Is Progressive rock "Progressive"?

cstack3 wrote: On of my favorite replies to this question comes from John Wetton in this interview: http://www.elephant-talk.com/wiki/Interview_with_John_Wetton_in_Big_Bang_Magazine AL: It's hard to have a prog context at hand, when you write a song on your own, anyway...  JW: Yes, exactly so. Prog stuff tends to happen in the rehearsal room. You get a drummer and a keyboard player involved, and they start extemporising on themes. I mean, I think that prog probably came about somewhere where American jazz and blues hit European classical music. I think that's how prog was born. The father was European classical music, and the mother was American blues, and the offspring was something we call progressive music. I don't think as a generic term it works anymore. Because it's not progressive, in fact it's more regressive.  AL: It promised too much, I think...  JW: It promised too much, yeah. And also, now it's back to everyone... Everyone who wants to be progressive, in inverted comas, want to use mellotrons, Marshall amps and Rickenbacker basses, you know, it's all back to 1973, which is hardly progressive. So it's very much regressive. But it seems that progressive has become a generic term for a style of music which involves time changes, classical moods...  AL: Sophisticated rock, in a way...  JW: Yeah. I don't mind, I like sophisticated rock, you know, I like the fact that people can play their instruments. But to me, I think that music must change, it always has to change. We can't stand and try to turn the tide back, it must change. And you have to go with that, otherwise you're drowned.

Not to hijack the conversation or start a feud here, but this sentiment expressed by a veteran of the scene gives voice to the notion that confining prog to a finite number of musical cliches will stagnate and regress the scene. This attitude puts antiquated albums and groups on a pedestal above all modern contributors to the genre. That's an uphill battle they can't expect to win.

What's worse is that it makes it too difficult for talented, innovative groups who have deliberately exited this mold while maintaining high levels of technical and expressive proficiency to gain the approval of the fans who spend their entire musical lives between the years of 1969 and 1976, give or take a year or two on either side. I think namely of the biggest innovators in the progressive metal and tech/extreme prog metal subgenres. I know not everybody here is guilty of this, definitely not even most. I have encountered a few xenophobic posts relating to these subgenres because they chose to embrace styles and textures different from those cultivated by the dinosaur groups. You don't have to like it, but don't you dare say what they're doing is not progressive. They're still pushing the envelope and traversing previously unknown musical frontiers, which is the point of progressive in the first place. Close-minded bigotry is the epitome of regressive behavior in my book.

Ironically, some of those same groups from the "golden age of prog" (a label I loathe for its perpetuation of the false assumption that one generation's music is and always will be better than the output of all others forever) even had a hand in pioneering such styles. Exhibit A: Red.

cstack3 wrote: I don't see the same level of "sonic experimentation" going on with modern prog bands as we did in the 1970's.   John McLaughlin put the double-neck electric guitar to great effect, electric violin appeared in Mahavishnu Orchestra, King Crimson and other bands, Steve Howe brought the pedal-steel guitar, electric sitar and other strange instruments to the stage, and keyboardists like Wakeman and Hawkens gleefully mixed synth with harpsichord, Mellotron with ancient pipe organ etc.   Prog seems to be very much a formula these days - electric bass, drums, electric & acoustic guitars, and a modicum of electronic keys, usually patched to emulate the acoustic instruments.   What it needs is a good, dynamic kick in the arse!  Any ideas?   I'd enjoy seeing more women in prog, musical influences besides European classical and American blues/jazz idioms, and some fresh instrumentation.

Yeah, I'd definitely like to hear some more new sonic textures myself. I mean, with all the new technology nowadays, why on earth do so many groups keep looking backwards? It makes no sense to me.

The only group that comes to mind that I've heard incorporate more modern sounds into their mix is Riverside, and even then I still feel like they're only scratching the surface. The ultra-modern synth sounds on Anno Domini High Definition were truly astounding to me, and I want to hear more of that. Like now! They didn't exploit that nearly as much on SONGS, but I'm inclined to give them a pass as they did a respectable job of balancing the retro sounds with more modern components.