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Thread: Which Artists and Songs Were The Most Pivotal to the Development of Progressive Rock?

  1. #51
    Member Since: 3/27/2002 MYSTERIOUS TRAVELLER's Avatar
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    should the list be all Caucasian?
    or should artists of other backgrounds get the credit they deserve?

    or, are you specifically focusing on the Symph style of Prog?
    because there were some great artists in 1969-1970 doing very progressive things using Rock music forms but they weren't all Caucasian

    Tony Williams' Lifetime was one in 1969
    Mandrill was another.
    In fact Mandrill may have very well recorded the very first side-long Prog suite, recorded in winter 1970 according to the liner notes
    Why is it whenever someone mentions an artist that was clearly progressive (yet not the Symph weenie definition of Prog) do certain people feel compelled to snort "thats not Prog" like a whiny 5th grader?

  2. #52
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    I think "pivotal to the development of progressive rock" implies that the music must fulfil two criteria:

    Firstly, obviously, it has to have BEEN progressive.
    Secondly, it needs to have been widely heard, not only by musicians but by the general public as well, in order to say that it provided a lead that others could follow.

    So while it's tempting for us each to post our own favourite obscure band from 1960-something and say " that was before so-and-so", like it or not it's really the "big-name" artists and bands who qualify for inclusion in a program of this nature - and unfortunately that probably excludes most acts from the non-English-speaking world.
    Last edited by bob_32_116; 06-26-2015 at 10:41 AM.

  3. #53
    Quote Originally Posted by bob_32_116 View Post
    unfortunately that probably excludes most acts from the non-English-speaking world.
    Fortunately, this is not exactly the case. The South Americas are a huge arena for progressive and other rock/pop musics, and several of the most famous artists from there - Charly Garcia, Luis A. Spinetta, Os Mutantes, Los Jaivas (whose leader Gabriel Parra had 250,000 people turn up at his funeral!) and other million-selling names - dwelled in "prog" influences during their heyday and thereby influenced hundreds of rock/pop artists and bands at large.

    While many names thought of as "big" in places like PE have done absolutely nothing of the sort. Steven Wilson, for instance, has not turned more copies or played to more people than any of the ones I mentioned - and is thereby not "more well known" or "more influential". The fact that conservative audiences - and particularly Angloamerican "prog" ones - seem paralyzed by sheer anxiety at the hypothetical madness of having to actually take in a lyric in languages other than English tongue (or listen to a "strange" instrument or maybe something just a bit outside of the usual comfort zone), does nothing to change the overall picture.
    Last edited by Scrotum Scissor; 06-26-2015 at 05:01 AM.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
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  4. #54
    Quote Originally Posted by bob_32_116 View Post
    I think "pivotal to the development of progressive rock" implies that the music must fulfil two criteria:

    Firstly, obviously, it has to have BEEN progressive.
    Secondly, it needs ot have been widely heard, not only by musicians but by the general public as well, in order to say that it provided a lead that others could follow.

    So while it's tempting for us each to post our own favourite obscure band from 1960-something and say " that was before so-and-so", like it or not it's really the "big-name" artists and bands who qualify for inclusion in a program of this nature - and unfortunately that probably excludes most acts from the non-English-speaking world.
    This is what I felt the challenge was as well.

  5. #55
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    I would suggest that The Tornadoes' Telstar (1962) and the original Doctor Who theme (1963) would have been very influential in the development of what would become progressive rock - both pre-dating the appearance of any symphonic elements.

  6. #56
    Lets not forget The Doors...not prog, but had an approach which put them somewhere else...lots of proggy bits for sure

  7. #57
    Quote Originally Posted by kayfabe58 View Post
    Lets not forget The Doors...not prog, but had an approach which put them somewhere else...lots of proggy bits for sure
    +1
    "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"

  8. #58
    you would have to add traffic to that list

  9. #59
    Quote Originally Posted by No Pride View Post
    But I was referring to original compositions from prog bands and their influences. I know Fripp felt his music was somewhere between Bartok and Jimi Hendrix, but it's not so evident when listening to KC, at least not to me.
    Don't you think that "Eruption" from Tarkus or LTiA, pts. 1 and 2 reference modern classical. (BTW, there's a Bartok excerpt in part 1.)

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    Quote Originally Posted by zombywoof View Post
    Procol Harum - In Held 'twas in I
    Indeed.

    Along with Zappa/Beefheart, The Beatles and Moody Blues really helped get the ball rolling. All leading up to ItCotCK and beyond.

    Life without Prog would be a life not worth living.
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    Quote Originally Posted by miamiscot View Post
    Indeed.

    Along with Zappa/Beefheart, The Beatles and Moody Blues really helped get the ball rolling. All leading up to ItCotCK and beyond.

    Life without Prog would be a life not worth living.
    and yet... somehow people got by and lived their lives before the 60's, or whatever date you put on the start of "prog".

    It leads you to wonder: did people in, say, the 1920's have a style of music that gave them the same feelings as we experience with prog? Or was it all just "Popular music if you want to dance, classical if you want to just listen"?

    Ironically, in the so-called Classical period (with a capital 'C'), musical composition obeyed a fairly rigid set of conventions, and many classical works consisted of "movements" that were at least nominally intended to fit a certain dance. Hence the term "movement". Beethoven was probably the one who began the trend to writing music expressly for the sake of the music itself, without regard to dance forms. Perhaps Beethoven, in his day, was the equivalent of prog?

  12. #62
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    Quote Originally Posted by bob_32_116 View Post
    It leads you to wonder: did people in, say, the 1920's have a style of music that gave them the same feelings as we experience with prog? Or was it all just "Popular music if you want to dance, classical if you want to just listen"?
    Ragtime?
    "Normal is just the average of extremes" - Gary Lessor

  13. #63
    Quote Originally Posted by bigbassdrum View Post
    Ragtime?
    The "Roaring 20's" was "The Jazz Age", which was then the new thing. (Ragtime's popularity was for about 20 years starting circa 1895.)

    Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" was done in 1924. (BTW, he did not do the orchestration.)

  14. #64
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    Quote Originally Posted by kayfabe58 View Post
    Lets not forget The Doors...not prog, but had an approach which put them somewhere else...lots of proggy bits for sure
    I sort of disagree that they were not "prog." Maybe not in the usual sense they weren't but then again there wasn't really much(if anything at all) that could have been considered typical full blown prog when they first came out anyway. Some of their stuff was very progressive for the time though. I actually feel very comfortable calling them a proto prog band. If they were from the UK no one would bat an eye about calling them a proto prog band.
    Last edited by Digital_Man; 06-26-2015 at 04:44 PM.

  15. #65
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    Quote Originally Posted by mogrooves View Post


    Textbook proto-Prog.
    There was a track from the same album called "skip softly my moonbeams" which was also pure prog even though it was only just under four minutes long.
    Last edited by Digital_Man; 06-26-2015 at 04:45 PM.

  16. #66
    I can actually think of several hundred songs that are 3-4 minutes but still are "pure prog". What on earth the latter may mean.

    I can also think of 20-70 minute long purported "prog" songs that are absolutely nothing else than potpurris of separate 3-4 minute "non-prog" songs yet stitched together in a way as hopefully forming a "super-prog" song which instead ends up being ridiculous.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  17. #67
    Progga mogrooves's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Digital_Man View Post
    "skip softly my moonbeams" which was also pure prog
    Closer to psych's eclecticism (and kitsch) than "pure" Prog, imo. More "proto-" I'd submit.
    Hell, they ain't even old-timey ! - Homer Stokes

  18. #68
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    I can actually think of several hundred songs that are 3-4 minutes but still are "pure prog". What on earth the latter may mean.

    I can also think of 20-70 minute long purported "prog" songs that are absolutely nothing else than potpurris of separate 3-4 minute "non-prog" songs yet stitched together in a way as hopefully forming a "super-prog" song which instead ends up being ridiculous.
    daaaang... QFT!
    it sounds like you were there at the turn of the decade witnessing these truths... I have the same experiences as you from 1969-1972 at the very least
    Why is it whenever someone mentions an artist that was clearly progressive (yet not the Symph weenie definition of Prog) do certain people feel compelled to snort "thats not Prog" like a whiny 5th grader?

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    Is "Alice's Restaurant" prog? It must be, that song took up one whole side of an album!


  20. #70
    Quote Originally Posted by bob_32_116 View Post
    Is "Alice's Restaurant" prog? It must be
    Well, at least it served both its purposes - artistically and humoristically. Which is more than I can say about most "whole side"-20 min. songs by some bands posing as "prog".
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  21. #71
    Some not often mentioned artists and bands. Early Marc Bolan and T.Rex.
    Ride a white swan
    Seagull woman
    My people were fair
    The wizard... And many more.

    Tommy Roes "Crimson and Clover" was a starting point for many.

    Very early Bowie.

    Tommy James and the Shondells...

    Someone mentioned moody blues and procol harum already.

    Traffic was prog in a way.
    Still alive and well...

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    Quote Originally Posted by Nijinsky Hind View Post

    Tommy Roes "Crimson and Clover" was a starting point for many.
    I think you mean Tommy James - who you mention later in your post.

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    Tommy James and the Shondells went full-on prog with the next album 'Cellophane Symphony'. I remember on the old board an article was linked where Tommy James listed his favourite albums or whatever it was, and 'In The Court Of The Crimson King' was there.

  24. #74
    Quote Originally Posted by JJ88 View Post
    Tommy James and the Shondells went full-on prog with the next album 'Cellophane Symphony'. I remember on the old board an article was linked where Tommy James listed his favourite albums or whatever it was, and 'In The Court Of The Crimson King' was there.
    I have a friend who opened for Tommy James years ago. He noticed, backstage, that TJ was wearing a corset for his shows to keep his shape, well, uh, shapely.

    My friend actually mentioned it during his performance and, needless to say, TJ wasn't happy.
    "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"

  25. #75
    Quote Originally Posted by ronmac View Post
    TJ was wearing a corset for his shows
    Was it the "Shatner 2000"?

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