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| Re: I put all the prog rock I have into a special Prog Rock folder... by William H. Hayt, Jr. 09/10/2004, 9:04pm PDT | ||||
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| Progressive rock is... a large and pretty beast. Here's a list of artists who I listen to on a regular basis and some brief descriptions:
King Crimson - The maker and reigning king (through the 70s) or prog rock. Complex, varied. Excellent. Best albums: Red (for rocking out and Larks Tongue in Aspic (for the inventiveness). Can - Kraut rock, if that means anything to you. Their best albums: Tago Mago, Future Days and Ege Bamyasi are highly experimental, when not hypnotic and driving. I personally lump them as one of the most original bands of the seventies. Egg - Psychadelic prog. See forefather: Azrachel as well. Emerson, Lake & Palmer - The only prog that broke into the mainstream. See Tarkus for the most thematic prog of all. Gentle Giant - Progressive rock made by bards from the 17th century. Ghost - Japanese progressive rock with their best album, Hypnotic Underworld, released this year. Gong - This is sort of hard to describe. Go consult AMG. Neu! - More Kraut rock, along with Faust. Good stuff. Rovo - Japanese guys from this decade. Mixing prog rock with electronics, tastefully. Soft Machine - Started out as prog rock, turned after a number of albums into jazz fusion. Van Der Graaf Generator - Nothing special but good. And for the international lover inside of you, some good Italian rock bands, prog and otherwise, from the seventies: Area, Balleto di Bronzo (aka the Led Zeppelin of Italy), Banco del Mutuo Sccoroso, Museo Rosenblach, PFM, Semiramis. And now a brief essay in defense of prog rock. Like you said, it can be some boring nerdy stuff, but that's only the derivative stuff. The true core of prog rock innovators were men and women who wanted to get rid of the Beatles/Cream rock formula: RIFFRIFFCHORUSRIFFRIFFCHORUSSOLORIFF. Jazz was consulted. Some, like Henry Cow, abused the spirit of free jazz and made what I consider feces, and were hailed as brilliant. Others, like King Crimson, innovated for a whole decade, changing players continually. It's a great genre, but you have to be careful. These days, terms such as "post prog" and "prog metal" float around like big fluffy clouds. But be careful. Those clouds are full of urine. The days of good innovative prog rock are largely over, with the exception of some Japanese bands that are doing some real interesting stuff, if you're open minded enough. |
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I put all the prog rock I have into a special Prog Rock folder... by 09/10/2004, 7:58pm PDT  Does Zappa qualify? If so, him. NT by 09/10/2004, 8:24pm PDT Re: I put all the prog rock I have into a special Prog Rock folder... by 09/10/2004, 9:04pm PDT Re: I put all the prog rock I have into a special Prog Rock folder... by 09/12/2004, 8:55am PDT Opeth (prog-ish) NT by 09/11/2004, 2:42am PDT Firaxis was founded on prog rock by 09/22/2004, 1:51pm PDT |
