Englishness and English Phlegm in Prog

What I find ... irritating..... is when someone from a different culture comes on a thread and tells me what it is to be English, and then tells me I can't possibly know, as I'm English, and therefore can't see it. 

File under "patronising", cross file under "stupidity".

If this thread is just "let's all have a little club where we post songs which have some kind of proto- English connection to them", then that's just some boring game which is probably on a level of the "solve if u r genius" threads you see all over social media. Boring, boring, boring.

(As for the "lots of low class" in England, sh*tfire, man, WORKING class. "Low class" is an insult. And if you don't know the difference between "English" and "British" then what are you doing commenting on this thread ??????? )

I stuck my oar in here because (a) I find a lot of people telling me what it is to be English who don't have a clue and (b) there's a MUCH more interesting point here. 

Prog rock starts off by being brewed up by a number of privileged middle class kids at a selective number of universities. Their music is listened to by very worthy promoters and producers from an upper middle class background who then decide what the General Unwashed Public are going to hear. Prog rock picks up on a wistful yearning for childhood and bucolic themes of nature from the previous psychedelic era (although it does to an extent intermingle with it.) This is played to people who have a choice of Max Bygraves or a few other groups..... who generally live in housing stock which hasn't changed all that much since 1915. Remember, two world wars, rationing, near bankrupt country.

When prog comes out - late sixties - things are beginning to change in the UK. And the rest of the world, for that matter. Living standards are, for the first time since WW2, increasing. There is - across the world, a sense of the optimistic or possible. This is reflected in the music. People are more inclined to consider new forms of music (look at Krautrock in Germany: the art of the new and experimental replacing the older establishment Schlager music). So, at the time, prog rock becomes acceptable. It's fantasy, experiment and a yearning for a bucolic, mythical golden age which is certainly a bit nicer than living in a smoke blackened terraced house with a gasometer at the end of the road. 

What happens ? Well, after a while, the dream, which is still somewhat of a hippie / psychedelic dream, goes pretty sour in the UK, with increased strikes, social tension.... reality kicks in. And then you get a more angry, uptempo music replacing it which pretty much echoes what is going on in society. So. Is THAT actually "English" ? Is punk rock - a reflection of youth culture in the late 1970's - more reflective of being "English" than music created and distributed by a very few privileged people a few years before ? And, as Dean says, why on Earth do people outside of the UK think that the English are somehow bucolic, slow moving and ponderous ? 

So I find that a bit more of an interesting conversational subject than people telling me "what it is to be English and how I can't hear English themes in music because I'm English myself. " Do me a favour. 

It also completely overlooks the fact that English musicians have English influences and are playing in England. What do you expect them to sound like ? Chinese ????? Yes, people copied it. With - as we can see - no understanding whatsoever. 

By all means have fun posting "examples of Englishness in music" but please don't confuse it with *actually being English" unless you've been here and lived here. Otherwise I'll tell you all about your country and what it's like and then tell you you're wrong. 

It's also quite interesting to reflect that a lot of prog rock from the 60's and 70's has scenes of bucolic idyll in, which hadn't existed here since, well, about 1760 and the Industrial Revolution (remember, we're the first country to industrialise by a long way) - it's just weird. Of course, within a few years, the music changes, the references change, too.

I could just have easily put up "Forgotten Sons" by Marillion, which is all about getting your nuts shot off in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. That reflected a lot on the actual times, and was probably more about being English in the mid 80's than sipping tea by a cricket pitch lyrics in 1974. 

Please don't stop putting up threads about what you perceive as what it is to be "English" either, honestly, go right ahead because not doing so deprives of us some good music. Could we please not think that it's anything other than a cartoon version of being English, though ? ;-)

Britain is not England Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Britain is just England Scotland and wales. The term The United Kingdom refers to England Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, hence the correct term being: The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Sean Trane, thanks, mate. Official prize for the most obscure prog rock band ever, surely. ;-)