypical because they weren’t drawing on the same primary neo-classical and neo-romantic influences.

Kansas and Happy the Man, who *are* more typically prog rock in their sound, they are influenced by European prog rock.

I admit I’m being somewhat radical by appropriating the term “prog rock” to Zappa, Beefheart, Residents’ sounds. But I think it’s legitimate in the same sense that it’s legitimate to call John Cage “classical music.” And I think it’s a legitimate project to look at what made this uniquely “American prog” different from the European style, and to disentangle its roots.