Prog and the younger generation

Toaster Mantis wrote: keiser willhelm wrote: i think prog is kind of hip right now. its cool to know obscure, artsy bands. bands like the mars volta and radiohead, though they arnt the most progressive band ever, are becoming more and more popular. people are experimenting. bands are experimenting. i think that close to 3/4 of the people i know enjoy this style of at least semi progressive music much more than hip/hop rap etc. and i think that this is a growing trend. I have mixed feelings about this. I hope most of these people get into prog because they understand it and appreciate it, not because listening to obscure music makes them feel "hip". I guess that by making a post like this, I might myself be falling into that very pitfall of treating music like some sort of yuppie status symbol ... but it's not an unknown phenomenon that rather "high concept" bands feel they're throwing pearls before swine when they become popular. Also, when a genre becomes a fad it risks becoming oversaturated with substandard bands getting record deals and wide distribution because their style has suddenly become easy to market. I know this has happened with glam rock in the seventies+eighties, grunge in the nineties and retro-rock here in the 21st century (okay that's not really a genre but still a useful category) so it's not just mindless snobbery on my part. Like with what I mentioned, too, it's neither unthinkable that these new prog fans will lose interest when the "next big thing" comes around and it'll be the late seventies all over again. Fortunately, from your choice of words it looks like many people one might call "bandwagon-jumpers" or "Johnny-come-latelies"  - or at least the ones you know - develop an actual appreciation for prog as in one beyond it being fashionable or because they think it's "funny". If I seem somewhat ignorant of what's going on in prog right now, I'll admit to this being very much the case as I'm more interested in checking out those of the classics I'm not familiar with yet. Oh, and Radiohead might be artsy, but obscure is the last word I would use to describe a band popular enough to have headlined this year's Roskilde Festival.

I didnt say radiohead were obscure, every kid and their brother knows about radiohead. but its not "mainstream" per say (though it is) its not rap, hip hop, R&B, not what the original poster was talking about.
i hope it didnt sound like the people i know were bandwagon'ers, i dont think i came across that way. i said they enjoyed it. they didnt just listen to it to be popular and hip. they like it genuinely and have introduced me to some really great bands (the animal collective, deerhunter, hella, yakuza, drive like jehu)

The internet is changing things. its bringing music to the masses in completely different ways. where before you had to research a band extensively, or maybe even just through word of mouth try and discover something new then go about the process of hunting down the CD if it even exists outside of a foreign country,  now you have myspace and sites like PA delivering you instantaneously thousands of bands that you can then immediately go and download in the span of 5 minutes their entire discography. . . its making it easy to know these bands, to know progressive music.

Wrong choice of words i guess and maybe im changing my mind from my original post but i think you have to admit that artsy music and in turn progressive music is becoming more and more popular. the prog circles are expanding. just look at this site. its growing and it is mostly due to the younger members.

Avantgardehead wrote: Prog can be hip, if you think about. A recent development in the hipster world is the "obscure hipster" who is usually into lesser-known music and more "obscure" stuff than your average hipster. For example, they could still like hip bands like Interpol, The Strokes, The Killers, and Feist, but also listen to things like Wolves in the Throne Room, Pelican, Isis, and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum.

What is it about Wolves in the Throne Room that endears them to the generically alternative crowd, who generally don't care much about that particular type of metal? The band in question having a really long name, or being a bunch of greenies?

keiser willhelm wrote: I didnt say radiohead were obscure

Actually, you did. Your exact words were its cool to know obscure, artsy bands. bands like the mars volta and radiohead, though they arnt the most progressive band ever, are becoming more and more popular. Typing that would make no sense if your intent wasn't to say that The Mars Volta and Radiohead were obscure and artsy.

i hope it didnt sound like the people i know were bandwagon'ers, i dont think i came across that way. i said they enjoyed it. they didnt just listen to it to be popular and hip. they like it genuinely and have introduced me to some really great bands (the animal collective, deerhunter, hella, yakuza, drive like jehu)

Good to hear then.

A few years ago I visited a concert by a Dutch 70-77 Genesis tribute band, among the visitors were 3 16-17 old guys who knew every song and they let us know, incredible. And during the gigs I witnessed from Anekdoten, The Dutch Symforce Festival and a Dutch triple progrock bands festival I noticed lots of young progheads  To me it seems that nowadays progrock is a kind of vivid underground scene, joined by younger people who are fed up with the commercial pop and rock music, supported by jeans and alcohol multinationals who try to brainwash you buying their articles instead of developping a serious adventure to discover good music

It seems as if Prog had become so obscure, that it went full circle and now it's getting respect again. Don't look for it with mainstream audiences -- that wasn't even the case in the 70's. But as far as an underground movement goes, I think it gained credibility amongst the "hip", if for no other reason than the genre continued to exist even as it wallows in obscurity...So, it's not like they can sneer at it because people are only doing it for the money, or because it supports large corporate record labels...

But that theory only works for the youth who seek out the unpopular, which has always been the essence of underground music...

Just today I saw an ad on Craigslist of a band looking for members - they described it as Prog/Punk. Those two genres were certainly mutually exclusive in the 70's!


Edited by jplanet - July 28 2008 at 17:04

My kids are 15 and 18.  Here's a short list of bands they like from the prog world.  I'll let the list speak for itself.

I'm also 15 years old, and I'm friends with a group of 7 or 8 friends who love prog in my school. We go to shows together, share music, a few of us are even in a Prog Metal band together. I will admit that when we go to shows like: Dream Theater, Rush, Porcupine Tree, Opeth....there aren't many teenagers there other than us.

Darklord55 wrote: My kids are 15 and 18.  Here's a short list of bands they like from the prog world.  I'll let the list speak for itself. Opeth Flower Kings Porcupine Tree Eloy Yes Nektar Ozric Tentacles Pink Floyd Hawkwind Sleepytime Gorilla Museum Pelican Kingfisher Sky Dream Theater Symphony X Pineapple Thief Meshuggah Radiohead Black Bonzo Wicked Minds Mellow Candle

Interesting, get them some Talisma.
Possibly, Jonas Hellborg Art Metal, too.


Edited by Slartibartfast - July 28 2008 at 21:29

First of all, I'm very happy to read your posting. Indeed, pretty much no teens are into progressive stuff. Today's youth are in total limbo. For a while during the 90's there were sparks of linking back to prog (i.e. Mercury Rev, Porcupine Tree) but nowadays the "American Idol" generation does not care at all - at all indeed - about true art. So I praise your interest, keep up the spark!

indie music couldnt be what it is today without the internet. at least, i highly doubt it.