How is Prog received where you live?

Gerinski wrote: In my current country Belgium I don't know any Prog fan personally, but then I do not know many people here. A few big bands still include Brussels in their tour calendar (Yes, DT...) but not many. There's a small venue organising relatively frequent prog concerts for small bands (The Spirit of 66) but unfortunately it's quite far from where I live. I have met and chatted with a couple of Prog fans there but not got into an actual friendship, it's too far. Neighboring Holland has more Prog scene but it's also not that close for going frequently.

I like it, my wife likes some, my daughter knows the words to wish you were here, the cats seem non-plussed about it.

^ Seriously?   

Polymorphia wrote: Hi, I'm from Mississippi. Most of the people I have contact with are pretty open-minded, even if they aren't very knowledgable. Many of my friends listen to pop artists. Every folk/folk-rock band reminds them of Mumford and Sons, and any electronic element is perceived as dubstep influence. I don't necessarily fault them with this, though. Most of them are just starting to appreciate music in a new way, and I say that's good for them, as long as they're not arrogant about it. On the other hand, most musicians here know about prog. Every time I go to a record exchange at the local record store, I find lots of prog in people's collections. My former guitar teacher is a big prog fan. Most music fans period down here period dabble in some prog. Even those who aren't into prog are willing to give it an honest listen.

Lucky-y-y. 

Hi, I'm from Mississippi. Most of the people I have contact with are pretty open-minded, even if they aren't very knowledgable. Many of my friends listen to pop artists. Every folk/folk-rock band reminds them of Mumford and Sons, and any electronic element is perceived as dubstep influence. I don't necessarily fault them with this, though. Most of them are just starting to appreciate music in a new way, and I say that's good for them, as long as they're not arrogant about it. On the other hand, most musicians here know about prog. Every time I go to a record exchange at the local record store, I find lots of prog in people's collections. My former guitar teacher is a big prog fan. Most music fans period down here period dabble in some prog. Even those who aren't into prog are willing to give it an honest listen.

Oh, I'm from Venezuela. And no, I don't know any other prog fan more that some Twitter people and the people from this forum. Art is dead here. :-/

I live in Miami so it's practically a barren wasteland here. barely any bands come down here because over here it's all about overly commercialized music like pitbull and reggaeton and if there are people that are into rock or metal, they usually like bands like metallica or linkin park... I can count on my hand the amount of friends I know that are into prog but only one of them like it as much as i do that we make the effort to take 4 hour drives upstate to Orlando or Tampa because that's as far as most prog bands will come down to here in Florida. rarely do they ever come to Miami. Only a hand few of bands that I love have come down to miami once and that was for prognation when Opeth and Dream theater were headlining and another time, Porcupine tree came which was a real treat because the day before we had driven to Orlando to see them so we saw porcupine tree back to back one weekend. totally worth the sleeplessness. lol Deftones are coming this march as well but they're even more popular so it doesn't surprise me.

I think pretty much everywhere in the world "prog" would be a predominantly urban pastime.  

Edited by Argonaught - January 01 2013 at 23:20

Hi everyone!

First off, I'm in Montreal, so I know the North American prog scene well enough. For example, in Montreal, Prog does not go over very well. We get the occasional show (recent years, Greg Lake, Steve Hackett, Saga and a couple more), plus a small prog festival which started a few years ago, but not much else. No media coverage either. There are almost 3 million people, so obviously a few fans here and there, but as much as Montreal used to be a huge prog town in the 70's, prog is not well seen anymore. Didn't stop me from releasing an album, but then again, nobody around here is interested in covering it in any way.

I was wondering how the prog scene is doing elsewhere in the world? Can you tell, where you live, does it get any coverage at all from the media? Do you get a lot of shows? I'm really interested in learning as much as possible.

Thanks for your replies; I do appreciate them!

A-J