WHAT IS PROG?
From
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Progressive
rock (shortened to prog, or prog rock
when differentiating from other
"progressive..." genres) is an ambitious,
eclectic, and often grandiose style of rock
music which arose in the late 1960s, reached
the peak of its popularity in the early
1970s, and continues as a musical form to
this day. Progressive rock began in England
and remained largely a European movement,
although there are a few notable American
and Canadian progressive rock bands. This
music style draws many influences from
classical music and jazz fusion, in contrast
to American rock, which was more influenced
by rhythm & blues and country. Over the
years various sub-genres of progressive rock
have emerged, such as symphonic rock, art
rock, math rock and progressive metal.
Progressive rock artists sought to move away
from the limitations of popular rock and pop
music formats, and "progress" rock to the
point that it could achieve new forms, often
but not always alluding to the
sophistication of jazz or classical music.
It is complexity, not the virtuosity of the
musicians, which most distinguishes
progressive rock: mainstream rock has some
extremely talented musicians who work solely
in simple meters and harmonies.
Progressive rock is difficult to define in a
single conclusive way, and outspoken King
Crimson leader Robert Fripp has voiced his
disdain for the term. The major acts that
defined the genre in the 1970s (Jethro Tull,
Yes, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Emerson Lake and
Palmer, Rush and King Crimson) do not sound
especially alike. There is also debate on
whether the musical output of artists and
bands as varied as Frank Zappa, Phish, and
Radiohead belongs to the genre. Some
common, though not universal, elements of
progressive rock include:
* Long compositions,
sometimes running over 20 minutes, with
intricate melodies and harmonies. These are
often described as epics and are the genre's
clearest nod to classical music. A very
early example (perhaps the first multi-part
suite to appear in prog rock) is "In Held
Twas I" by Procol Harum, clocking in at
17:30. Other famous examples include Pink
Floyd's 23-minute "Echoes", Jethro Tull's
"Thick as a Brick" (43 minutes), Yes' "Close
to the Edge" (18 minutes), Rick Wakeman's
"Music Reincarnate" (28 minutes), Genesis'
"Supper's Ready" (23 minutes), and Van der
Graaf Generator's "A plague of Lighthouse
Keepers" (20 minutes). More recent extreme
examples are the 60-minute "Light of Day,
Day of Darkness" by Green Carnation, "Garden
of Dreams" by The Flower Kings and "Six
Degrees of Inner Turbulence" by Dream
Theater. * Lyrics that convey
intricate and sometimes impenetrable
narratives, covering such themes as science
fiction, fantasy, history, religion, war,
and madness. Most of the English progressive
rock bands avoided direct political
commentary, preferring to couch their views
in fictional or allegorical settings -- for
example, Genesis' album Selling England by
the Pound is tied together by a theme of
commercialism versus naturalism, while
Emerson, Lake and Palmer's Brain Salad
Surgery gradually progresses from nature to
technology to illustrate the dangers of man
being replaced by machine. Other early 1970s
progressive rock bands (especially German
ones) featured lyrics concerned with
left-wing politics and social issues.
* Concept albums, in which a theme or
storyline is explored throughout an entire
album in a manner similar to a film or a
play. In the days of vinyl, these were
usually two-record sets with strikingly
designed gatefold sleeves. Famous examples
include Journey to the Centre of the Earth
by Rick Wakeman, The Lamb Lies Down on
Broadway by Genesis, Tales from Topographic
Oceans by Yes, 2112 and Hemispheres by Rush,
Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall by Pink
Floyd, and the more recent Operation:
Mindcrime by Queensr˙che, Metropolis Part
II: Scenes from a Memory by Dream Theater
and Snow by Spock's Beard. The Mars Volta's
albums "De-loused in the Comatorium" and
"Frances the Mute" both follow storylines
which are conveyed by both the music and the
lyrics. Aqualung, perhaps the best-known
record by Jethro Tull, is often regarded as
a concept album due to its recurring themes,
but songwriter Ian Anderson has always
claimed that the album is just "a bunch of
songs". * Unusual vocal
styles and use of multi-part vocal
harmonies. See Magma, Robert Wyatt, Gentle
Giant, Ian Anderson, Spock's Beard, and
James LaBrie. * Prominent use
of electronic instrumentation — particularly
keyboard instruments such as the organ,
piano, Mellotron, and Moog synthesizer, in
addition to the usual rock combination of
electric guitar, bass and drums. More
recently, many bands have experimented with
wave manipulation and editing, as well as
the methods mentioned above.
* Use of unusual time signatures, scales, or
tunings. Many pieces use multiple time
signatures and/or tempi, sometimes
concurrently. * Solo passages
for virtually every instrument, designed to
showcase the virtuosity of the player. This
is the sort of thing that contributed to the
fame of such performers as keyboardist Rick
Wakeman and drummer Neil Peart.
* A coordination between the rhythm section
of the band, more specifically between the
bassist and the drummer. The rhythm section
often uses countertempos and other
techniques that contrast what the rest of
the band is doing in conjunction. Examples
of this can be found in rhythm sections like
those of Chris Squire and Bill Bruford of
Yes, John Wetton and Bruford of King
Crimson, Michael Rutherford and Phil Collins
of Genesis, and others. *
Inclusion of classical pieces on albums. For
example, Emerson Lake and Palmer have
performed arrangements of pieces by Copland,
Bartók, Moussorgsky, Prokofiev, Janacek,
Alberto Ginastera, and often feature quotes
from J. S. Bach in lead breaks. Jethro Tull
recorded a version of a Bourrée by J. S.
Bach, in which they turned the piece into a
"sleazy jazzy night-club song", according to
Ian Anderson, Renaissance frequently used
Rakhmaninov-style piano interludes and
Marillion opened their live album of the
same name with an excerpt from Rossini's La
Gazza Ladra (The Thieving Magpie).
* An aesthetic linking the music with visual
art, a trend started by The Beatles with
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and
enthusiastically embraced during the prog
heyday. Some bands became as well-known for
the art direction of their albums as for
their sound, with the "look" integrated into
the band's overall musical identity. This
led to fame for particular artists and
design studios, most notably Roger Dean,
whose paintings and logo design for Yes are
so essential to the band's identity they
could be said to serve the same function as
corporate branding. Hipgnosis became equally
famous for their unusual sleeves for Pink
Floyd, often featuring experimental
photography quite innovative for the time
(two men shaking hands, one of whom is in
flames, are featured on the re-release album
cover of Wish You Were Here). H.R. Giger's
painting for Emerson Lake and Palmer's Brain
Salad Surgery is one of the most famous
album sleeves ever produced. Hugh Syme is
another artist to become famous, mostly for
his work on every Rush album cover since
1975's Fly By Night. * The
use of sound effects in compositions. For
example: the sound of a heartbeat at the
beginning and end of Pink Floyd's Dark Side
of the Moon; sounds of warfare throughout
Jethro Tull's single "Warchild".
Progressive rock compositions sometimes take
the following forms:
* A piece that is subdivided
into movements in the manner of a classical
suite. Examples are the four-part "Tales
from Topographic Oceans" by Yes, six-part
"Hemispheres" by Rush, and the seven-part "A
Change of Seasons" by Dream Theater. All of
TransAtlantic's epics are multipart. In
addition, The Mars Volta's "Frances the
Mute" features three tracks, out of the
five, which are broken down into movements.
In a few cases, a progressive rock piece
follows the outline of a specific classical
form, such as the four-part sonata form used
by Yes' "Close to the Edge".
* A piece that is composed of a patchwork of
musical themes that could conceivably stand
as individual songs, but together serve to
relate a complete narrative through music.
Examples are "Supper's Ready" on Genesis'
Foxtrot (the "Willow Farm" section of which
was played as a single), "A Day in the Life"
on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and
the B-side of Abbey Road by The Beatles,
Jethro Tull's Aqualung from the album of the
same name, and "The Gates of Delirium" on
Yes's album Relayer (from which the single
"Soon" was taken). * A piece
that allows the development of musical ideas
via progressions or variations in the manner
of a bolero or a canon. "King Kong" on Frank
Zappa's Uncle Meat is an example. History
of progressive rock
Progressive rock was born
from a variety of musical influences in the
late 1960s. The later Beatles and many
psychedelic bands began to combine
traditional rock music with instruments from
classical and Eastern music. Psychedelic
rock continued this experimental trend and
began to compose very long pieces, although
usually without any carefully thought-out
structure (for example, Iron Butterfly's
"In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida"). Bands such as The
Nice and the Moody Blues began deliberately
combining rock music with classical music,
producing longer pieces with deliberate
structures. These bands are sometimes
considered "early progressive" and sometimes
considered a transitional genre between
psychedelic and progressive.
Many music historians point to King Crimson
as the first "true" progressive rock band;
their first appearance was in February 1969.
They were quickly followed by other English
progressive rock bands, including Yes,
Genesis, Emerson Lake and Palmer, Jethro
Tull, and Pink Floyd. It is worth noting
that Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull, and Pink
Floyd all began their careers before King
Crimson, and all changed their musical
styles considerably following the release of
"In the Court of the Crimson King".
Progressive rock was especially popular in
continental Europe. Indeed, progressive rock
was the first form of rock that actually
captivated countries such as Italy and
France. This era saw a great number of
European progressive rock bands, most
notably Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM),
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, and Le Orme from
Italy, and Ange and Magma from France. Of
these bands, only PFM was significantly
successful in the English-speaking world.
Fans and music historians have a variety of
way to categorize the flavors of 1970's
progressive rock. The Canterbury scene can
be considered a sub-genre of progressive
rock, or simply another collection of true
progressive rock bands. Other bands took the
genre in a more commercial direction; these
bands, including Renaissance and Electric
Light Orchestra are sometimes classified as
"progressive rock", "commercial rock", or
"symphonic pop". Progressive
rock's popularity peaked in the mid-1970s,
when prog artists regularly topped readers'
votes in mainstream popular music magazines
in England and America. By this time,
several New World progressive rock bands had
been formed, including Rush (from Canada),
Kansas (from Kansas, of course), and the
Dixie Dregs (from Georgia).
With the advent of punk rock in the late
1970s, popular and critical opinion in
England and America moved toward a simpler
and more aggressive style of rock, with
progressive rock increasingly dismissed as
pretentious and overblown. This attitude has
remained common to the present day, though
it has begun to diminish since about 2004.
The early 1980s saw something of a revival
of the genre, led by artists such as
Marillion, IQ, Saga, and Kate Bush. Groups
that arose during this time are sometimes
termed neo-progressive. Around the same
time, some progressive rock stalwarts
changed musical direction, simplifying their
music and including more obviously
electronic elements. In 1982, the much
anticipated supergroup Asia, composed of
Steve Howe (Yes), Carl Palmer (ELP), John
Wetton (King Crimson), and Geoff Downes
(Yes), surprised and disappointed with their
pop oriented debut album. In 1983, Genesis
achieved international success with the song
"Mama", with its heavy emphasis on a drum
machine riff. In 1984, Yes had a surprise
number one hit with the song "Owner of a
Lonely Heart", which contained contemporary
electronic effects and was accessible enough
to be played at discos, and more recently
has been remixed into a Trance single. Many
progressive rock fans were unhappy with the
direction taken by such bands during this
time It should be noted that
the term "progressive" in the early 1970's
had been coined to emphasize the newness of
these bands, but by the 1980's the term had
become the name of a specific musical style.
As a result, bands such as King Crimson
which continued to update their sound were
not always called "progressive", while some
newer self-described "prog" bands purchased
vintage mellotrons in order to recreate the
sound of early 1970's prog. Fans and hostile
critics alike had established "progressive
rock" as the permanent name of this genre,
and so the connection to the usual meaning
of "progressive" became irrelevant.
The progressive rock genre enjoyed another
revival in the 1990s with the so-called
"Third Wave", spearheaded by such bands as
Sweden's The Flower Kings, the UK's
Porcupine Tree, and Spock's Beard from the
United States. One of the most important
bands of the alternative rock movement, The
Smashing Pumpkins, incorporated progressive
rock into their unique, eclectic style,
going so far as to release two albums
dealing with the same concept.
In recent years, the most commercially
viable category of prog has been progressive
metal. These bands are usually happy to be
known as progressive, although the music
bears very little resemblance to the
original progressive rock form, and produce
very long pieces and concept albums. Several
of the leading bands in the prog-metal genre
(particularly Dream Theater (U.S.) and Opeth
(Sweden)) cite pioneer progressive
hard-rockers Rush as a prime influence,
although their music shows more influence
from bands such as Yes or Metallica.
Meanwhile, other heavy metal bands not
generally considered prog-metal, such as
System of a Down, have nevertheless
incorporated prog-influenced elements like
bizarre shifts in time signatures and tempo
in their music. The work of
contemporary artists such as Ween and
post-rock bands like Sigur Rós and Godspeed
You! Black Emperor could be said to
incorporate some of the experimental
elements of progressive rock, sometimes
combined with the aesthetic sensibilities of
punk rock to produce music which many find
challenging, innovative and imaginative. A
better example of a contemporary post-rock
band however is probably The Mars Volta, who
are notable for intentionally fusing punk
with progressive rock, two elements once
polar opposites. Among more experimental and
avant garde musicians, the Japanese composer
Takashi Yoshimatsu publicly cites
progressive rock bands as a prime influence
on his work. There are also a
number of contemporary prog bands, such as
Mostly Autumn that combine Celtic, and
sometimes pagan, influences with earlier
prog rock styles. |
