Originally Posted by
Facelift
If you're listening to music in general to appreciate the medium (regardless of genre) at its highest level of artistic possibilities (and I would assume that this would be of interest to anybody keeping track of what the artistic apex of rock music might be) then I don't really understand why anybody would be listening to progressive rock, its many virtues notwithstanding. It can't hold a candle, in this regard, to the masterpieces of the great classical composers.
I like progressive rock because I like the inclusion of elements to rock music that give the style greater possibilities for conceptual and instrumental creativity. Unlike some rock music purists, I am not only not fundamentally opposed to these elements or these possibilities and I think that, in the right hands, these things can take the music to great new places which would be of interest to an audience attuned to this aesthetic. But I'm going to stop short of proclaiming that these elements make it the highest evolution of the genre. Depending on what one most values in rock music, one could make a great case that rock music reached its artistic apex with the punk movement.
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