Prog V3.0 Discussion Thread

I think it's kind of set up that way - I don't have an issue with the last two tracks ("The Solitude of Miranda" is especially good) but they do feel like bonus tracks in a way.

The Form of the Good is pretty great though it's maybe tougher to get into. It's entirely instrumental (outside of some faint backing vocals) and really dense at times. "The Tree Factory" is pretty cool, kinda Zeuhl-ish, though it goes through a number of cool movements (one definitely sounds Zappa-inspired). The key track is the 20-minute "Aggrandizement" which is totally insane - not like any prog epic I've ever heard, it's just one steadily rising instrumental part that keeps piling on and on and on. It's the sort of thing you have to listen to at ear-bleeding volume.

The last two tracks really dampened my enthusiasm for the album.

The Mercury Tree are pretty good - new album is kind of lovely. They're like a weirded-out occasionally-microtonal Yank take on Thumpermonkey. Discovered by snooping on ultros' RYM profile, which I'm sure is acceptable behaviour

Hey stay out of my stuff, you

Glad you liked it anyway, I probably should have brought it up here but I forget these things. Here it is if anyone else is interested:

https://themercurytree.bandcamp.com/album/permutations

The Quietus and ultros' rym page are p much the only two music sites I read in 2016 (apart from the obvious, of course)

new Deluge Grander is up and running. headfirst I go!

Cool.

I'm going to listen to this only cuz one of them pm'd me and I said I would... the samples seemed decent enough.

Also this may be of interest, it's modern chamber music that's barely prog but it kind of sounds like Univers Zero and it's on AltRock Productions. And it's really quite good.

https://altrockproductions.bandcamp.com/album/night-en-face

it's...........ok. like, there are good moments. i'll definitely listen to it again. really though (and i know frogbs will come in and yell at me for thinking this) the whole Deluge Grander project existed to make the first track on their first album, and everything since hasn't quite matched that half-hour slab of brilliance

will listen to this though thanks!

me and my 50 socks all FP'd you for this, see you in a month asshole

i guess 'aggrandizement' is quite good as well. they should just release albums with two 20+ minute tracks on them

seriously though I can understand that. I think DG's music has gotten more difficult on each album, like it's kind of steered from a fairly recognizable Zeuhl-prog hybrid to something more resembling classical music. that 20-minute track on Form of the Good still sounds like nothing I've heard, it's like he took the massive instrumental finale of a traditional suite and made that the epic. pretty cool. Heliotains completely passed me by the first couple times I listened to it - could not remember a single thing about it until I really sat down and concentrated, after which I realized it's as brilliant as the others, just harder to grasp. I've only heard some samples from the new one (it's not on Bandcamp yet) but it feels like it's kind of the same.

Been listening to the Birds And Buildings debut, it's good but it really does just sound like Deluge Grander, I know it only has two members from DG but I think maybe they'd be better off just keeping the DG name and changing the members when they want to be the "other band".

Cheer-Accident/Polvo vibes + Bob Drake cameo

https://starperiodstar.bandcamp.com/album/daylight-spending-time

cool!

cheer-accident themselves have a new one soon, featuring a couple of former gorilla museum employees (among others)

this sounds p cool though!

whoa the Star Period Star is really good

:D

And I didn't know Cheer-Accident had a new one, that's really exciting! I never liked SGM unfortunately but the bandcamp blurb has got me seriously hyped

Actually you knwo what

I actually like the Birds And Buildings debut better overall than the Deluge Grander debut. There seems to be a couple of parts from the first track repeated in later tracks but I wasn't sure.

i need to listen to B&B again but my impression was that it was interesting and varied

The last track has clip of Kenneth Clark's Civilization documentary series! I get a feeling that this guy's music is a lot about upheavals throughout history but sometimes the lyrics are hard to grasp.

"Chakra Khan" sounds like a username here.

glad star period star have a new one, good to know bob drake's involved. liked them a lot but it was hard to find any info about them on the internet for a very long time.

ni combined with another band i haven't heard of called poil and they put out this record. it's pretty proggy.

https://piniol.bandcamp.com/album/bran-coucou

SPS are obscure even by avant-prog standards, I was surprised to learn that they'd been going since the mid-90s.

Piniol looks interesting, added that to my to do list

yea that first B&B album is an all-timer. the second album is a bit less accessible but it's just as good. lotta curveballs in that one.

still digesting Oceanarium, it's just so damn thick and difficult to parse if you aren't giving full attention. but it's sounding better every time I hear it.

Piniol album very nice.

koenjihyakkei has a new one coming out next month, i know they've been working on it for a while - i have an earlier digest video from jan 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9L358RmKgN0

oh fuck yeah

New The Mercury Program someone just alerted me to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9ScTcdo1CA

Microtonal tunings!

The Mercury Tree I mean, oops

White Willow anyone? Online store samples of the albums don't sound that interesting.

This track is great but it's more akin to Tim Bowness solo than White Willow:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHohhvLLb8o

There's a new Regal Worm coming soon, the lead track is lovely.

https://regalworm.bandcamp.com/album/pig-views

Miasma And The Carousel Of Headless Horses - Manfauna

Coolest band name ever, music is nice enough but I never got deep enough into it. Sounds like Guapo and there are two members from that band. Cant believe how old this release is, it seemed like only a few years ago this band was getting hyped and they only put out two things. I might try Perils sometime but I'm a little disappointed.

Guapo released so much more than I knew.

Early Guapo was/is fantastic, especially live, like a British Ground Zero, ex-member posts here on the reg too.

Only one I got was Five Suns. The second track was totally incredible but other otherwise couldn't get into it.

behold

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3SS27wGjq0

I heard English Electric Part 1 when it came out and was appaled at the brass balls nerve they had, lifting big chunks of Genesis songs and tweaking them slightly while the vocalist sings a Wikipedia page over the top, then it grew on me and I really started to like it.

i sorta felt the same way about the second Feelies album and the Velvet Underground (and Pavement and the Fall (and Interpol and Joy Division)) but i got over that. for sure there's a major cheesiness to some Big Big Train songs which can be a huge turnoff but when they're on they do legit neo-Genesis better than Elbow does

This new Regal Worm record sounds pretty great on first listen.

https://regalworm.bandcamp.com/

ex-member posts here on the reg too.

― MaresNest, Friday, 27 July 2018 19:29 (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

;)

Oh, do you think I'm referring to myself LJ? Goodness no! I fucking WISH I was in Guapo circa 2000.

"I really quite liked the Big Big Train record from a couple of years back, but I was totally amazed at the very blatant, wholesale lifting of certain very well known themes by Genesis and nobody in the press or on the net called it, which I thought was weird/interesting."

I can't get into a single thing this band has done. like flower kings before them. it just sounds generic and dull to me.

also their name is dumb

I tried to get into Big Big Train a while back but the albums I got were their earlier ones before they'd really gotten hyped up. What's a good starting point, or should I just not bother?

Flower Kings are another group I tried to get into...I mean, they sounded like a dream come true, with double-disc albums every year, tons of epics, and a bunch of musicians whose names I recognized even without knowing the band. And then I heard 'em, and...yeah. I actually think they do okay when they go more pop, but when it comes to the proggier stuff they write themselves into corners over and over again. And that voice! Christ. I had one called "Stardust We Are" that was kinda nice. It's 2 hours long.

for me all of these bands fall down when the compositions aren't interesting enough. Porcupine Tree was great because Wilson is an excellent songwriter. It's not enough to follow prog templates if you can't write an interesting melody or aren't doing something really interesting and experimental.

What's a good starting point

my favorite three are grimspound, folklore, and the second brightest star. all way better than anything i've heard by flower kings (even roine's album with jon anderson), on par with vintage kaipa

yea that's the long and short of it. FKs definitely have a few memorable tunes but they usually tend to be the more novelty-oriented stuff that draws from "Harold the Barrel" or "Benny the Bouncer". BBT on the other hand, I listened to the one album I've got nearly a dozen times and I remember like, two small vocal melodies. it was Gathering Speed, dunno how representative that is of their other work. I assume they got better.