Yes’ ‘90125’ is probably an obvious answer to this. Truth be told, I’ve never quite warmed to Yes’ composition style, for whatever reason. I recognise that they’re awesome but they just aren’t a favourite of mine to listen to. I wouldn’t mind hearing a defense of Yes here but I don’t want it to derail the thread!

Some of the little bit of I’ve heard of It Bites sort of fits the bill with their use of digital synths, but they’re strongly guitar-based neo-prog music so it’s not exactly what I’m looking for.

Missing Persons are very good but are more new wave than what I’m looking for.

I’ve found a few jazz fusion albums that almost fit the bill at times. Chick Corea’s (R.I.P.) Elektric Band, some of Herbie Hancock’s 80’s output, Bruford’s Earthworks, Kazumi Watanabe’s ‘Spice of Life’ albums.

One can easily imagine Level 42 would have been a group to have done this, but actually as they became more pop-oriented they shed a lot of their jazz fusion influences.

So any pop artist with some skill, competence is basically sophisticated, right? 

Typically in pop, you hear the same melody a few times in the verse, and another melody in the chorus. In prog music, the theme is often developed rhythmically and harmonically over time.

I love them!

Love this! Thanks!

I do like The Buggles. I consider them of a piece with 80’s Yes due to their shared membership and musical material.

Horn produced another flash-in-the-pan sophisti-pop group called Dollar. He is interesting, I feel I should look more into him. 

Yea, loving what I’m hearing here! They list Prefab Sprout and Japan as influences, two of my absolute favourites.

https://laughingstock1.bandcamp.com/album/the-island" rel="nofollow - https://laughingstock1.bandcamp.com/album/the-island

I’m not a great fan, overall, of the Pleasuredome album, but it’s worth it for the songs that are good. The title track alone is bloody amazeballs.

The Blue Nile

Prefab Sprout

China Crisis

Japan

Joe Jackson (first new wave, later sophisti-pop)

The Pale Fountains

The Painted World

You’ve named some of the best. I only don’t know The Painted World. I can recommend some newer artists, although I was hoping to make this thread about a prog/sophisti-pop hybrid, rather than sophisti-pop itself.

I’ll have to revisit those Ferry albums. Thanks.

Can you recommend some Simple Minds?

I’m a fan, though I consider them more new wave. They did dip into the genre a bit here and there, and I think they did a fine job:

I know a lot of modern sophisti-pop groups (I run an online group on the genre) but none of them mix in progressive elements like this. So good. Are their other albums similar?

Listen to those Ferry albums...

and then this one....by Simple Minds..New Gold Dream and also Sparkle In The Rain...but many of them might fit your bill.

But my personal favorites are Sons and Fascination and Sister Feelings Call...both brilliant art pop and instrumental things also.

One of my all time favorite tracks by them...

Hi Crane!!

The Painted Word (my mistake, its The Painted Word not World) was the band of Peter John Vettese (keyboardist of Jethro Tull), they oonly release two amazingd albums, i recommend you "Lovelife"

Sophisti- pop prog hybrid i recommend you:

North Atlantic Oscilation, I specially recommend you the album "Fog Electric"

Wild Nothing - "Nocturne" where the band shows influences from Shoegaze and Dream pop

Leaves - "The Angela Test" very Radiohead + Orchestrations + pop

Eksi Ekso - "I am your b*****d wings" post rock + orchestraton + pop melodies

I’m liking the Painted Word songs I’m hearing. Very good, if typical, sophisti-pop. I’ll try to track down the full albums. I’ll also have to look into your other recommendations. Thanks!

I’m a really big fan of Nordic Giant’s Amplify Human Vibration album, too, which isn’t really anything like Fog Electric, but for some reason my mind always pairs the two albums up, and generally if I listen to one of those albums, I end up wanting to listen to the other one, too.

Despite the use of the word pop in the name, dreampop and shoegaze are generally seen as synonymous and interchangeable. Often you’ll find that what is described as shoegaze on one side of the Atlantic, is referred to as dreampop on the other.

A lot or rock is pop anyway, so it’s somewhat spurious to imply they are wholly different. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Whether the music is more rock-oriented, or more pop-oriented, dreampop/shoegaze is essentially alternative rock that focuses on texture over melody. The 4AD bands were often labelled as dreampop, for example. And, since I was talking about NAO and Nordic Giants in my post, I may as well mention that fellow Kscope artists, Engineers, have also been labelled dreampop.

Personally, even though I like a lot of bands that have been labelled that way, I don’t use it myself as I tend to feel that there is so much difference between all the bands, that it renders the label somewhat arbitrary and meaningless - similar to grunge, in that respect.

I was trying to make a silly joke, that's why there were two silly emoticons there, but I agree with what you say there (the sentences I bolded there). 

Aren't Nordic Giants a post rock band? I listened to one of their albums. If i remember right, I suggested them here on PA. 
 

While I think you’re right that dream pop and shoegaze both emphasise texture over melody, I don’t think they’re exactly synonymous. I tend to think of shoegaze as distinctly derived from rock, explicitly in its use of affected guitar to achieve its textures.

Honestly, it is possible that over time they have come to mean different things, but certainly when they were first used, they were used interchangeably. Dreampop was coined as the name of the genre before shoegaze. In fact, from memory shoegaze as a label came about in a similar way to Krautrock - as a joke, that was never meant to become a label, but somehow stuck. I think the joke was something along the lines of “Dreampop? You may as well call it shoegazing.” And so people did, and what was once known as dreampop started to sometimes be called shoegaze as well.

But because shoegaze was coined in the UK, it took awhile for the usage to make it across to the US. (It would be different for sure these days, with the interweb as it is now.) That meant for a time, generally speaking, bands were increasingly known as shoegaze in the UK, but still known as dreampop in the US. Bands like My Bloody Valentine who are definitely more rock than pop to me, were initially known as a dreampop band. I suspect any separation of the terms has been done retrospectively.

Personally, I don’t really care, and have never used either label. Neither gives a great indication of what you are going to hear. They are as arbitrary and meaningless as grunge was. But living in NZ, where we had about 50/50 media coming from the UK and the US it was definitely noticeable at the time that the same band was called dreampop initially by both, and then shoegaze in UK media, and dreampop in US media.

How about bands like Spandau Ballet, or Sparks?  Lots of synth, not blues-based etc.  

Lots of options to explore!

     Some claim the term was coined while watching "Ride" stare at their shoes during concerts. Others say, the term was coined because the bands stood still during live performances in a detached, introspective state with their heads down. The heavy use of effects pedals meant the performers were often looking down at the readouts on their pedals...thus shoegazing.  

I’d always read the term shoegazing came from a joke about dreampop bands spending all their time looking at their pedals.

There’s a great deal of dreampop/shoegaze that I love. - on both the rockier and poppier sides.

Although I like many of the artists named so far aren't we really just sticking shiny new labels on very old bottles of 'Pop' here? I mean there was a thread recently on the equally spurious Zolo genre and now Sophisti-Pop?. It boils down to this: All people prefer certain Pop Music over others but elitists believe themselves too 'deep and smart' for Pop Music so the Pop Music they prefer they don't call Pop Music because Pop Music is also enjoyed by 'shallow and dumb' people ergo, the Pop Music elitists prefer is really Sophisto-Pop. This is pitiful. Pop Music doesn't have to be a pejorative term.

That said, this cranky rodent will enter into the discussion in the spirit I hope it was intended:

Stan Ridgway

the Specials and the Special A.K.A

the Colourfield

Heaven 17

China Crisis

OMD

Deacon Blue

the Style Council

Is Steven Wilson live Footgaze?

Said the guy on the prog rock forum 

They’re wonderful. Have you heard their latest, 2015’s ‘Autumn in the Neighbourhood?’ It’s fantastic!:

From what I gather, sophisto pop is sort of an amalgamation or basket that includes both blue eyed soul and smooth jazz.  Wiki says Aztec Camera, Swing Out Sister, Simply Red, Prefab Sprout, Sade, Level 42 are all sophisto pop but that then is a very wide basket. I don't quite know why AC and Prefab Sprout should be in that group whereas I see some similarity or association between Level 42, Simply Red and SOS.  I believe the Level 42 bassist joined SOS for the latter's performance of Breakout at the Prince's Trust concert in 1989.

Whether it needed a new term is, indeed, highly debatable.  But hey, it's no worse than the millions of death metal/black metal sub genres out there which get increasingly dubious with vanishingly few differences between the sub genres. 

I run a sophisti-pop group on Facebook, and I’ve had this discussion a lot. I generally concur that Prefab Sprout is out of place with these other groups. Especially since Sprout’s sound is so unique and eclectic. Yet, they’re considered one of the premiere representations of the genre. Go figure!


-------------
“Art is the recognition of the universal presence of God.” —Ernest Hello

Basia (2 albums)

The Blow Monkeys (1 album)

Deacon Blue (7 albums)

The Divine Comedy (5 albums)

Everything But the Girl (6 albums)

Bryan Ferry (6 albums)

Julia Fordham (3 albums)

Go West (1 album)

Hothouse Flowers (1 album)

Level 42 (1 album)

Lighthouse Family (3 albums)

Prefab Sprout (6 albums)

Roxy Music (2 albums)

Rumer (4 albums)

Simply Red (8 albums)

Spandau Ballet (1 album)

Swing Out Sister (3 albums)

Tears for Fears (5 albums)

Psychedelic Paul wrote: The Divine Comedy (5 albums)

Damn, forgot the inestimable talents of Mr Neil Hannon & Co. One of my favorite artists ever

Second tier: Alphaville with the great voice of Marian Gold, ABC with the great voice of Martin Fry, the Fixx (the Cy Curnin and Jamie West-Oram combo), Icehouse and OMD . Many more.....

Another missing person is Tony Mansfield (master producer with Aha, Naked Eyes, Minor Detail and many others) but his band New Musik made just that: unique and original synth pop with tons of details, pings and echoes, sounding like The Korgis (A Stackridge offshoot). 

I SECOND THAT EMOTION !

To be honest, I would've been surprised to find any of those four bands listed in ProgArchives, but then again, I'm constantly surprised by the non-prog artists who are included here. 

The elephant in the room is the  'prog-related' category. Many of the bands there are subjectively included and imho are no more prog oriented as the ones I named. Bowie, Zep, BOC, Wishbone Ash,,,,there is nothing especially prog  related about them imho . And of course there is crossover...some there are also borderline prog.

But this is another discussion we have had many times here.

Many of the bands mentioned, are already listed at PA.
 

Not necessarily from the 1980’s, but “80’s” conveys the heavy use of digital synthesiser and programmed sequences that I’d personally like to hear.

This definitely belongs here. The original topic of conversation is prog. Rather than suggesting it be moved, it would make more sense to ask for it to be brought back on topic - which is prog bands that have the sophisti-pop vibe. There are such bands in PA, and not in the prog-related section, but generally in Crossover.

you're right, maybe ask Keishiro for help. 

Squeeze's album "Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti" is their most progressive and they are also an overlooked sophisti-pop style band.

10cc is here in the Archives and so is Mercury Rev, and I would consider them both sophisti-pop

This was lost almost immediately after I posted it. I know you checked out, and enjoyed The Opium Cartel. Did you give Laughing Stock a listen? No worries if you did, and it didn’t do it for you. I know they don’t quite fit the bill. 😄

It’s sitting in my queue as we speak. I’ve been discovering so much new music lately it’s kind of overwhelming! I will definitely get around to it. Right after IQ’s ‘Frequency’....

Laughing Stock’s ‘The Island’ wasn’t as interesting to me, sorry to say. The most interesting tracks were those which jammed different genres together, e.g. “That Face.” But Laughing Stock indulged too much in the tendency to extend tracks unnecessarily, without compensatory musical development or introduction of material. Most distracting were the lyrics, which were (I think) self-consciously silly. Vis a vis this thread, on the whole I didn’t hear as much of an 80’s influence on this album. I’ll give it another listen, as these are obviously fine musicians who crafted a technically accomplished album with plenty of advanced ideas.

Another great album, the debut of the band Doves - "Lost Souls" brilliant!!

Haven't heard that one but their album "The Last Broadcast" has prog elements, even a bit of King Crimson's Moonchild.

Another great album Chopper, my two favs by doves, but i prefer their debut, if you can check it out!

I can recommend Julee Cruise (especially her albums 'Floating into the Night' and 'The Voice of Love'), Melody's Echo Chamber (a project of Melody Prochet), Say Lou Lou, and Lykke Li. 

Also check out the 4AD label projects , in particular This Mortal Coil, and Cocteau Twins .

I recently started going through the top 5000 albums on the rate your music site(the all time list) and writing down the ones that I have heard of or that I haven't heard of but look interesting to me(based on genre and description)and the Divine Comedy were one that  popped up(I don't remember what number or which album(s) though). The Doves might have popped up too I'm not sure. 

I´m also a RYM user, as far for the divine Comedy, they have two excellent  albums with very high scores "Fin De Siecle" and "Absent friends", i recommend both albums, pure baroque pop!

I'm not actually a rater on there but I do use the site a lot to check out ratings. I also use allmusic sometimes. I wonder how many younger music fans discovered close to the edge because of rym or prog in general. Anyway, I will keep those divine comedy albums in mind. Baroque pop seems like an interesting genre to me. 

The Nightfly

My fav album by Donald Fagen!

I'm loving the title track to the second Painted Word album "Universal"

Seems their albums are rather hard to track down, with only scattered songs on YouTube. 

I’d like to mention the album Victims by Gizmo, an obscurity from 1981. It doesn’t precisely fit what’s been outlined in this thread, but it’s somewhat more synth-heavy and pop-oriented than your typical prog.

you can post the link though for full length albums from youtube. 

I said post the link not the video 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4Xnjh1acwQ&t=1s" rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4Xnjh1acwQ&t=1s

Many have been mentioned already but for me the artists I most respected in the 80's that were NOT prog or metal

Tears For Fears

OMD (Maid Of Orleans has a tron!)

China Crisis

Simple Minds (borderline prog band and well known to be fans of Genesis)

Propaganda (a lot of prog musicians were involved in A Secret Wish so its virtually prog anyway!)

Big Country (maybe too 'rock' for this thread?!)

XTC

Siouxsie and The Banshees (check out Israel and Peep Show)

The Stranglers

Jon and Vangelis (The Friends of Mr Cairo surely fits the bill?!)

Ultravox (Vienna is the absolute bees knees for sophisti-pop) 

I love this song (but the rest of the album, isn't very good)

I'm not sure if I know the exact definition of pop, but normally it is short of popular music, and rock counts as popular music too, no?

Pop can be sophisticated in different ways: composition, vocal subtlety, production subtlety, lyrics etc.  If we count Tv-2 as pop, they were clearly sophisticated, especially in terms of lyrics.