prog bounds (some thought involved!)

Lappy, I'll readily admit I haven't read your post properly, and now it is a bit late for me to answer in a coherent way (I'd hate to lose credibility for good). However, you do make some very good points, with which I find myself in agreement.

Though you know me as a hard rock/heavy metal fan, I hope you also know I am open to exploring virtually anything in music. Therefore, I share your point of view that the addition policy is definitely more biased in one sense. Bands or artists that  have no recognisable ties with 'traditional' prog are shunned, even if they are objectively much more progressive than many of those who are added. I have noticed that there is a definite bias against bands associated with 'new wave' (whatever that may mean)  - which made the addition of Japan highly controversial, and makes people foam at the mouth at the very mention of Talking Heads.

More coming tomorrow... Almost time for bed here!

 Excellent analogy Laplace, though I think that searching the Oort Cloud may be to vague an undertaking, after all, the only objects that cross the planetary plane from there are comets that shine briefly then depart (Prog Related perhaps). We should be looking for bands closer to "home": Kuiper Belt objects if you prefer, (like Pluto, Sedna and Quaoar) - one example of which that immediately springs to mind would be After The Fire - a band that 99.9% of people would associate with 80s new-wave synth-pop (of hits such as One Rule for You and Der Kommissar), but who began life as a post-Genesis (Neo)Symphonic band in the late 70s.

wow.... I agree!!!!

Proletariat wrote: wow.... I agree!!!! I got a kind of line, mainly staying in psyche influenced rock and hard rock, with a few (seemingly) random outskirts in other genres. seems like alot of electronica, hip-hop, indie, alternative, punk, funk etc. could be added (of course only the intelligent parts of each genre)

i think that to characterize the intelligent part of each genre you putted there as proggy is the theme of another forum room

Never heard of Pronk? Give the Cardiacs a try.

Ok Shakespeare, ill explain to you how i cannot conceive progressive punk.

The world is made of opposites, which are the exact opposite of each other (a and non-a) and fight to destroy each other and, at the same time, are dependent of each other to exist, like the positive need the negative to exist and light needs the darkness to exist.  This theory is called dialectic, and was conceived by the Greek philosopher Socrates (if  i am not mistaken) and used  during most of the western civilization as it was, but during the the XVII and XIX centuries it was "reborn" by Hegel's philosophy, its followers and Marx. Their theories are far too extensive and far to hard to be shorten in such a small space, but, according to the historical  materialism, this dialectic always happened and forever will in every level of the society, culture and system of beliefs (if you wish to know more, try reading Marx and TRY Hegel; i mean TRY Hegel because its theories are far to complex and obscure, being hard even to philosophers to really understand him).

Knowing this, lets go to the facts: progressive music emerged during the XIX and the XX centuries due to musical conformity and homogeneity, basically. Same thing happened when progressive rock emerged, and it very fast became a mass culture thing (just see the top 10 list of the 70's: the top sellers where almost all prog or prog related and the repercussion of prog rock in popular culture: pink floyd's dark side of the moon and Mike Oldfield's tubular bells). However, prog rock had some problems:

1st a lot of bands with the exact same sound (just see how many yes-like / genesis-like / pink floyd-like / etc-like bands where);
2nd too many poor "prog" bands, like journey, styx, starcastle, etc made market get saturated with low quality "prog"
3rd some bands had a kind of music simply too avant-garde / complex / difficult to be listen, what, in the end, pushed away many people from prog
4th the change of the focus of the general culture on the late 70's, demanding some kind of music that where more "straight to the point" and spoke the language of the of the musically uneducated population (i don't mean here that people that listen to prog is "better" that everybody else, just that, to listen to some kinds of music you need to have some education, like classical music, progressive music, rock, etc, and  on early punk that education  was not needed, just like you don't need any kind of education to listen to 50 cent sing speak make sounds with his mouth about having sex with as many women as possible or getting rich or die trying) and talked about the urges of the new generation (like getting sedated, not going to school, wanting to get drunk and say f**k you to everybody: you, me, the Queen and God, just like the ramones and the sex pistols said, skilfully, on their songs).

Because of that, prog rock slowly died a horrible and painful death into the 80's, to "reborn" only on the early 90's, but not as strong as it was, just like happened to punk and just like will happen to metal, etc.

Conclusion: because of being the main actor on  the fall of prog and its awful music, i think that punk has nothing to do with progressive rock as both were opposites of a dialectic relation during the 70's (the prog and the non-prog[punk]).

PS: before you guys crucify me, i must say that  prog rock never really, REALLY died, but that is a unique characteristic of our post-modern society: to keep "defeated" actors of the dialectic process alive, but that life is nothing more than an artificial life supported  by the unnatural demand of the people that participated of that movement. This is nothing more than a shallow and short explanation to the process that we live today on our post-modern world to keep things that we like "alive" artificially, just like a person that where on a coma and woke up: that person is alive, but will never be as strong, as intelligent nor as eager as it was before the coma (usually! every rule have its exception!).

Admin edit: fixed an error in the quote.


Edited by Angelo - March 23 2008 at 05:16

Sckxyss wrote: ^ The prog rock movement may have been the opposite to that of the punk movement, but as far as style goes, there is no rule that states which styles cannot be fused. If you need some evidence, listen to the Cardiacs, early Mars Volta, or even the avant-garde influenced post punk bands such as This Heat or Pere Ubu.

Some things: the punk MUSIC and not the punk MOVEMENT is what i was referring myself to, since the punk movement was, in its origin (ramones, and sex pistols), something to make MONEY (hell, the ramone guitarist invented the way they dressed and played, well, the way they played was influenced by the rolling stones, i mean, play like you cant care less about what you are doing, but anyway, to make MONEY and the sex pistols were assembled by Malcolm McLaren, a sex shop owner, to promote the clothing he was selling, so he assembled them  to make, well, MONEY), although  it became slowly  more complex. According to Wikipedia, "The Sex Pistols emerged as a response to what was perceived to be the' increasingly safe and bloated' progressive rock and manufactured pop music of the mid-1970s."

However, and i must agree with you here, there are no boundaries to musical influence but, in the case of Mars Volta, i think that it is only some kind of straightforward or direct prog. The other bands you listed here i do not know but i think that they fall in the same categories of progressive death and black metal, and here i will quote myself:

CCVP wrote: In the prog black/death metal case, the punk influence is so far away that the only thing that resemble it is the guitars speed (grindcore, crossover, etc) and vocals (also grindcore, crossover, bla bla bla), but that is controversial and the progressive elements (musical complexity, technicality, brand use of different instruments, etc) outshines the punk elements by far.

Here i meant to say that  for "pronk" the punk is still here, but the prog outshines it by far.

Besides, if that sub-genre (pronk and post punk) were so important in prog rock they would probably be listed here, since the owners of the site already gave themselves the trouble to list a especial sub-genre to Italian prog (to me, EXTREMELY unnecessary, but o well, Italy DOES have a large amount of prog production during the 70's, like Germany, France, UK. . . .), as well as experimental/ post metal (some of bands listed in this sub-genre are just the crossover of some prog rock genres with metal, like happens with orphaned land, which is NOT experimental NOR post metal, the band is progressive folk metal and should not be there, but i think that this sub-genre here needs only better guidelines and better explanation), heavy prog (that is indeed a good creation of the directors of the website, one of the few that i support since bands like Rush and Uriah Heep were some kind of "progressive hard rock") and technical/extreme progressive metal (this sub-genre needs to be better explained and have better guidelines, but its a great 1st step, since is undeniable that extreme metal is increasingly fusing itself with progressive rock).


Edited by CCVP - March 21 2008 at 17:34

I guess I'm one of few who think the musical areas covered on PA are just about right.. well-balanced, open-minded but reasonably conservative  ...musics such as Punk/Postpunk, Noise, Industrial, Minimalism and Experimental are represented here in, as laplace mentioned, many different ways (most recently Mathrock)

Besides, i left a hint for the progressive electronic team i my 1st post.

FOR GOD SAKE FOLKS FROM PROGRESSIVE ELECTRONIC TEAM, JUST TAKE A LOOK IN DAFT PUNK'S DISCOVERY AND HUMAN AFTER ALL ALBUMS!

Atavachron wrote: but understand how hard certain of us fought to have Mathrock even acknowledged as a legitimate entity..  Post/Mathrock not well-represented?  I think not...  some of these new genres will continue growing as will interest in them and it is a continuous effort to understand and properly archive them, you can't just say "OK, now we have a Raga or Postrock category that is as big and comprehensive as Symph"   It requires dedication and, mostly, work to give all areas their due   ..it also has to be the right time and the material must be available so it can be properly documented   ...someone has to do it, and they have to do it well

all i meant is to say that math rock/post rock is not as big as some other sub-genres of prog rock, and with a reason: a sub-genre as new as that one and so "underground" takes a lot of trouble to be uncovered (they ain't underground for nothin' ).

However,  these genres don't have such a appeal as progressive metal have and most of that appeal i will grant to Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy and his filming neurosis: he documents everything that Dream Theater does and passes on to the fans, he is always giving interviews (as well as the rest of Dream Theater, except for John Myung ), constantly make world tours and each 2 years releases a brand new studio album. I bet that if a post rock/math rock band did like Dream Theater does they will attract a lot of attention to the genre.

Atavachron wrote: CCVP wrote:   I bet that if a post rock/math rock band did like Dream Theater does they will attract a lot of attention to the genre. perhaps, or maybe many more people do and always will prefer melodic, cleaner music over the abrasive and sticky miasma of Mathrock

there are much more downers than you think dude: why does gothic, doom, sludge doom, depressive metal and funeral doom exists?

hell, i listened to doom metal and i almost wanted to kill myself! the atmosphere is so depressive that i almost lost my reason to live. AND IT WAS ONLY DOOM!!!!!! JUST IMAGINE SLUDGE DOOM, FUNERAL DOOM AND DEPRESSIVE METAL FOR GOD SAKE!!!!!!!

and there are many MANY doom bands around, just take a look : http://www.metal-archives.com/ (go on bands by genre and they click on doom)