What is post-rock exactly?

Sean Trane wrote: Frenetic Zetetic wrote: In my brain, post rock = the rock that came after the rock we already had, but for some reason can't be called alternative or pop punk/rock etc. Post rock is my least favorite label of all time. I feel like it's ambiguous, and purposely so, so it can contain a large amount of bands nobody wants to categorize any other way. It's a lazy label IMHO. To me post-rock meant plenty to me... Not just the name of the genre (which could refer to post-apocalyptic rock), but the banf ds included within the tag all have +/- something in common, namely a slowly progressing and mainly instrumental crescendo that borrows much to minimalism and allows for longer tracks Post rock, despite its relentless repetitions seems to be also a drummmer's music, allowing them plenty of space to wander off and return. GYBE! and others owe at least some debt to terry Riley's Rainbow In Curved Air , for example. However, one could also find some objections or feel frustrations towards the post-rocj-k bands for the halo of mystery they shroud themselves with... In some ways, I understand why theuy do it (better not being recognized in the streets), but it's also fairly pretentious and there is a definite form of lazyness when it comes with providing a semblance of explanation about their music/art. It's too easy to say: we let the auditor/spectators make up their own minds about what we do. But TBH, if I was rather taken in by post-rock from 95 to 05, I tend to think that the genre hasn't evolved much since the 00's started.

I also had a very positive relationship with post rock from the beginning. I was already into Talk Talk when Spirit of Eden came out and was mightily impressed. So relaxed, so much attention to detail and so little distraction from the sound (including the voice) and the rhythm. Later in the mid nineties I got to know Tortoise, Hood etc. and saw a number of German bands influenced by them (mostly not on PA and fairly unknown) and it struck me how taking away rock elements that either annoyed me (posing!) or I had suspected that one can do without (standard song structure, solos, vocals or at least standard lead singer style vocals) left something that made a lot of sense to me (and I've got to admit, leaving out elements for which my instrumental abilities aren't good enough also encouraged and influenced my own music) - with warmth, relaxation, melancholy, but still the forward driving energy of the rhythm that keeps it all together.
It felt somehow that I could have had this kind of music in my mind forever and maybe I even had, but outside influence meant that it felt inferior to me before somebody else was enough of the bold artist type that can recognize such a vision and put it into the world without having such stuff already around. 
For this reason also the genre name makes some sense to me. I hadn't thought about it as being part of "prog" though before I found this site, but I'm fine with it being here - actually to me "prog" is a much more problematic descriptor than "post rock", so the discussion to what extent post rock is part of "progressive rock"  is more a discussion about the meaning of the latter than the former. I see the connection though.

One thing more, although the similarities are still there, emotionally the likes of Neu! and Glenn Branca feel quite different to me, to the extent that I could only relate to Neu! emotionally far later than I discovered post rock for me. I knew them before post rock but they'd leave me very cold at the time; I'd perceive them too much as being located in an emotional nowhereland and their music felt like "study" to me, trying this stuff out for the sake of exploration, rather than expression of something I could relate to. 

Average Post-Rock fan: Godspeed's Lift Your Skinny Fists is amazing! Four sides, four songs? Genius.

siLLy puPPy wrote: AFlowerKingCrimson wrote: I once suggested that post rock got at least some of it's inspiration from kraut rock and someone chopped my head off for saying that.  So if you're head is missing then you're thinking with whaaaaat?

My question would be: If Simon Reynolds (the man credited with "coining" the term "Post Rock" when reviewing Graham Sutton's BARK PSYCHOSIS album, Hex) was referring to the music of Hex with his term assignation, what did he call all of those David Sylvian albums in the 1980s? And Eno and Deuter and Moebus-Rodelius, etc.? 

SteveG wrote: Because calling a genre post rock sounds better than calling it post grunge.

BrufordFreak wrote: My question would be: If Simon Reynolds (the man credited with "coining" the term "Post Rock" when reviewing Graham Sutton's BARK PSYCHOSIS album, Hex) was referring to the music of Hex with his term assignation, what did he call all of those David Sylvian albums in the 1980s? And Eno and Deuter and Moebus-Rodelius, etc.?

Reynolds probably didn't consider them even rock-related. 

No genre can be described objectively. Definition will always differ from person to person, therefore post-rock is whatever you think it is. All discussions about "this is post-rock" or "this is not post-rock" (or any genre) are bound to be a waste of time and energy.

Edited by Junges - May 21 2018 at 20:07

Junges wrote: No genre can be described objectively. Definition will always differ from person to person, therefore post-rock is whatever you think it is. All discussions about "this is post-rock" or "this is not post-rock" (or any genre) are bound to be a waste of time and energy.

Mascodagama wrote: Pop:                 _^^_ Regular Prog:    _—**—^—**—__—=*##&##*=—_ Post-rock:        _______—————====^^^§§§!!!!_ Avant/ RIO:      #_]>~€_}}…$§|***,.£&#@ Simple, really.

Mascodagama wrote: Pop:                 _^^_ Regular Prog:    _—**—^—**—__—=*##&##*=—_ Post-rock:        _______—————====^^^§§§!!!!_ Avant/ RIO:      #_]>~€_}}…$§|***,.£&#@ Simple, really.