When was prog labeled?

Prog is a relatively new term, which I don’t believe was ever used before the ‘90s, and no one here so far has provided any evidence contrary to this. I would go as far as to say that anyone who thinks they heard the term prog prior to the ‘90s is suffering from the Mandela Effect (Google it, if you’re not familiar).

But the use of progressive rock is far harder to pin down, purely because progressive was used as a term in itself with rock being added as a suffix sometime afterwards. How long afterwards seems to be lost in the mists of time.

And because of retrospective labelling, what people consider progressive rock to mean now does not at all correlate with what was called progressive (rock) contemporaneously. Anyone who has paid attention to the liner notes for the 30th Anniversary KC releases on CD will surely have noted the progressive charts in newspaper clippings that included names like Rod Stewart.

The question probably shouldn’t so much be when was progressive (rock) first used, so much as when did progressive (rock) first change in meaning to become what most people now accept it to mean (which is far narrower in scope than it was originally). And the next question I would pose is, who cares? But that’s just me….

I’ve never really understood why people care about what is or is not prog, or what the first prog album was, etc. in terms of a site such as this, it makes sense to care. But on a personal level, it seems bizarre to me to worry about such matters. All I care about is whether I like what I’m listening to, or not. But again, that’s just me…

I guessed you cared, and therefore didn't find it bizarre. I wasn't having a go at you at all. But the repetition of polls/threads discussing fifty years old is probably not that dissimilar from the repetition of polls/threads regarding when prog/gressive was first used, why, and how, etc. So it isn't as different a topic to discuss as you might think.

There's nothing wrong with this post at all (or any of those repetitive polls), but the topic has somewhat been done to death. There's not really even any dead horse left to flog. It's decomposed and biodegraded beyond recognition from its original form. The horse is a part of the earth now. And the endless repetition of certain topics and bands on PA is part of this forum. A lot of people enjoy these discussions and polls, and though I don't have any great interest in (most of) them, I tend to just ignore them. When I come onto PA, there is generally a whole page of new posts, and I might read one or two of them. If I feel bored, or have time to kill, I might gloss over some of the posts that seem same old, same old, to see if anything new has been brought up - which is how I came to this one.

There are a certain percentage of (mostly older) forum members who seem to dwell in the past, which is fine. Everyone has their comfort zone, and so long as no-one disparages anyone else's we can all exist together in relative harmony.

Hi,

I think this will continue to be so as long as we promote the commercial minded idea of a top 5 or top 10. 

Until such a day as we recognize the music, and not its commercial appeal, I think that we might get somewhere about what "progressive music", and "prog" really is and appreciate a lot more of the stuff than the continuous discussion (as you suggest) of the same thing over and over. I suppose that if I had the chance to be an admin, I would want a role deciding to allow a post through or not, and take down many of these until such a time as the user learns to search ... or we will continuously have 10 year old kids every day asking the same question about the chicken and the egg, or the moon!

I don't want to sound mean ... but I have to agree that after a while things get a bit ... well you know ... 

I just pointed out some jazz musicians that are still playing that are great. Are Coltrane, Monk,  or Miles still playing? Anyway I could have listed more jazz musicians under thirty that are awesome but it doesn't matter, you would still say that they wouldn't win a poll. 

This only leads me to believe you haven't the foggiest idea what you're talking about. Often, particularly in regards to prog or jazz or classical, recordings are "popular" because they were groundbreaking and great. With any sort of objective perspective and historical context, to say Lee Morgan was better than Miles Davis puts you in a minority of one. That would be from any jazz critic, jazz listener or jazz performer. Lee Morgan would not be on the list. It would read something like:

  1. Louis Armstrong
  2. Duke Ellington
  3. Miles Davis
  4. Charlie Parker
  5. John Coltrane
  6. Dizzy Gillespie
  7. Billie Holiday
  8. Thelonious Monk
  9. Charles Mingus
  10. Count Basie