Prog's not prog.

Dean, although I agree that traditional gothic metal isn't prog, however some newer gothic metal does seem to be prog while remaining gothic on the same album. The example I'm thinking of is Decipher by After Forever. I guess the 2 newest epica albums would qualify as well. 

Hi, I listened to Porcelain Heart, Windowpane, Burden, Bleak, and the Grand Conjuration.  I think I started to listen to a few others but couldn't get past the intros.  I was most impressed that they had a keyboard player, but most of the time I couldn't hear any keyboards on the live stuff.   I think I've been misinterpreting this website.  Seems that everything is progressive and they just keep splitting bands down into smaller and smaller categories.  I thought it was funny that they give Italy it's own category.   I guess progressive classical would be Claude Debussy, or Stravinsky, or Jehan Alain.  

Nuke wrote: Heh, not goth metal at all, but judging by your posts you probably don't care to learn all about the different genres of metal. Opeth are basically a death metal band at their core, but they take lots of influences from progressive rock and other genres outside metal, so that makes them "progressive metal" in a sense. Maybe they are a bit goth in that they are slow and melodic, but that could also make them doom, drone, ect. Kudos for giving them so many chances, what songs did you listen to?

No problem, thanks for the interesting read, I will definitely check it out.  I've never thought of Henry Cow as avant pop, maybe avant broadway sometimes such as Desperate Straights, but usually I've seen them as progressive rock.   I think I might agree with you on Bjork, that sort of fits the description you gave.  Threre are also a number of young classical composers that are apparently writing for rock groups now because they cannot get their symphonic works played by orchestras.  Interesting!

Logan wrote: LanCaiHe wrote: Avant Pop??????  That sounds like an obvious contradiction to me.   Sort of like saying an intelligent idiot? Sorry for the belated response, but I was away and just noticed this now. Avant-Pop (and experimental pop) commonly refers to music that employs conventional pop idioms/ form such as a verse/ bridge/ chorus structure and common pop harmonic melodies and puts experimental, avant-garde spins on the music. Bowie and Bjork, for example, have music that is considered Avant-Pop.  I don't think it's unintelligent to play around with Pop conventions and incorporate avant-garde elements.... Rock is generally a simple form of music (and often considered a subset of Pop), and I don't blame bands for using standard rock conventions as a base for more progressive music (e.g. Progressive Rock).  Tell me it's a pop rock album, and I probably won't be that interested, however. Here's a fun little read: http://www.altx.com/manifestos/avant.pop.manifesto.html

Avant Pop??????  That sounds like an obvious contradiction to me.   Sort of like saying an intelligent idiot?

My God, I've listened to more Opeth than I ever care to again.  I just listened to two more tunes.  If anything at all they are Goth Metal.  If I had the distasteful task of categorizing their music, that's what heading I would put them under.   We had an add compaign here where I live years ago for a sticker to put on household cleaning products to protect young children from poisoning themselves. It was a green sad face sticker.  It was called "Mr. Yuck."   The theme music for the slogan was this simple tune built on a diminished chord and a tritone that said "Mr. Yuck is green, Mr. Yuck is Mean!"   It sounded exactly like the two Opeth songs I just listened to. 

LanCaiHe wrote: Yes, well, I went back to that band Opeth, and they are definitely not prog.  There is just nothing special about it.  I can't even stand waiting for them to start talking.  Remind me of that movie by the Kids in the Hall "Brain Candy".....that metal band called "Grievo". LOL  So boring. :-(