How to define and classify "Progressive Rock"?

Davesax1965 wrote: May I just crack my knuckles and pick up the fountain pen for a moment ? Musical sub genres.  These are just for advertising and marketing purposes, ladies and gents. If you write and play music (raises hand) you don't automatically think "Oh, I know, I'll write some Funk Metal, throw a bit of Blackgaze in and we'll end up with some Blackened Screamo".  Unless you're very, very sad.  I'd be sitting there thinking "What's a typical chord progression for Sludge Metal and what's the solo going to sound like ? " - truth of the matter is that music doesn't work like that. You can copy someone who'd decide that they're Electrogrind or Progressive Metalcore.  But basically, it's all generically heavy metal, which is generically rock music which has blues derivations, or perhaps not in some cases and perhaps so in others.  It used to be a case that Band A sounded different from Band B. and, for a while, there was not much to distinguish heavy rock, hard rock and heavy metal, for example. But. All of a sudden, everything has to be categorised ? Why ? Sells albums. I think. Allegedly.  "We - Mongolian Doom Badgers - play Snot Metal and sound just like Codpiece of Disaster".  But in the real world, ie "listening to music", how much categorisation and sub categorisation do you want ? If a musician tries to play in one specific style, it's derivative, if they try and sound like someone else, it's probably going to be crap music, and if you go off looking for a specific category of music, you're closing your mind to what's out there.  "Krautrock" covers many different bands and genres. Go off and listen to the lot, with an open mind. Same with "Progressive rock". Stop analysing. Stop categorising. Listen. Enjoy. By constantly searching for stuff that sounds the same, you're closing your mind.  After all, it's not like you're paying for it anymore, and oh no, I've done the analytics from my Bandcamp website, you tight fisted lot. Your only expenditure is time. Not money. ;-)

Edited by Cristi - August 17 2022 at 09:52

David_D wrote: If talking about Progressive Rock sub-genres on RYM, they're: Avant-Prog (incl. RIO and Zeuhl) Brutal Prog Canterbury Scene Neo-Prog Symphonic Prog

May I just crack my knuckles and pick up the fountain pen for a moment ?

Musical sub genres. 

These are just for advertising and marketing purposes, ladies and gents. If you write and play music (raises hand) you don't automatically think "Oh, I know, I'll write some Funk Metal, throw a bit of Blackgaze in and we'll end up with some Blackened Screamo". 

Unless you're very, very sad. 

I'd be sitting there thinking "What's a typical chord progression for Sludge Metal and what's the solo going to sound like ? " - truth of the matter is that music doesn't work like that. You can copy someone who'd decide that they're Electrogrind or Progressive Metalcore. 

But basically, it's all generically heavy metal, which is generically rock music which has blues derivations, or perhaps not in some cases and perhaps so in others. 

It used to be a case that Band A sounded different from Band B. and, for a while, there was not much to distinguish heavy rock, hard rock and heavy metal, for example. But. All of a sudden, everything has to be categorised ? Why ? Sells albums. I think. Allegedly. 

"We - Mongolian Doom Badgers - play Snot Metal and sound just like Codpiece of Disaster". 

^ There are no laws about genres, so if someone considers Metal as a main genre, it is a main genre to him; and he can probably define lots of Metal sub-genres. Classifications are man made and can change from person to person. Sometimes there's a more overarching consensus about classifications, which then become a norm. But a norm is just what it is: a norm. Not a natural law.

Psychedelic Paul wrote: These were the 20 parent genres of music on our long-since defunct music site ..... ..... Metal ..... Rock  .....

Psychedelic Paul wrote: It's not a silly joke at all and I don't "still classify things like that". I think you'll find that most all-music sites don't have lots of sub-genres for prog. We have lots of prog sub-genres here because it's a specialist prog site, and yes, I already know what you're going to say:- "Thank You Captain Obvious!"

Psychedelic Paul wrote: Least of all Cristi.

Psychedelic Paul wrote: You're wrong again. I don't persist with that classification today. All I'm saying is that's how we used to classify prog back in the days of YouTube Episodes & Music. Anyway, what happened to David? He posed the question, but he seems to have disappeared, leaving me and you to argue it out again like an old married couple.

David_D wrote: Psychedelic Paul wrote: David_D wrote: Paul, I'm curious about your way of classifying.  We had a very simple way of classifying Progressive Rock when I used to run my own music site:- 1967-1979: Classic Prog Post-1970's: Neo Prog And that was it!  Psychedelic Paul wrote: ........ .....That's how we used to classify Progressive Rock on YouTube Episodes & Music back in 2013-2015. We didn't have any of the additional prog categories we have here such as Crossover Prog, Eclectic Prog or Heavy Prog, etc, etc. It wasn't just a Progressive Rock music site though - it was an all-music site with 20 parent genres of music and 200 sub-genres, but with only two sub-genres for prog:-  Classic Prog & Neo Prog.  That's very interesting, Paul, thanks.

Cristi wrote: Psychedelic Paul wrote: Cristi wrote: Psychedelic Paul wrote: Cristi wrote: Psychedelic Paul wrote: It's not a silly joke at all. I think you'll find that most all-music sites don't have lots of sub-genres for prog. We have lots of prog sub-genres here because it's a specialist prog site But we are not on an all-music site, are we?  it seems to me you give those kind of sites more credit and respect than you have ever given PA, which is insulting to the work admin and collabs (and other users) have done on the PA database. How you do not understand that is beyond me...  No, you've got it completely wrong. I've never even visited any all-music sites since I've been a member of ProgArchives. Why would I need to? I've got all the music I need right here and on YouTube.  Then the only conclusion i can take is that you were trolling with that classification.  Wrong again! That was how we used to classify prog when I used to run my own music site, whether you like it or not.  But do you realize today how inaccurate that classification is? Why do you persist with that classification still?