100 Cases of evidence that punk didn't quite manage to kill prog in the long run

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

1. Marillion
2. Arena
3. Pendragon
4. Queensryche
5. Dream Theater
6. Spock's Beard
7. The Mars Volta
8. Orbital
9. Leftfield
10. Goldie
11. Underworld
12. Radiohead
13. Gorky's Zygotic Mynci
14. Spiritualized
15. Talk Talk
16. The Polyphonic Spree
17. Flaming Lips
18. Guillemots

― Geir Hongro, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:18 (nineteen years ago)

where to begin geir? where to begin?

― M@tt He1ges0n, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:19 (nineteen years ago)

That's only 18.

― Dom Passantino, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:19 (nineteen years ago)

true punk didn't set out to kill prog, it set out to coexist with all previous forms of music. if it had chosen to kill, however, dream theater ought to have been first on its list.

― unfished business, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:19 (nineteen years ago)

flaming lips are more punk than prog anyway. witness the title of their early compilation.

― unfished business, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:21 (nineteen years ago)

flaming lips are more punk than prog anyway

Used to be.....
Case in point: "Pompeii an Götterdämmerung"

Btw.

19. Muse

― Geir Hongro, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:23 (nineteen years ago)

Van der Graaf Generator had a surprising amount in common with the more interesting members of the subsequent punk and post-punk generations. Punk's rejection of musicianship, artistry, and complexity might have appeared diametrically opposed to VdGG's core characteristics, which were the very things the class of '76 supposedly sought to purge. However, something in their aesthetic definitely resonated with figures like Mark E. Smith, Howard Devoto, John Lydon, and Nick Cave, all of whom have expressed admiration for the band. Most famously, during a July 1977 Capitol Radio show, Lydon treated listeners to some of his favorite tunes: alongside surprising inclusions like Captain Beefheart and Tim Buckley, Lydon included a track from Peter Hammill's 1975 solo album Nadir's Big Chance, recorded with Banton, Jackson and Evans.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:25 (nineteen years ago)

Well, several punks liked Can, Roxy Music, Neu! and Kraftwerk too.

― Geir Hongro, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:26 (nineteen years ago)

Known most for his early membership in the Clash and also for his slicing, slashing guitar work with Public Image Limited, Keith Levene is one of the more overlooked key players of punk and post-punk, not only as an innovative guitar player but also as a major factor in punk's sound collision with reggae. Since leaving PiL during the making of their fourth record, Levene has worked sporadically, popping up every now and then with a new project.

Bizarrely enough, the punk pioneer got his start in music as a roadie for Yes in the early '70s. Through a former schoolmate, Levene weaseled his way into helping Alan White -- the drummer of his favorite band -- with the cymbals and snares while touring.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:26 (nineteen years ago)

Spiritualized?

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:27 (nineteen years ago)

Tiësto.

― blunt, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:29 (nineteen years ago)

Geir, most of that list is either not 'prog' on any traditional gauge (wtf 'underworld', 'spiritualized', 'orbital', 'leftfield'), or is inconsequential, reactionary bullshit (most of the rest). I refer you to DJ Martian's highlighted post on the other recently bumped prog thread for my thoughts on the issue of 'prog'.

― unfished business, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:30 (nineteen years ago)

Well, several punks liked Can, Roxy Music, Neu! and Kraftwerk too.

Geir Hongro on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 5:26 PM (3 minutes ago)

so then what was your point? that prog didn't die? no shit! no music scenes ever really "die", they just change or take a nap for awhile....

― M@tt He1ges0n, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:31 (nineteen years ago)

the point is that geir likes beating dead horses (punk, rap isn't music, etc.)

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 22:40 (nineteen years ago)

"reactionary"!

― bidfurd, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 23:00 (nineteen years ago)

19. http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=41&threadid=52857

― bendy, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 01:30 (nineteen years ago)

20. Yanni

― Curt1s Stephens, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 01:57 (nineteen years ago)

The premise of this thread, however true it may have turned out to be, is the hoariest of ILM memes: it's right up there with metal is the nu-country or country is the nu-metal or pop is the nu-punk.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 02:05 (nineteen years ago)

Punk rock tried to kill the metal
But they failed as they were smited to the ground

New wave tried to kill the metal
But they failed as they were stricken down to the ground

Grunge tried to kill the metal
Hahahahaha they failed as they were thrown to the ground

(Screaming) Aiieee Aiieee

(Harmonizing)
No one can destroy the metal
The metal will strike you down with a vicious blow
We are the vanquished foes of the metal
We tried to win for why we do not know

New wave tried to destroy the metal
But the metal had its way
Grunge then tried to dethrone the metal
But the metal was in the way
Punk rock tried to destroy the metal
But the metal was in the way
Punk rock tried to destroy the metal
But metal was much too strong
Techno tried to defile the metal
But techno was proven wrong
Yeah!

Metal!
It comes from hell

― latebloomer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 02:19 (nineteen years ago)

if that's a real song i'd really like to know who it's by.

― Emily Bjurnhjam, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 03:41 (nineteen years ago)

wasn't that a Jack Black song from SNL?

― dan selzer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 03:50 (nineteen years ago)

I've mentioned this before, but classic hard rock and prog was music I grew up with (in the late 80s and early 90s), hearing it on the radio, from my cousins, guitar teachers, etc. I didn't even ever really hear that much punk rock (aside from bits and pieces on MuchMusic) until I actively sought it out later on. AFAICT, classic prog bands are still playing stadiums and getting airplay so the idea that Pink Floyd or Rush were somehow killed off in the long run by (Who? Siouxside and the Banshees? Wire?) seems so blatantly wrong as to not even be worth disproving. If anyone says that punk killed off prog, do they just mean in the short term? Maybe things are different in Europe?

― Sundar, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 04:26 (nineteen years ago)

Emily B: Tenacious D

― marmotwolof, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 04:40 (nineteen years ago)

AFAICT, classic prog bands are still playing stadiums and getting airplay

But most of the original prog band changed their style from prog into AOR sometime during the late 70s. And they didn't change back until the very late 80s or early 90s.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 08:25 (nineteen years ago)

Spock's Beard?

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 08:44 (nineteen years ago)

20. Public Image Ltd

― m coleman, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 11:01 (nineteen years ago)

21. Band of Holy Joy

― Mark G, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 11:03 (nineteen years ago)

Nobody said, punk killed prog. Just before '77 the biggest bands on Earth were prog bands, after that, well, not quite: Genesis became a simple pop band, Yes, Jethro Tull slowly disappeared from the Top 10, some of the prog bands started to play less prog and more rock/pop music.

― zeus, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 11:37 (nineteen years ago)

i don't think there's anything wrong with the premise of this thread, which i read as "evidence that, despite conventional wisdom, prog did not die out in the '70s."

― s1ocki, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 12:01 (nineteen years ago)

Think prog rock died after the 70s? Think again.

― djmartian, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 12:22 (nineteen years ago)

re: tenacious d

ha! of course.

― Emily Bjurnhjam, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 12:24 (nineteen years ago)

Nobody said, punk killed prog.

???

It's been a meme of british music media discourse since about 1978! I mean as a proposition, obviously it's bullshit, but it is very much still the received wisdom "out there".

Geir, most of the bands you list are goddamn awful!

― Pashmina, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 12:29 (nineteen years ago)

there's definitely an indie-prog sensibility going on these days, big complicated elaborate song cycles with a running theme etc. sort of following "the soft bulletin" and "aeroplane over the sea."

― gff, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:30 (nineteen years ago)

This is the worst thread I have ever seen on this board.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:44 (nineteen years ago)

GFF OTM, and you get a similar fondness for intellectual ambition (pretention?), musical complexity, and big statement-making in suddenly-hip art metal. Mastodon, Isis, etc. This kind of thing seems to have been absent from hipster pop/rock for a loooong time, and it does seem somewhat reasonable to "blame punk" ... or at least the reactionary narrowness of punk aesthetics.

I like it. It's as though people feel free to geek out again -- to play with the idea of what albums and even music can potentially be. Unself-consciousness about self-consciousness. Something like that.

― Pye Poudre, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:50 (nineteen years ago)

But most of the original prog band changed their style from prog into AOR sometime during the late 70s.

Right, I suppose The Wall is somewhat less proggy than Dark Side of the Moon (even though it's still a 2-disc concept album) but, even so, in what way was this trend really punk's doing? I wasn't there but it would seem more intuitive for me to think that prog bands going AOR had more to do with the massive popularity of AOR than with Steve Howe feeling challenged by The Slits or something. (I like all the punk bands I'm referencing FWIW.) If anything, I can see more of a disco influence than a punk influence on some tracks on The Wall, as well as on some Yes and Genesis things. I can definitely see an influence of new wave on what prog bands did in the 80s (since most of the original punk bands broke up or changed their style to new wave some time in the late 70s and early 80s.) And Rush was still doing some of their proggiest music in the late 70s. In any case, the older proggier albums by the major prog bands were still selling after punk.

I guess I'm not totally clear on what the proposition is even supposed to mean. Does it mean "Almost no one's listened to 'Bohemian Rhapsody' or Dark Side of the Moon since 1977 (because we're all listening to the Sex Pistols or Gang of Four?)" If so, it seems obviously false. Or does it just mean that no one's really been making new mainstream music in a prog style since the late 70s? This makes a little more sense (although I'm still not sure how much of this is because of punk.) But, really, pop styles change all the time. Hardly anyone was making mainstream psychedelic guitar pop records in the late Beatles' style after the 60s. Hardly anyone makes records like Pet Sounds or Electric Ladyland in the mainstream. No one makes records that sound like Elvis. But you rarely hear anyone saying that these have been killed off.

mark s once wrote something about how important punk was in terms of the career opportunities for pop journalists in the UK at the time. I sometimes wonder if this is why a movement that (until Green Day) lasted for two or three years as a mainstream phenomenon and produced none of the 100 best-selling albums of all time and maybe a handful of big singles has taken on so much importance in writings on the history of popular music.

― Sundar, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:17 (nineteen years ago)

LOL I read that whole opening list like "You know how I know you're gay? Because you have a [INSERT BAND] poster".

― nickalicious, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:27 (nineteen years ago)

(Of course, I don't mean that people shouldn't write or care about things that aren't that popular. I'd be in trouble if they didn't. It just seems strange that someone would grant this kind of importance to something like punk rock that they could claim something like it killed off very popular forms of 70s rock that clearly continued to have an audience afterwards.)

― Sundar, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:29 (nineteen years ago)

xpost obv

― Sundar, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:29 (nineteen years ago)

Wow, that was an awkward sentence.

― Sundar, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:36 (nineteen years ago)

there's definitely an indie-prog sensibility going on these days, big complicated elaborate song cycles with a running theme etc. sort of following "the soft bulletin" and "aeroplane over the sea."

gff on Wednesday, 21 March 2007 14:30 (1 hour ago)

plus, indie punk, touch & go type shit has been on some prog chops shit since forever...Don Cabellero, Dennison Kimball, Polvo, A Minor Forest, etc etc....

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 15:37 (nineteen years ago)

yes!

it's funny, after reading ilm for years now i sort of forgot that the "punk killed prog" meme WAS a meme that people believed! considering the VH1-ization of popular understanding of pop/rock history (all this stuff kind of happened! some of it was funny and lame! but it all rocked! in its own way! hooray!) i really do think that the whole IDEA of inter-generational/inter-genre combat as the motor of music history is kind of dead.

+ there was another mark s insight that punk and prog were more like squabbling nerd cousins anyway, the older one trying to be smart, the other trying to be cool.

― gff, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:06 (nineteen years ago)

It's not right to say that prog was killed. What has died is the usefulness of the prog-punk dichotomy, if we're thinking about indie rock from this decade and the last. Don Caballero is a great example, but there are so many others: Oneida, Unwound (on the last album), Mercury Rev... and even more mainstream bands like Built to Spill and Flaming Lips.

― professor ganson, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:10 (nineteen years ago)

Right, I suppose The Wall is somewhat less proggy than Dark Side of the Moon (even though it's still a 2-disc concept album) but, even so, in what way was this trend really punk's doing?

Pink Floyd were never fully prog anyway. OK, so they came close on "Animals", and on "Echoes" and "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", but the rest of their work consisted mostly of single 4-5 minute songs. Even though they were often linked together in a concept (and just because "Hotel California" was a concept album doesn't make it prog).

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 21:55 (nineteen years ago)

Back to the original point that states punk didn't kill prog, I'd argue that at least the top six

1. Marillion
2. Arena
3. Pendragon
4. Queensryche
5. Dream Theater
6. Spock's Beard

prove it did kill it. These bands have all the artifice of the 70s prog but it all sounds rather staid and sensible in a way that a 14 minute song in 13/9 time has no right to be, there is no... no eccentricity there, no preposterousness and that was an essential part of prog's life.

― Sandy Blair, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 22:16 (nineteen years ago)

I agree with you in the case of some of them, but not others. Marillion are great in their own way and have also managed to develop their own style without getting rid of their 70s prog roots. Spock's Beard I feel are good at copying the 70s style wholeheartedly. All of them suffer from the use of instruments that just don't sound right though. For instance, PCM synths and FM synths belong nowhere in prog!

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 22:28 (nineteen years ago)

prog without the monstrosity, to quote my own review of Pure Reason Revolution's going-through-the-motions debut LP.

― unfished business, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 22:34 (nineteen years ago)

re: media narrative of punk vs. prog-- The simplemindedness here is that not only is punk supposed to have killed prog, but that killing prog was supposedly the REASON punk came into being. Submit Rotten's "I Hate Pink Floyd" t-shirt as evidence A. I've also heard that punk was a reaction to disco or soft rock. This line of thinking continued, giving us the theory that all grunge bands picked up their instruments with the objective of knocking Winger out of top ten. I'd like to think there were other instigations for punk than dislike for existing music--though that dislike certainly became part of the punk pose.

― mulla atari, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 22:43 (nineteen years ago)

In the same way that a vocal atheist in the west will have to spend a lot of time decrying Christianity and less time contradicting much less popular religions, punks main mouth pieces had to attack the overwhelming critical orthodoxy.

However, sInce it was such a bandwagon, pretty much everyone with a grudge clambered on and used the punk rollercoaster to state their dislike of things: bondage, disco synthesisers or even days of the week, but the main and initial thrust was bland rock, and the common reason stated was that it was distant from its audience.

― Sandy Blair, Thursday, 22 March 2007 08:27 (nineteen years ago)

... or at least the reactionary narrowness of punk aesthetics

... and Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, Wire, Gang of Four, The Fall, Scritti Politti etc didn't happen, did they?

― Tom D., Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:12 (nineteen years ago)

Musical movements never die (or get killed), they just become redundant!

― Mark G, Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:19 (nineteen years ago)

At the start, it did seem like prog was dead. Although it was probably killed by AOR rather than punk. Most ex-prog acts played AOR by the early 1980s.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:53 (nineteen years ago)

You kinda live by the maxim that if you say something often enough it'll become true, eh Geir?

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 22 March 2007 10:55 (nineteen years ago)

Well, it is. Yes played AOR from "Owner Of a Lonely Heart" and during most the rest of the 80s. Genesis played AOR from "And Then They Were Three" onwards. Several old prog heroes formed the AOR band Asia. With the exception of King Crimson (who were influenced by new wave instead), all of the old symphonic rock heroes had an increasing tendency to play 3-4 minute pop songs by the early 80s.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 22 March 2007 11:12 (nineteen years ago)

He's not entirely wrong.

It doesn't make it true though.

― Mark G, Thursday, 22 March 2007 11:13 (nineteen years ago)

symphonic rock heroes

... uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

― Tom D., Thursday, 22 March 2007 11:17 (nineteen years ago)

"The Hoary Meme" is my favorite King Crimson song.

― bendy, Thursday, 22 March 2007 13:58 (nineteen years ago)

"... or at least the reactionary narrowness of punk aesthetics."
-- me

"...and Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, Wire, Gang of Four, The Fall, Scritti Politti etc didn't happen, did they?"
-- Tom D.

You're right, of course. I was presenting a rule of thumb about the orthodoxy of the mainstream punk narrative. But rules of thumb are just loose guidelines. And anti-orthodoxy was part of the orthodoxy, as absurd as that sounds.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 22 March 2007 17:34 (nineteen years ago)

Yes + Genesis doesn't equal all prog rock, is the main problem I have with yr thesis Geir. Plus it's kinda reductive to describe what those two groups did in the early 80s as AOR toot sweet.

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 22 March 2007 18:03 (nineteen years ago)

Yes + Genesis doesn't equal all prog rock

No, they equal symphonic rock. Prog also contained a lot of unlistenable unmelodic crap such as various German krautrock bands. But the good ones - the symphonic rock ones, basing their music mainly in 18th and 19th century styles in a somewhat retrospective way rather than trying to be "progressive" - were spearheaded by Genesis and Yes.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:04 (nineteen years ago)

You listen ta Relayer and tell me that's 'retrospective' or 'based in an 18th or 19th century style'.

Oh, wait, that's clearly your least favourite Yes album. *sigh*

― unfished business, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:06 (nineteen years ago)

A Guide to the Progressive Rock Genres
http://www.gepr.net/genre2.html

― djmartian, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:09 (nineteen years ago)

"Relayer" - with the exception of "To Be Over" and the finishing beautiful "Soon" section of "The Gates Of Delirium" has never impressed me. Correct.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:17 (nineteen years ago)

19. Muse

EXCEPT THEY CAN'T PLAY: http://www.laserbeast.com/mp3s/Muse_-_Dracula_Mountain.mp3

― Catsupppppppppppppp dude ‫茄蕃‪, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:19 (nineteen years ago)

Well, Geir, at least you're consistent.

― unfished business, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:23 (nineteen years ago)

which is not a charge that could ever be levelled at you mr unfished business!

― bidfurd, Thursday, 22 March 2007 23:15 (nineteen years ago)

Relayer is the only Yes album I would think of returning to. It's more abrasive character appeals to me; everything else is just too light, too hippy, too boring.

― professor ganson, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:20 (nineteen years ago)

oh yah you cant get any heavier than TO BE OVER.and SOON. LISTEN TO ONCE HEART OF THE SUNRISE, ASSHOE~!!!!@!#!@#

― chaki, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:31 (nineteen years ago)

that opening riff of 'heart of the sunrise' = METAL INVENTED

― unfished business, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:55 (nineteen years ago)

or something

― unfished business, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:55 (nineteen years ago)

and yeah, Relayer is the best. GOD is fucking phenomenal.

― unfished business, Friday, 23 March 2007 00:56 (nineteen years ago)

I think geir is right with the really big "prog" bands going AOR. But obviously there was still an underground scene that still exists today.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Friday, 23 March 2007 01:05 (nineteen years ago)

@ chaki: Good point about Heart of the Sunrise. Still, Gates of Delerium and Sound Chaser are tops, imo. The rest of Relayer would be skippable if it weren't for some nice moments from Howe (solo on To Be Over is quite nice, iirc).

― professor ganson, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:43 (nineteen years ago)

I think we can safely say that there are way less than 100 cases of evidence that punk didn't quite manage to kill prog in the long run

― Mark G, Friday, 23 March 2007 14:57 (nineteen years ago)

Did they wear capes? That's the easiest way to distinguish prog bands from the more general category of 70s art rock.

― bendy, Friday, 23 March 2007 15:30 (nineteen years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.