Bands that changed your musical taste....

What was the band?

Mine would be King Crimson, Focus, Hawkwind and Genesis although I listned to Pink Floyd earlier w/o realizing they were prog. 

Pink Floyd and Rush. I'd heard Rush 2112 for a very long time before I knew they were prog, and Pink Floyd I'd heard on the radio and thought they were psychadelic rock. Then I listened to Dark Side of the Moon and looked Pink Floyd up online and found out they were prog, and got all their later albums (7 of them)  Then my dad showed me an old Alan Parsons cassette with "Tales of Mystery and Imagination" and I bought the CD version of that.

Then I bought Thick as a Brick, Fragile, and Roger Waters' Amused to Death all at once. Then I got Close to the Edge, Aqualung, Scenes from a Memory, and then the list goes on with my first Genesis CD being Foxtrot, the Selling England by the Pound, and now The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway...

I looks like the "gateway" bands which get people into prog are:

Pink Floyd, Rush, ELP, Genesis, Yes,  and King Crimson (even though I can't find any King Crimson albums in this buttcrack of musical taste called Oklahoma! ARRRGH!!)

Buying Tangerine Dream's Encore on my 16th Birthday changed mine.Oh and listening to a tape of Floyds Ummagumma i borrowed from my older sisters boyfriend too.

Not quite different from what the previous reviewers, but I will add one which is not mentioned so far... OK, Yes seems to be everybody's favorite, so is mine... Jethro and Floyd had been among my favorite bands before realizing they were prog. (As my friend who then introduced prog rock to me stated, Pink Floyd is a very bad progressive band, anyway... Just compare them with some other highlights from this site, such as Gentle Giant, King Crimson, early Genesis etc...)

One band, actually one (double) album that changed my perception is Aphrodite's Child's 666. I learned to appreciate it even more during the five years (since I first listened to) and it even changed my perception of Vangelis... (well, I'm still not his fan, but has all albums in mp3 format, and I love his early "prog and fusion" works!) It's interesting that I didn't know then that it was in the genre "prog-rock", but I definitely liked it. Later on I had some more information about prog rock, basically with the help of this site (thanks, anyway!) and in time I always wondered why this great band (even for this one exclusive album) wasn't included... At last, there we have it...

Well, before getting acquainted with Yes and involving deeply into their music, my favorite band was Deep Purple. Some people consider it as prog, and so do I... (you might object, saying only a few of their early albums fit into the category; and I will give you counter examples of Genesis and Tangerine Dream, which are included in this site! Not to mention many new age artists with a handful of so-called prog records!) DP's first 4 albums (including concerto; and especially their self titled 3rd album) really paved my way to prog. And when I got back from the military service 1.5 years ago (after 7 months without or with very little music...) I happened to find this great site (probably I was looking for some info about Yes) and this almost entirely changed my musical perception. Actually, I realized that I've already been a prog fan (most of the groups I liked since I was a metalhead and rockhead turned out to be prog groups...) and decided to involve deeper.

Lastly, (sorry for the long and boring post!) some albums which opened the doors of prog-rock to me 5 years ago: 666 as mentioned above, Fragile by Yes, King Crimson's first album and disc two of Frame by Frame compilation (Wetton area, bought it from the library, I couldn't find disc 1!), ELP's Tarkus and Brain Salad Surgery, last 3 discs of Yesyears set (from the same library!), Marillion's Misplaced Childhood, and of course Fugazi with the mind-blowing Assasing, and some early works of Genesis... and let's not forget Uriah Heep's Salisbury, which is also a classic.

Thanks for the opportunity.

Crimson was the biggest revelation to me. They quite literally rocked my world and every other band seemed pale in comparison.

XTC got me into new wave music and The Police followed soon after.

I am SUCH a white boy....

Symphony- X, Yes, Threshold were the bands that first got me into the Prog scene. Thank god for them!

My music taste gradually progressed thorugh the genres of Prog rock starting with Prog/Metal now im into alot more Prog/rock.