Can Retro Prog be Progressive?

King By-Tor wrote: Garion81 wrote: Any music can be progressive in what ever frame work it is written in.  Saying writing in a style popular in the 70's can't be new or progressive is like saying you can't write new music in a classical style it is all retro.     damn spiffy. Even people's precious Kayo Dot could e called retro for their similarities (at times) to King Crimson

Even Rush called be called Retro for the heavy blues rock stuff they had in their sound

We're equal now Mike! MWAHAHA.

Betcha you didn't see that coming from a mile away




Edited by HughesJB4 - November 15 2008 at 06:51

In fact, I'm not done yet

Now for the bigger crunch coming up: Prepare to have your faces melted off and put in a pot to be cooked i.e post with more musically academic content warning
Non-musicians, be warned
Well, okay, it's not that bad.

What is considered progressive?

Let's discuss some musical devices that have been used for quite a while in music's history.

Let's take counter and polyphony for instance.
Two musical devices favored by many of the Baroque era composers.

Now, let's take these into a more modern context.

Say if a prog rock band, hypothetically speaking and thinking more along late 60s/early 70s for the first time, uses counterpoint and polyphony in their music.

Is it progressive? (in the sense of actual progression, not in terms of it being 'prog rock')
Or is it just 'retro?

These devices have been used for hundreds of years before the people in x band have been born.
One side of the argument says "What is new about this? Bach was all over it by the 1700s at least, if not even earlier, and chances are, people used these musical devices before him".

If we choose to look at it from a more historical point of view, and take all music, not just rock, into account, then, nothing was really innovated, hence it's retro really.

But now, let's leave music before 1965 out often equation, and better yet, let's pretend classical music in the vein of the Baroque style or whatever, is not being written at all.

What we have now, is progression, in the true definition of the word.
We have seen someone incorporate elements in rock music never done before.
And then we have the first guys started to take it to another level and use Fifth Species counterpoint instead of merely just the first species, for the first time etc.
Still, progression is happening

And now, we can apply this to other later periods of prog music (although we no longer need to say it's necessarily about counterpoint or polyphony anymore, it can be a whole multitude of things, like other musical devices, genre mish-mashing etc).

Let's prog metal for example.

Retro if we view as metal and elements we consider prog already having been done.
Progressive if we recognize metal was never played in such a complex way before.



So, it's a matter of perspective/what angle we approach it, the historical context we chose to see it in, and even more I can't be bothered to think of at the top of my head as I really need sleep.




Edited by HughesJB4 - November 15 2008 at 07:30

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Again, Progressive Rock has absolutely no relation with progress or evolution, a band can play in the style of Procol Harum, and still be part of the PROGRESSIVE ROCK movement.   The term Retro Prog is absurd IMO, or must a genre live 2 years and be forgotten? Why can't a genre live 40 or 100 years, why must we change at the Speed of MTV and Billboard?   Baroque Music existed from 1600 to 1750 more or less, and nobody called a composer playing in Baroque style in 1700 a Retro Musician, why must genres live only a couple of years?   This is not pop where you have to be new in order to exist, this is Prog where people buy The Lamb or CttE 40 years after their release.   Iván

That´s just your way of seeing things. And from what I understand you don´t really listen to more experimental or non symphonic/neo bands, so it´s obvious you will think that way.

Logan wrote: Retro can be Prog (noun), but retro (regressive) is not progressive (adjective).  I find "retro" a useful term to describe music that sounds like it is of, harkens back to, a past era/ time.  I commonly say, "it has a retro aesthetic" or "it has retro elements" when evaluating music.

In defence of Matias, he did say "from what I understand...."

Logan wrote: In defence of Matias, he did say "from what I understand...."

I take my hat for your diplomatic abbilities Mister Henry Kissinger Logan

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote:   The term Retro Prog is absurd IMO, or must a genre live 2 years and be forgotten? Why can't a genre live 40 or 100 years, why must we change at the Speed of MTV and Billboard?   Baroque Music existed from 1600 to 1750 more or less, and nobody called a composer playing in Baroque style in 1700 a Retro Musician, why must genres live only a couple of years?

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: crimson87 wrote:   As simple as that , retro prog sounds progressive but it suffers from stagnation. And stagnation is not a  main characteristic of prog rock.       Please, when you will get it..Progressive Rock is the name of a musical genre, as Modern is the name of music from 1820 to 1899.   There will be many more contemporary composers, but Wagner or Chopin or Dvorak will always be MODERN MUSICIANS, even in the XXX Century, because MODERN IS JUST A NAME.   In the same way Progressive Rock is just a term, call it Art Rock or whatever but a band that was part of the Progressive Rock genre in 1971, will be  a Progressive Rock band in 2099.   There's not a genre or sub-genre called Regressive or retro Prog, only progressive Rock, and things wion't change, because you can't change history   Is this so hard to understand?   Iván

Really? There wasn't a genre or sub-genre called crossover prog until recently. We're changing history at this site all the time. If we want to have a genre called retro-prog, then we will.

For the record, I do NOT want such a genre. I think the word 'retro' applies to an attitude, not a genre.

But shouting the same argument time and again doesn't make it right, Ivan. There's an established genre called retro-rock, in which artists evoke the rock of the 1970s. I personally think - as do some others here - that some contemporary prog bands do this too. It's a way of referring to a broad group of artists, to distinguish them from other contemporary prog artists who are pushing musical boundaries.

I'm still yet to hear an ARGUMENT against this idea, just some repeated assertions.

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Epignosis wrote: I can guess.  Your motivations are to be right and be heard.    No, my motivations are to debate in search for the closest approach to truth, through research not guessing.   Iván

Hey, hey- note the smiley!