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verslibre View Drop Down
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Points: 15000 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 25 2015 at 10:46

For "canonical," I'd probably choose King Crimson, Yes and Pink Floyd.

For my favorite big three, Floyd would be replaced by ELP.
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Points: 954 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 25 2015 at 12:00
Originally posted by Dellinger Dellinger wrote:

Originally posted by Komandant Shamal Komandant Shamal wrote:

Originally posted by RoeDent RoeDent wrote:

Some think it's about sales, some think it's influence, some disagree over whether some of these bands are "progressive" enough or not.


 

Personally, i think about the popularity of English singing progressive rock bands in 70s, ie at the time when all the legends were current bands as well. So, as Floyds were regarded as a great psychedelic rock band in 70s, ie not prog, and as Genesis were an obscure band in the early 70s and went to pop with ATTWT, The Big Three of progressive rock regarding popularity in 70s that could be only ELP, Tull and Yes.

 

Oh and following the same criteria, Crimsons, who were disbanded in the middle of decade, with their slightly, lets say, "avant" prog for 70s - eg LTIA or "Red" era - werent in "the big three".


I think this is a very objective and workable point of view to choose the big 3
Thanks.
 BTW, by the progressive rock solo artists, that were Frank Zappa, Mike Oldfield and Todd Rundgren. They were The Big Three of progressive rock solo artists regarding their popularity in 70s.
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Points: 4671 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 25 2015 at 12:32
Metallica
Megadeth
Slayer
and maybe Anthrax
--
Frank Swarbrick
Belief is not Truth.
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Points: 1759 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 25 2015 at 12:38
Originally posted by Dellinger Dellinger wrote:

Originally posted by Xonty Xonty wrote:

Originally posted by Mellotron Storm Mellotron Storm wrote:

Originally posted by cstack3 cstack3 wrote:

  • <span style="line-height: 1.4;">King Crimson</span>
  • <span style="line-height: 1.4;">Yes</span>
  • <span style="line-height: 1.4;">Genesis</span>
...based upon the strength of the compositions, quality of instrumentals and vocals, and influence upon the genre. 

There were many outstanding bands, but I think these guys influenced everything in prog, then and now.
<span style="line-height: 1.4;"></span>


That's my big three as well, I would love to somehow get Floyd in there but only three right? ELP and Jethro Tull aren't even close but that's just my taste in music.


My thoughts exactly. King Crimson are perhaps the best "progressive" group when you take it literally, as they've constantly evolved but produced consistently good music in its own right. Yes have a signature sound which is the kind of style that instantly comes to mind when I think about prog rock, and Genesis are just Genesis Smile JT and ELP both had much fewer classic albums than the others, but I reckon it should be "The Big Four", with Pink Floyd included as well.


Actually, I feel King Crimson has kept a more recognizable sound throughout the years than Yes and Genesis... Genesis at least on the change from prog albums in the 70's to pop albums in the 80's sound like a totally different band (and still, Banks keyboards offer the link that would betray them if they had wanted to pass as a different band). Yes, well they have had many different line-ups and eras, and they do sound different from one to the other. There's just about no relationship between Owner of a Lonely Heart an 90125 (and the whole west line-up work, actually) to what they did in the 70's golden years. And then there's the Sherwood albums, and Drama, and the 2010's albums, which may have more to betray the band, but still have rather different sounds. As for King Crimson, they do have many songs within each album that sounds like a real evolution for the band... but then, they always had at least some songs with the Schizoid Man element. There's Pictures of a City, Cirkus, Sailor's Tale (entering the instrumental version which would become very common from this time forward), Easy Money, Lark's Toungues (both parts, and then the other parts that would appear on later albums), a great deal of Red, Discipline and Indiscipline, Vroom Vroom, Level Five. And there's surely many others I forgot, or don't know yet, or whatever.

Sure, but when you solely consider each band's output in terms of prog, King Crimson didn't have a consistent signature sound like Yes did. They went through certain phases (e.g. the 3-album Discipline era), but Yes and Genesis had a much more gradual change. From their early works until CTTE, Yes just developed their sound and then branched off a little with Tales and Relayer, but the feel was still very similar. Genesis did have a constant but faster evolution throughout their albums but it can be traced, as you start to hear their progressive pop crossover on ATTWT when Hackett left. For me, whenever King Crimson experiments with a new style, they go right into it and almost sound like a different band (from Islands to LTIA for example). It's mainly down to the fact that Fripp repeatedly fires and hires members. However, they still use a similar album template (a ballad like "I Talk To The Wind", a lengthy experimentation like "The Devil's Triangle", a more frantic one like "Easy Money", and so on), but produce something that's entirely different. The contrast between Schizoid Man and Red is much more obvious than that of, say Heart Of The Sunrise and Gates Of Delirium for me. Either way, they're still both incredible bands.
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Points: 4807 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 10:32
It's like asking what are the four main food groups. Base and inconsequential.
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Points: 12608 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 12:53
Originally posted by Komandant Shamal Komandant Shamal wrote:

Originally posted by Dellinger Dellinger wrote:

Originally posted by Komandant Shamal Komandant Shamal wrote:

Originally posted by RoeDent RoeDent wrote:

Some think it's about sales, some think it's influence, some disagree over whether some of these bands are "progressive" enough or not.




 


Personally, i think about the popularity of English singing progressive rock bands in 70s, ie at the time when all the legends were current bands as well. So, as Floyds were regarded as a great psychedelic rock band in 70s, ie not prog, and as Genesis were an obscure band in the early 70s and went to pop with ATTWT, The Big Three of progressive rock regarding popularity in 70s that could be only ELP, Tull and Yes.


 


Oh and following the same criteria, Crimsons, who were disbanded in the middle of decade, with their slightly, lets say, "avant" prog for 70s - eg LTIA or "Red" era - werent in "the big three".


I think this is a very objective and workable point of view to choose the big 3
Thanks.
 BTW, by the progressive rock solo artists, that were Frank Zappa, Mike Oldfield and Todd Rundgren. They were The Big Three of progressive rock solo artists regarding their popularity in 70s.


Oh, I feel that with solo artists it would be even more difficult for people to agree. I would think that Rick Wakeman should be in there. And I would not consider Todd Rundgren just because I know just about nothing of him    Actually, I don't know much from Frank Zappa either, but he's got quiet a reputation, though.
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Points: 2673 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 13:27
Radiohead, Muse, and Tool.

Edited by Metalmarsh89 - May 26 2015 at 13:28
Want to play mafia? Visit here.
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Points: 20468 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 13:28
Originally posted by Rednight Rednight wrote:

It's like asking what are the four main food groups. Base and inconsequential.
 
Yes...but then that covers about half of the post threads on the board.
 
LOL
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Points: 2223 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 13:32
Originally posted by Rednight Rednight wrote:

It's like asking what are the four main food groups. Base and inconsequential.
 
I didn't know base and inconsequential were food groups.
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Points: 17494 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 14:24
Santa Maria
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Komandant Shamal View Drop Down
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Points: 954 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 19:10
Originally posted by Dellinger Dellinger wrote:

Originally posted by Komandant Shamal Komandant Shamal wrote:

Originally posted by Dellinger Dellinger wrote:

Originally posted by Komandant Shamal Komandant Shamal wrote:

Originally posted by RoeDent RoeDent wrote:

Some think it's about sales, some think it's influence, some disagree over whether some of these bands are "progressive" enough or not.




 


Personally, i think about the popularity of English singing progressive rock bands in 70s, ie at the time when all the legends were current bands as well. So, as Floyds were regarded as a great psychedelic rock band in 70s, ie not prog, and as Genesis were an obscure band in the early 70s and went to pop with ATTWT, The Big Three of progressive rock regarding popularity in 70s that could be only ELP, Tull and Yes.


 


Oh and following the same criteria, Crimsons, who were disbanded in the middle of decade, with their slightly, lets say, "avant" prog for 70s - eg LTIA or "Red" era - werent in "the big three".


I think this is a very objective and workable point of view to choose the big 3
Thanks.
 BTW, by the progressive rock solo artists, that were Frank Zappa, Mike Oldfield and Todd Rundgren. They were The Big Three of progressive rock solo artists regarding their popularity in 70s.


Oh, I feel that with solo artists it would be even more difficult for people to agree. I would think that Rick Wakeman should be in there. And I would not consider Todd Rundgren just because I know just about nothing of him    Actually, I don't know much from Frank Zappa either, but he's got quiet a reputation, though.
 You should check Todd Rundgren's albums from 70s. Todd's 70s stuff sound very fresh, not dated at all and pretty modern even today, after 40 years. 
Agreed with you regarding the popularity of Rick Wakeman but i'm afraid that in 70s -aside of big sales of his solo albums "Journey To The Center Of The Earth", "Six Wives of Henry VIII" and "Myths And Legends of King Arthur" - he was [and still] mainly know as the keyboards wizard for Yes so i wouldnt consider Rick Wakeman as one of The Big Three progressive rock solo artists of 70s.
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Points: 1563 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 26 2015 at 20:48
Popularity:
Floyd
Yes
ELP
Not much to debate on that. Except maybe Rush for the third.

Favourites:
Floyd
Genesis
Tull
Wanted KC to come in but...

Influence on the genre:
KC
Floyd
The Wilde Flower
The third basically split up and combined members to form some of the greatest prog bands ever (Caravan, Gong, Soft Machine, Hatfield, and even Camel)

Lesser-known names from the 70's that had a big influence (on me and the genre)
Henry Cow
Gentle Giant
Renaissance
Every album HC came out with is five stars in my book, Octopus is my favourite album to ever exist, and Novella was my first ever album, which hooked me in to this genre. 
There is no dark side in the moon, really... Matter of fact, it's all dark...
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Points: 10616 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 27 2015 at 03:38
Right, we shouldn't treat this question too scientifically.
I just speak from the heart.
Then it would be:

Yes, Genesis, and.........

Erm... Floyd? Crimson? ELP? Ermm

Okay, Yes, Genesis, ELP. 
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Points: 1189 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 27 2015 at 04:45
This one is really easy: Pavarotti, Domingo and Carreras =P

Going back to prog,  the most logical answer is King Crimson, Yes, Genesis. And I'm totally OK with it.
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Points: 4488 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 27 2015 at 05:24
Originally posted by jammindude jammindude wrote:

I sometimes get looked at cross-eyed for this opinion, but I honestly believe that The Moody Blues need to be considered in this discussion.    I think you could make a good case for Days of Future Past being the first full on progressive rock album....predating In the Court of the Crimson King by two full years....although Piper by PF beat it by just 2 or 3 months.    It may have a lighter feel to it, but I feel the Moodies were extremely important to the early prog rock movement.  

Still though, I don't think they'd quite crack my top 3....maybe in a tie...but I always like to give them an honorable mention because I feel like they get left out of the discussion too often. 

I would go with:

1. King Crimson
2. Pink Floyd
3. Genesis/Yes/Moody Blues  (tie)


I totally agree with your Moody comments here, I only "discovered" them last year but their influence seems to me to be massive.

So, for influence:

The Moody Blues
King Crimson
Pink Floyd

I was always lead to believe there was an established big 4:

Pink Floyd
Yes
King Crimson
Genesis

But my big 3 (as in favourites) are:

IQ
Genesis (the Hackett years)
Dream Theater
Ayreon

Tongue
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Points: 1199 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 31 2015 at 09:38
I don't say big three, instead I separate everything in tiers of four

Tier One: Yes, Genesis, King Crimson, Pink Floyd
Tier Two: Rush, Jethro Tull, ELP, The Moody Blues
Tier Three: Frank Zappa, VDGG, Camel, Gentle Giant
Tier Four: Mike Oldfeild, The Soft Machine, Caravan, Magma

It goes on, and there is a different are for the new bands. I haven't planned it all out, but tier one has Dream Theatre, Porcupine Tree, Marrilion, and The Flower Kings
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Points: 6446 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 31 2015 at 11:30


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Points: 7251 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 31 2015 at 11:48
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2 - Paul
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Points: 2446 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 03 2015 at 17:35
Floyd and Crimson just aren't good enough composers to be top 5 let alone top 3. Tull are definitely top 3. I prefer gentle giant, van der graaf, caravan, camel and magma over yes and genesis. Top 3 is hard to choose but tull are definitely #1. The remixed album sets just reinforce this

Edited by dr prog - June 09 2015 at 17:55
All I like is prog related bands beginning late 60's/early 70's. Their music from 1968 - 83 has the composition and sound which will never be beaten. Perfect blend of jazz, classical, folk and rock.
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Points: 20196 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: June 03 2015 at 19:56
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