I enjoy subtlety, unusual time signatures, some complexity and strong melodies. So.....I really have no ears at all for Progessive Metal, Industrial and the like. Bombast doesn't appeal to me at all. Growling vocals tend to make me laugh or cringe, depending on what mood I'm in at the time.

 

Also, can't appreciate certain elements of the unstructured/all improvised/free jazz prog scene. Now, Coltrane's "My Favorite Things" album is, to my ears, inspired work. The Dave Holland Quintet's "Extended Play: Live at Birdland" isn't; just noise and chaos.

 

Bands I enjoy the most are Weather Report, Yes, Genesis, Big Big Train, early to mid period Porcupine Tree, Pink Floyd, certain Art Zoyd tracks, certain Sieges Even tracks,  the double live Bill Bruford's Earthworks album "Footloose and Fancy Free",  certain Birds and Buildings tracks, iamthe morning, Mahavishnu Orchestra, King Crimson, Neal Morse's "?", Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Philp Glass' "Low Symphony", David Bowie, Portugal. The Man, Pure Reason Revolution, Tull, Sia, Steely Dan, Super Furry Animals, TV on the Radio, Underworld and The XX.

 

If you mean groups like Kansas than I totally agree. Ever since I first heard them I thought they were a poor man's version of Yes. And, God help me for saying this on PA, but I feel the same way about Rush. Could never appreciate their musical substance, or, in my ears case, lack of it.

Neo-prog without a doubt

I agree with you on all these except the Ozrics. Magma are so pretentious; inventing their own language is the ultimate in being utterly ridiculous for me and their music is awful, though I concede that they are excellent musicians.

I also find The Mars Volta impossible to access.

I actually love Kansas, even though they've got the cheese. I was thinking of more modern neo-ish type groups with the super-pristine production and often indistinguishable, characterless vocal style. Problem is I can't recall any names at the moment. 

 

It took me a few months and a few dozen tries at listening to Genesis' "Supper's Ready" before the light went on in my head and I got it.

My number 1 vote goes to Zheul Prog. MAGMA is a band that takes some getting used to.

 

I never could listen to Magma.

Another. Post Rock/new math.....I think a band like ULVER would not be very accessible sounding for most.

 

Post Rock/New Math/Math Rock....Crimson's take on it was, imo, uninspired and heavy without any substance other than to waste time, for the most part. Certain bits were OK but overall not worth listening to more than a few times as I found it lacking any attachment to my musical appetite. I always felt the hard part about Math Rock was getting emotion into what is essentially a cold, cerebral act of music. 

Some Pyche/electronic Prog like Ozric Tentacles would really be way per the heads for a lot of people.

 

I haven't listened to Ozric Tentacles in a few years....never felt the need to hear them more them a few times. 

Also, Tech Extream. You basically have to be a person with a serious edge to appreciate and find this style of music accessible for you. I for one love it. I've even fallen asleep listening to some Meshuggha. Lol

 

Amazing isn't it? That's what makes the world go 'round. We all have our favorites.

But, to be clear on the true sense of the word 'accessible' I think at least 80% of Prog rock genres are not accessible or radio friendly in any way.....that's the beauty of Prog for me ! :)

 

100% agree

 

 

With me, the deal is if it's gonna be batsh*t crazy complex stuff, there needs to be the appealing aesthetic factor. I listened to Psyopus once, didn't do anything for me. There are better tech metal groups out there. 

schizoidman wrote: What Prog do you find the hardest, or, impossible to like?

 

With "inaccessible" I was trying to imply that one has listened to something but found it not to their liking, so...."hate" works....much stronger word, but, ultimetly, the end result is something one doesn't like.

 

 

I always felt the hard part about Math Rock was getting emotion into what is essentially a cold, cerebral act of music requiring more concentration than emotion to perform. 

I mean....Great Math Rock should connect to a person on an emotional realm as well as a cerebral one.

 

Maybe this has something to do with the theory that some of us are right (emotional) brain oriented and some of us are left (logic) brain oriented.

 

Look up the band Pretend, and their album - Bones in the Soil, Rust in the Oil. Hope you enjoy. 

 

I see your point but, if, a person has listened to music and doesn't like it they can't be labeled as ignorant due to the fact that their ears don't like the same thing as someone else's ears.

 

For someone to dismiss a certain genre outright without giving any ear time is, indeed, quite ignorant.

 

 

You've already clarified what you meant, however, so my quibble is already moot.

 

Thanks. I will give that album an ear and post later in this thread.

 

By the way, I see you have Russian Circles as your sig. I listened to "Enter" back in 2007 or so and found it to be quite good. Never went back to it though. But that's just me.......

I can assure you that, despite liking the Ozrics, I have never taken any illicit substances and certainly not any psycho-active ones! They are perfectly accessible without.

I have taken them instead, when I was younger, and Ozrics wouldn't be a band for these moments. Syd Barrett and his fairytales was the best fit.

Regardless this "outing", I have taken a lot of time to really appreciate Magma but now I'm a zeuhl fan. I have bought TD's Zeit in the 70s and I have started loving TD in the 80s. Now that's one of my top ten albums. All you need to appreciate all the genres is a bit of open mind, and the right attitude while listening. Then you can even not like a thing, it's human, but never put a stone over something. I have rediscovered a lot of things just going back after years. Sooner or later I may be able to like Genesis, who knows?

 

It is truly an art form to communicate one's intentions, meanings and so on in internet forums. I have found the members of PA to be some of the more patient, articulate and like-thinking minds, so, I enjoy this place very much.

 

Kansas, while being popular, are, to my ears, inaccessible, due to the lack of any emotional attachment on my part with their music. I hate to keep knocking them because I respect that others do find them uplifting and get that certain thing from them that they don't from other groups. I respect their value to others though they have none with me.

 

It would be a much, much, much, much better world if more people would, or could, have that outlook.

 

Thanks.

They're a band that doesn't stick to being strictly cerebral.

Accessible (not so great imo): Flower Kings

Mjello monsieur Crimson King

With your affinity for the French scene, I would've thought you knew of Andre Fertier's Clivage? Listed here under the very same moniker, this act flows freely between psych, fusion, zeuhl, Indian inspired music, symphonic and something akin to the kind of funk you hear in Blaxpoitation movies. I love this thing!

Here's a tune from their masterpiece Mixtus Orbis:

Uhm.

The Stratos album is entirely made up of sounds emanating from this man's incredibly versatile vocal chords (may he rest in peace). It is a hard listen, I'll admit to that, and it took me a while to get into - and it's not one I can just pop on at every given moment. Really need something of warm up for that

I get what you're saying about TFK, but then again I'm glad that they have the following they've got. Roine seems like a very nice chap - even if I don't exactly enjoy his music, and something tells me that I'm part of the minority vote on that one. To each his/her own I guess

Well he made two The other one's called Metrodora and just as..... erm experimental

There's also a live "Concerto all'Elfo" in which he explains what he does (unfortunately in Italian).

I have reviewed it in 2010

http://www.progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=294733" rel="nofollow - http://www.progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=294733

It took me a while to appreciate Henry Cow's "Leg End". Nearly all (if not all) of their music is through-composed, so it takes a long time to take it in. I think that's really impressive, but it's very rare for an artist to be able to write a great through-composed piece that feels cohesive, and I'm not sure I feel that they entirely achieve that. In Praise of Learning took a while too, but I absolutely love it now.

Weirdly, Genesis took a very long time for me too. I had listened to Nursery Cryme and Selling England by the Pound so many times thinking, "It sounds like I should like this, but it just isn't very interesting." One day it just kind of hit me. Those moments are really nice.

It's rare for anything to sound great to me on first listen, it seems, but some things take a lot longer than others.

Same feelings about Genesis. Albums that I've revisited after years are TD Zeit, Sylvian-Czukay Plight and Premonitions, and yesterday I have surprised myself liking Caravan's "The Album"... 

I'm not into the Metal side of things, since it's the type of music I don't really like, but I like heavy, melodic rock. All the screaming/growling is something I cannot relate. But I could not dare say they are not good musicians, or that they have no feelings/emotions into their music, it's simply that is not my kind of music, and I'll leave it at that.

 

it's a tough answer, because there are too many things that people use to make their call.

 

From experience, over the years, I would say Amon Duul 2 is such a band ... and the reasons are quite interesting ... some folks get hung up real bad on the vocals ... and then my favorite ... each piece is so different from the next (specially in the early days), that most folks have a hard time enjoying it ... the "recognizeable" thing that you like in that song, won't be found in other songs! And generally, that is a good prescription for ... a lot of folks. It does not have that "top ten" kind of thing that everyone knows or wants!

Between the Buried and Me

And I say this as A FAN.   It took me a year to even figure out there was A FREAKIN PATTERN buried in all that noise. 

Sometimes it's hard to even figure out why the track markers show up where they do, because you can't pick out one "song" from another, and there's no structure to it anyway (not that's immediately noticeable anyway) so it all comes across as:

Cool riff A

Cool riff B

Cool riff C

Cool riff D

Cool riff E

Cool riff F

(oh, what the hell, we've been doing this awhile, let's put a track marker here)

Cool riff G

Cool riff H

Cool riff I

But it was the fact that some of those little individual "bits" were really quite cool.   And then after revisiting it for the umpteenth time, I started to notice that there were some repeating patterns that were showing up RHYTHMICALLY.  Then I was like, "hey wait a minute...this is not random...they're doing this on PURPOSE!"  

But it's easily the most inaccessible thing I've heard since Naked City....or maybe Disco Volante by Mr Bungle.  .  

 

Did I post this tune in this thread (I forget things) - or are you just mentioning it as an example of inaccessible music?

And yeah, you're quite right - such a shame this hasn't received a proper re-issue. One of my fave albums located in the much maligned Indo Prog/Raga rock sub.

 

EDIT: Seems that I did Wow I was positive that it was in another thread...yeah I'm getting old

 

 

Yup I saw you hitting the big 3-O here the other day... Just wait for 31 such a fun age! Diapers, wine and tooth aches oh yeah baby!

 

I'm off to feed the cat now - she's mijaouing like Bruce Dickinson. Cheers!

Psych and space too.

With that nickname? 

this

Well played. 

Should mention that to some of the folks that work in your group. I was on topic at least! (until this post!)

You should not try on hats that you do not want wear just in case they are found to fit.

But somehow I'm not really surprised to read that.

HemispheresOfXanadu wrote: ^I think he just spelled hip-hop wrong. Err... and referenced non-hip-hop albums...

Are you implying that hip-hop is bad?

This is utterly false.

(Argh snap!....I actually just posted a response to him in another thread)

HemispheresOfXanadu wrote: ^I think he just spelled hip-hop wrong. Err... and referenced non-hip-hop albums...

Are you implying that hip-hop is bad?

Just that it's considerably more often "copy and pasted" than prog, at least in my experience.

I have an excuse to post this

The first album I remember not liking after thinking I would would be Unfold the Future. It was just boring. I was so disappointed that I listened to it maybe weekly until I finally beat it into my head that it was a good album. This is all my opinion, but that was pretty f**ked up.

When Geesin and Waters have put farts and trivia of this kind on tapes and Geesin played piano on it the result was quite good and progressive and between tapes and computers the difference in this case is in the use of scissors instead of a mouse.  

Think to the most experimental period of Battiato (late 70s). He has released albums made mainly of tapes cut and pasted together plus various synths and sequencers. When he later decided to make pop music he hired Giusto Pio and his violin. 

What about the music of spheres by David Gilmour and The Orb? 

I can get your point and I hate house and techno as well as I hated the 70s disco music, but your attitude sounds just conservative and close-minded to me. 

If you were around in the early 60s what would have you thought about Theremins?

 

Maybe not so much off topic as moved to some interesting tangents

 

Inaccessible is subjective/personal taste for sure. With that being said most extreme genres in any art form be it writing, painting, movies and, of course, music, are relegated to a certain niche audience, never reaching mass acceptance.

 

Extreme genres in music would be death metal, Zeuhl, avant garde, tech/extreme prog metal, gansta rap, etcetera. None of those genres are likely to be found popping up in American Idol, which, y'know, maybe isn't such a good thing.... lol! (god I hate that show....is it even stil on the air????....hope not.......).

 

IMO, Surrealist has a valid argument. Unarguably, some groups rely on computer technology above their own talent, or, in some cases, lack of it. Those artists will stand or fall by the work they produce, rightly so, as with all art....mostly, which leads me to this....

 

The old addage that "the cream rises to the top" doesn't apply as well today as in the past due to the fact that there is simply so much music out there today via internet sites, social media, web radio, commercial free pay radio like Sirius, that "the cream" is getting harder and harder to find for the masses.

 

Aficionado sites like PA are invaluable for us prog fans as so much of prog is available here to discover and accept or reject.

 

I would think that information would be something that the artist would very much want to keep in the studio as in "What happens in  the studio stays in the studio."

 

I've done a lot of reading on the Beatles recording sessions and techniques. Really can't think of a worse example than them as there aren't many other groups with the wealth of singing and writing talent that they had. That being said....

 

Early Beatles songs were pretty much what you here is what was really played live and recorded and released.

 

Later songs were completed by whichever way John, Paul or George, along with George Martin, thought was best, be it splicing two or more different takes to create one master recording ("Strawberry Fields Forever"), dropping a taped guitar part into a song instead of having to replay the part again (the guitar riff in "Taxman"), speeding up the vocal (certain early versions of "Across the Universe"), backwards guitar ("I'm Only Sleeping"), cut up tape respliced together (the organ outro for "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite") and, of course, Revolution #9 which is a collage of various recordings edited to form the one singular piece.

Then how would you know that they're using "mending tools to rise above their own talent?"

In other words, can you point to a band for which you know this is objectively the case, or is this all speculation?

Would somebody please give these hippies some instruments.

I don't care how fake it is, I love the new stuff if it rocks my brain cells. Who would give a flying f**k if it is made with Cakewalk or a twelwe string guitar.

The best I can think of would be modern metal bands, especially djent-y ones, playing into their laptop and tweaking their tone.

But they still played something.  That's just a software equivalent of a pedal.

Personally I think The Beatles reference is a poor example of this tbh. Sorry, but the examples you mention are by many considered as some of the earliest attempts at mixing things up in the studio to create something new and unorthodox. If anything it shows The Beatles at their most "progressive". I don't think it was done due to the lack of talent, but more because it could be done and moreover to see what came out at the other end. This was all about achieving something unique that hadn't been done before. The accusations flung in this thread (among many threads actually) are that pro tools and other such electronic gimmicks make up for lack of chops - not because these devices are put to use in order to attain something stylistically fresh and original.