Prog Rock

Don't know anything about Frank Ocean, is it proggy?

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Monday, 12 June 2017 19:23

seems like the Zappa milieu is more or less the american rendition of prog… virtuosity, allegedly elevating dumb teenage twaddle into real music…only impediment is that he reveled in conveying his sneering jerk persona, which I don't think comported with the high-minded english prog ideal…

― veronica moser, Monday, 12 June 2017 20:52

Thought you were describing Frank Ocean for a minute there

"Don't know anything about Frank Ocean, is it proggy?

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Monday, 12 June 2017 19:23"

no. he can be weird but just being weird doesn't mean proggy.

I remember lamenting on some prog forum about the lack of good American prog from that peak era and they mentioned the Muffins, whom I hadn't heard of. I checked them out and was pleasantly surprised.

Might have been a lack in the 70s but surely there's loads of great American prog bands by now.

Echolyn, Glass Hammer, and IZZ come to mind

there's a fuckload of metal that's prog if you don't mind stuff getting harder & more aggro than normal prog

Battles and Deluge Grander were first American bands to my mind.

I think that article maybe should have spelled it out that prog found a nice refuge and place to grow within metal.

Agree with JCLC there, but outside of metal (and even within) the problem with most nowadays prog is that it sounds more inspired by neo-prog than the 70s stuff or anything with a bit of genuine experimentation or adventure to it. Even a lot of avant-prog could have easily been released at any point in the last 40 years.

I don't have a point btw I'm just grumbling

You could also argue that prog found some relevance in the 90s again through math/post-rock I think, I've never seen any prog documentary/article that acknowledges this.

phish are prog and they're one of the biggest bands in the US

The math rock connection is easier to make but did any post-rock bands namedrop much prog aside from Pink Floyd and some krautrock?

80's crimson

xp I think that still counts, though afaict math/post bands are mostly reluctant to admit any influence from prog, though Krautrock seems to have always had more indie cred than Yes et al

the first album by Todd Rundgren's Utopia is prog, I guess he was an anglophile though

regarding the lack in the 70s -- reposting this from just upthread because there is cool shit in ashratom's rundown that deserves to be heard

http://rateyourmusic.com/list/ashratom/usa_midwest___ontario_progressive_rock__1970s_early_80s_/

reluctant to admit any influence from prog, though Krautrock seems to have always had more indie cred than Yes et al

― ultros ultros-ghali, Monday, 12 June 2017 23:45

I'm curious if this is a fear of music journalists? Something more? I find it really weird that apparently lots of bands are embarrassed to admit their influences. Wouldn't journalists be likely to omit mention of bands that were too uncool to their readers?

Subhumans said there was lots of prog bands they would never admit to liking but I don't know if that was to their friends or to journalists and fans.

way too many people are frightened of coming out of the prog rock closet and it's really kind of sad

Well they were talking about back in the early 80s

no. he can be weird but just being weird doesn't mean proggy.

Hallelujah. Zappa is surely prog. And Utopia until they started getting poppy.

As usual, everyone pretending VDGG didn't exist

― imago

pretending VDGG _don't_ exist

seems like the Zappa milieu is more or less the american rendition of prog… virtuosity, allegedly elevating dumb teenage twaddle into real music…only impediment is that he reveled in conveying his sneering jerk persona, which I don't think comported with the high-minded english prog ideal…

― veronica moser, Monday, 12 June 2017 20:52

Thought you were describing Frank Ocean for a minute there

― Robert Adam Gilmour

new username time

prog is so entertaining and satisfying to listen to and expensive to record that critics and record companies needed to intervene to restore the extremely profitable commercial 3 - 4 minute pop song model. that's really what the supposed punk rock revolution was all about

phish are prog and they're one of the biggest bands in the US

Phish are "jam" rather than "prog," not that there isn't some overlap. But prog geeks mostly hate jam bands as far as I can tell, definitely the Rush fans in my high school had no use for the Dead. There's a cultural divide as much as a musical one.

"jam" is often a euphemism for prog imho. i'm not saying there's no stylistic distinction between government mule and radiohead but there is major overlap between the two modes. the dead's "terrapin station" is one of the great american prog epics of the 1970s, i'd say, up there with "marquee moon" and "come sail away"

a recent phish prog jam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzHWdxKddK4

cheer accident isn't really sneering like zappa

they are deeply weird and singular imo

as good as many of the greats

i'd argue for post touch & go math rock like don cab, even farther out mars volta (though they sort of split the difference between that tribe and post patton stuff)

there's matadorable prog too like

http://store.matadorrecords.com/pig-lib

IMO it's hard to be considered a "prog" band these days unless you're specifically playing a retro prog style, like symphonic prog, RIO, etc. Original prog bands were progressive compared to rock and roll, and since rock music being "artistic" was a relatively new thing, that meant (for a decade or so) you could try all manner of things and be considered progressive. Once the 80s hit, you either had to recycle the original bands' styles, incorporate new wave/punk, or go so far down the experimental rabbit hole, a lot of the original prog fans wouldn't have even considered you prog at all.

Now, there's nothing (musically) to react against, really. You can be as experimental as you want -- "progressive" refers (once again) more to politics than music. Even if you had the same spirit of adventurousness, experimentation, artistry (or whatever you want to call it) as King Crimson or Henry Cow or the original krautrock bands, there's no telling, stylistically, how that might manifest itself in your music. Likewise, you can play music that's ridiculously complex, and want nothing to do with "prog", or take no conscious musical influence from it.

still kinda interesting how touchy a subject it is but seems to me it's like how you develop an ear for jazz and know it when you hear it and who cares if not all jazz is awesome. lester bangs may have found keith emerson or whoever pretentious and rick wakeman wore a cape but that doesn't mean the latest mastodon album doesn't rule

Lester Bangs did like Magma and Tangerine Dream, I think.

Magma and The Boredoms aren't English-language so they get ignored in all these bloviating retrospectives as well

it is weird, reggie. There are some genres, like death metal for example, where it's not necessarily a band thing to say "we play a proggy kind of _______" or something, or admit to being influenced by prog bands. But anywhere that remotely valules being "hip"-- prog still has this aura of nerdiness, of being the definition of stuff that isn't cool, or something you can just put on when people come over to your house.

*valules - drugs to take when discussing metrics

It's weird, the Unthanks were practically walking on eggshells when they were explaining it's okay to like prog.

Metal is weird in that all sorts of uncoolness is accepted but then there's all these other things that are on shaky ground.

Trying to imagine the album art that would most outrage a prog-phobe in the 70s and 80s. Hand him some Fuzzy Duck, Starcastle and Matching Mole albums and the first Gentle Giant album, ELP's Tarkus and Gong's Flying Teapot.

"from the sun to the world (boogie no. 1)" by ELO can boost a party depending on timing

I find it really weird that apparently lots of bands are embarrassed to admit their influences.

I remember an old Flaming Lips interview where they talked about coming out to each other as secret Yes fans.

Have to admit I used to get a particularly amazing thrill when I considered some music embarrassing but was crossing over into loving it. I don't know if that feeling is possible anymore but it's probably for the best that I don't really get embarrassed by listening to anything now (as far as I can tell).

yeah that interview was in magnet and pretty hilarious. they were touring clouds taste metallic and confessed to each other in the van they'd been listening to yes before heading out. wayne says iirc that bizarre epiphany and talking about it inspired the soft bulletin (the mollusk-level for me in the '90s prog wars)

xpost

which is kinda funny because I remember an interview with Dean Ween where he said the same thing re: not wanting to admit you really dug Yes

When was Dean talking about? I can't imagine Ween as adults being embarrassed by liking anything.

the game was different before deaner and wayne etc scored with "push the little daisies" and "she don't use jelly". those two bands going major label seemed to loosen other people up to confessing what they like sometimes not just talking up what they think is cool (not that there isn't overlap!)

it was on his old website which appears to be down now. I can't remember exactly what it was but it was something like, "these are the records I would whip out when all the girls went away"

Now, there's nothing (musically) to react against, really. You can be as experimental as you want

― Dominique, Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Is this true, though? The difference, to my mind, is that nowadays experimentalism is automatically met with indifference rather than scorn or outrage. The mainstream still very much exists and in some ways is more dominant than ever.

dean's about a million and change bros' surrogate awesome older brother. but mary timony recorded queen-like prog as killer as ween, at least on the magic city. if there were any justice in this fallen country, besides trump not being president, critics would feel free to bring up happy the man in tortoise reviews and not as a zing. van der graaf generator's impact on the italian prog scene, a la the velvet underground on the new york dolls and such, would be more familiar, too. alas

xpost

xp
Depends on who's looking I guess -- you can totally ignore the mainstream if you want.

Agree about indifference (in a general sense), but it's because you can choose to pay attention to whatever you want. There are still "scenes", but it's no longer making a statement, or presenting a real alternative to the mainstream just making weird rock music. UNLESS you find a way to do it that generates clicks, press, money, etc. And in that sense, the style of music is a lot less relevant than the thing (whatever it is) that makes you stand out from the crowd for that brief moment in time.

all of this is me leading up to my argument that Kanye, the Kardashians and Trump are our finest prog artists

GTR > KKT

Depends on who's looking I guess -- you can totally ignore the mainstream if you want.

Agree about indifference (in a general sense), but it's because you can choose to pay attention to whatever you want. There are still "scenes", but it's no longer making a statement, or presenting a real alternative to the mainstream just making weird rock music. UNLESS you find a way to do it that generates clicks, press, money, etc. And in that sense, the style of music is a lot less relevant than the thing (whatever it is) that makes you stand out from the crowd for that brief moment in time.

― Dominique, Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Agreed, re: the 'thing' that distinguishes you from the pack and that is systematically something other than the music itself, assumed to be mere form rather than content (assuming that distinction still makes sense). Politics in particular is routinely presumed to determine aesthetics altogether (which I'd argue is problematic even from a strictly political point of view).

As far as choice goes, it's a quasi utopian situation for ILMers and the like, but it paradoxically creates a closed loop for busier and/or less curious listeners who may otherwise have had their minds blown by an utterly unexpected musical experience. It's easier than ever to make a beeline for whatever genre you're primarily interested in and stick to it from here to eternity.

This is all anecdotal, of course, but since I don't know anyone who cares about music the way most people on this forum do, I tend to assume that it's the norm. Anyhow, my sense is that the gap between melomaniacs and non-melomaniacs is wider than ever.

But anywhere that remotely valules being "hip"-- prog still has this aura of nerdiness, of being the definition of stuff that isn't cool, or something you can just put on when people come over to your house.

Heh, the only person I know who self-identifies as a 'hipster' has sung along to The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway with me while driving around Montreal.

IMO it's hard to be considered a "prog" band these days unless you're specifically playing a retro prog style, like symphonic prog, RIO, etc. Original prog bands were progressive compared to rock and roll, and since rock music being "artistic" was a relatively new thing, that meant (for a decade or so) you could try all manner of things and be considered progressive. Once the 80s hit, you either had to recycle the original bands' styles, incorporate new wave/punk, or go so far down the experimental rabbit hole, a lot of the original prog fans wouldn't have even considered you prog at all.

― Dominique

"prog" as a movement was a collection of non-unique signifiers that congealed. someone makes a disco record today and it's instantly recognizable, because nothing had ever sounded like that before, because it had a BEAT. particularly with "big tent" prog it's hard to name an immediately identifiable _sound_ that isn't specifically and detrimentally beholden to the 1970s ("oh, a mellotron!"), which further serves to rubbish any vanguardist claims the genre may once have made (also to disco's benefit: it was not first and foremost a vanguardist genre).