Progressive Indie?

ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote:  Family and King Crimson are labeled as both Art Rock and Progressive Rock - everywhere. Maybe in America. In America, art rock and progressive rock have always been synonymous. In Europe, no. But you claim they are two fundamentally different genres.  Of course, because in Europe back then, mainstream and underground music were two fundamentally different things.

I don't doubt that this was true in whatever part of Europe you grew up (edit: I do actually doubt it, but I was trying to stay nice and polite:). Europe is a great many different things though. My dad or all those older guys I share musical interest with - never make your kind of "fundamental" distinctions between groups or genres. ELP or Camel doesn't represent any kind of underground and Velvet Underground or Family were never mainstream anyway. I'm glad we approach this music from our near past in a less cultural and more of a musical way. Because your truths from the past are anecdotal, and a lot of them are irrelevant and wrong. The music lives on. Although it doesn't change, fifty years later we hear it differntly. Using a mainstream/underground divide that makes no sense in describing the actual music in question is useless to me.

ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote: The way I see it Sufjan Stevens is a progressive artist in the truest sense of the word. The term "progressive" in music should not be taken literally ("in the truest sense of the word") because music does not progress. If the music were to progress, it would mean that it was going somewhere. Any musicologist will tell you that this is not the case. Progressive rock is just a term that denotes the aggregate state of part of the underground music scene in Europe at the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s. By the way, Sufjan Stevens has nothing to do with progressive rock. He is an American indie folk-rock artist.

I think you and your musicologist ways are stuck in definitions and ways of seeing this that doesn't feel particularly relevant to me. I'm not interested in a form of Progressive Rock that isn't allowed to be and mean differnt things at differnt times. That's for genres that belong in a museum. And you can think of that in whatever way you like.

ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote:  Family and King Crimson are labeled as both Art Rock and Progressive Rock - everywhere. Maybe in America. In America, art rock and progressive rock have always been synonymous. In Europe, no. But you claim they are two fundamentally different genres.  Of course, because in Europe back then, mainstream and underground music were two fundamentally different things. Using a mainstream/underground divide that makes very little sense  I'm afraid that the distinctions between art rock, which is mainstream rock with an artistic bent, and progressive rock, which is a subgenre of underground music, are too metaphysical for you.

Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: By the way, Sufjan Stevens has nothing to do with progressive rock. He is an American indie folk-rock artist That's a perfect way of telling me you haven't got the faintest clue what you're talking about - without telling me. Thank you.

The artistic distance of genre-wise positions between American indie-folk star Sufjan Stevens and, e.g., a French progressive band like PoiL, is roughly the same as the distance between some 60's easy rockers from Laurel Canyon and, e.g., The Plastic People of the Universe from 1968 Prague.

Edited by ProgExpo - February 11 2024 at 04:30

Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: By the way, Sufjan Stevens has nothing to do with progressive rock. He is an American indie folk-rock artist That's a perfect way of telling me you haven't got the faintest clue what you're talking about - without telling me. Thank you.  The distance of artistic positions between Sufjan Stevens and, e.g., PoiL, is roughly the same as the distance between some easy rockers from Lauryl Canyon and, e.g., The Plastic People of the Universe from 1968 Prague. No need to compare with PoiL

Ok, let's imagine that I remove French underground band PoiL from the example and put Napier's Bones from England. What changes? Nothing. Sufjan Stevens is never going to be progressive rock.

Saperlipopette! wrote: an indie-folker

Surely, Sufjan Stevens is an indie-folk rocker with folktronica here and there in his songs.

ProgExpo wrote: music does not progress. If the music were to progress, it would mean that it was going somewhere. Any musicologist will tell you that this is not the case.

^ The same can be said of "cult artists".

Saperlipopette! wrote: ProgExpo wrote: By the way, Sufjan Stevens has nothing to do with progressive rock. He is an American indie folk-rock artist That's a perfect way of telling me you haven't got the faintest clue what you're talking about - without telling me. Thank you.

That's Svet for you.

I love how lively the Sufjan discussion has gotten, even moreso than at Folk. Mike, I simply didn't suggest him to Crossover initially as I thought he would get a chilly reception. I certainly wouldn't mind reading what they, or Logan in Prog-Related, ultimately think before proceeding over at PF, where we are trying to convince Hugues to join us and make the decision unanimously.

Edited by Gordy - February 11 2024 at 12:02

PeterO. wrote: The Dark Elf wrote: ProgExpo wrote: I'm afraid that the distinctions between art rock, which is mainstream rock with an artistic bent, and progressive rock, which is a subgenre of underground music, are too metaphysical for you. The Dark Elf wrote: I would suggest you are not metaphysical, but constipated.  The definitions of "art rock" and "progressive rock" are fluid, and prog was essentially "underground music" until it wasn't (and that was very early on), and many bands later considered "prog rock" were earlier referred to as "art rock".  As a matter of fact, the transitory term "underground music" is an inapt reference for music in general as it does not define a specific genre. ProgExpo wrote: In my humble opinion, it is not at all fluid. Naturally, a lot of underground musicians wanted to make it big in mainstream rock, especially in the U.S. because of its absurdly large market, which opens up some (unimaginable for Europe) possibilities, yet the songs they wrote for the ears of underground music freaks have nothing to do with mainstream rock songs they supposedly did later, whether they are artistically inclined or not. It is fluid, very much so. Genres, and particularly rock genres, are and were often transitory and ephemeral. I'm not sure what country you come from (the "Ottoman Empire" being a bit vague), but you neither speak for all of Europe, nor for most fans of prog rock.  Again, "underground music" is not a genre of music, but a transitory state of being for certain bands in any number of genres. A band is underground until it is not, no matter the genre it gravitates toward. Psych, prog, punk, metal, hip hop, indie all had their moments of being underground -- and then, suddenly, they were not.  And genres within rock are very fluid: Genesis was underground, then art rock, then prog, then pop. Pink Floyd was undeground psych, then art rock, then prog, then more standard rock with prog elements. Jethro Tull  has morphed into any number of genres (blues/jazz-rock, hard rock, prog, prog-folk, even metal according to some industry sources). A band with idiosyncratic methods and/or non-mainstream compositional style remains "underground" until that moment they are not. It is a time period, not a genre. If the boundaries of the fields of underground and mainstream are that fluid, it would mean that artists can go from the underground to the mainstream, earn some money, and then return to the underground. However, this is not the case. An underground musician can collaborate with songwriters to create mainstream music with reminiscences of their underground stuff., and then book mainstream shows with the help of a management team to make their songs radio-friendly, get their music licenced for movie and television show usage, and even advertise. Underground musicians have the option of hiring a producer to change their sound and take it in a more popular direction. But this is selling out, and then there's no going back; they never return to the underground.