What Do You Look for in Progressive Rock/Music?

wiz_d_kidd wrote: Frenetic Zetetic wrote: Some great threads and discussion have been taking place lately, with lots of cool insights, views, and experiences coming together.  This has lead me to wonder: what do you personally look for in progressive rock/progressive music in general? For me personally: I love sweeping, grand, symphonic synth and moog sections (intro to Watcher of The Skies, Wakeman's CTTE Solo, etc) I enjoy complex time signatures/odd meters and shifts done well (Apocalypse in 9/8 for example, pretty much 95% of Gentle Giant's output, etc) I love lyrical themes dealing with psychology (Gentle Giant comes to mind here) I love smooth, smoky 70's production, but also really really enjoy the crisp new age sound of 80's records like Genesis Duke, Yes 90125, etc. I'm sure I'll come up with many more as this thread progresses. What are your thoughts and prog preferences? Discuss! So, do you listen the the album "The Art of Madness" by The Psychedelic Ensemble?  It might scratch your itch... Me, I like depth, complexity, lots of layers or music woven nicely together... masterful composition!  Vocals have to be exceptional, and performed like they're another instrument with the band. Virtuoso musicianship is definitely a requirement for me.  Odd time signature? Maybe, if they establish an interesting counterpoint to the piece.  And "energy"... I love it when the music has energy (even though I'm not exactly sure what that means!)

I like music that grabs me at an emotional level. Even if an album doesn't grab me on the first listen, there might be something that tells me to give the album another listen. However, this doesn't really say anything meaningful. And it can be difficult for someone to predict if I'll like a given piece of music. Nevertheless, I do tend to like music that is energetic and with a tendency towards minor and other exotic chords. When I was a young teenager, I was into heavy metal/hard rock, especially the music of Black Sabbath. Although I moved away from heavy metal as I got older, I did retain a taste for music that is heavy-ish, though I'm not particularly a fan of progressive metal. Sometimes, a track can appeal to me because it has an amazing "groove". Shine On You Crazy Diamond Parts 6 - 9 has an example of such a groove. Another example is Air Blower from Jeff Beck's Blow By Blow.

Frenetic Zetetic wrote: Man With Hat wrote: The main characteristics of the music I like are: Complexity, variety, experimentation/exploration of sound, 'fullness' (a lot of sound/sounds), and percussive/rhythmically inclined  From a prog angle, I look for all those things in a rock context.  Right on! What are your thoughts on the term "Art Rock" as a reference to progressive music?

I prophesy disaster wrote: I like music that grabs me at an emotional level. Even if an album doesn't grab me on the first listen, there might be something that tells me to give the album another listen. However, this doesn't really say anything meaningful. And it can be difficult for someone to predict if I'll like a given piece of music. Nevertheless, I do tend to like music that is energetic and with a tendency towards minor and other exotic chords. When I was a young teenager, I was into heavy metal/hard rock, especially the music of Black Sabbath. Although I moved away from heavy metal as I got older, I did retain a taste for music that is heavy-ish, though I'm not particularly a fan of progressive metal. Sometimes, a track can appeal to me because it has an amazing "groove". Shine On You Crazy Diamond Parts 6 - 9 has an example of such a groove. Another example is Air Blower from Jeff Beck's Blow By Blow.

 I think really same way! As heavy metal, I am old school man with Zeppelin, Sabbath, Heep & Motörhead, but anyway Metallica, Sepultura & Stone hits me too. Progmetal - only Opeth. Sabbath was also to me one of the first musics I´ve ever heard (my brother had Master of Reality & Vol.4 in cassette).

In my case, my passion for  progressive music is due the possibility of to find a countless number of musical styles in a single track ! Besides this the opportunity of listen great arrangements, lyrics and virtuous musicians !

I don't care for pretentious lyrics or anything like that, I just want to hear all these different sounds coming together in a melodic way. But that describes music in general, I guess just good music.

When I was a kid, I was a mainly a Sci-fi fan. I found myself tending to like grand sounds and songs that made me feel like I could see whole alien panoramas in them. Thus, I first gravitated to rock "soundscapes". Even though I love hard-hitting guitar, keyboards were kind of the transportation device. 

Edited by axeman - March 26 2018 at 08:23

^ What? In the modern world, you can just program your source for replay. Btw, I can 'escape' with 3 minute songs as long as an album has many of them!

SteveG wrote: ^ What? In the modern world, you can just program your source for replay. Btw, I can 'escape' with 3 minute songs as long as an album has many of them!

^LOL.....or Trout Mask Replica songs....you'll need 23 hours  to recover.