What made the 70's prog so unique? - Progressive Rock Music Forum

Author

Message

Topic Search

Topic Options

Kati

Forum Senior Member

Joined: September 10 2010
Location: Earth
Status: Offline
Points: 6253

Posted: May 17 2015 at 05:36

sensual paintings are too much for our prog community nowadays meanwhile the pop artists who sell cd's to 11 to 14 year old teenagers are selling their naked sexuality as a brand and image i.e. Miley Cyrus MTV video Miley Cyrus - Wrecking Ball https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My2FRPA3Gf8

Prog peeps are becoming conservative poops really, shame on all, even disregarding previous prog album covers.

Some people suck out the fun and free fab things in life, this is a shame!

Edited by Kati - May 17 2015 at 05:43

Svetonio

Forum Senior Member

Joined: September 20 2010
Location: Serbia
Status: Offline
Points: 10213

Posted: May 17 2015 at 05:43

Kati wrote:

Svetonio wrote:

The Dark Elf wrote:

Green Shield Stamp wrote:

Komandant Shamal wrote:

Dean wrote:

The Dark Elf wrote:

Toaster Mantis wrote:

The early 1970s were a pretty interesting time for art in general, see also film and literature for that matter. I get the impression it wasn't a very fun time to be alive in, maybe it's different in other countries but the 1973 oil crisis hit my parents' generation harder economically than the 2008 stock market crash hit mine, for very similar reasons though!

The 70s in the U.S. were an absolute blast to live through, Simon (as a teenager, anyway). The best concerts I've ever seen, cigarettes and drugs were cheap, gas (even with various oil embargos) was cheap (I remember a "gas war" one summer when the gas price went down to 25 cents), and unprotected sex didn't kill you. Because the drinking age was still 18 (it eventually went up to 21), I managed to start jamming in bars when I was 16 in 1976 (I looked older for my age).

What more could you ask for?

And that's why the USA didn't invent Prog Rock ... too busy having fun Wink

In the UK we had the 3-day week and power-cuts, inflation was running at 20%, we saw a 70% increase in fuel prices and house prices increased by a factor of five (and thus so did rents). During that decade unemployment doubled and that would continue to increase dramatically in the early half of 80s.

Somehow I don't think that Komandantio will be doing his performing seal impression for this post. Wink

I do think that you "somehow" missed a much more important thing for the birth of Prog Rock in England, especially in a part of England that you mentioned earlier.

Mainly not so nice looking Prog Rock musicians, in early 70s in England, in fact they had the problem to find the girls just for sex and fun. They saw some grupie-girls for the first time when they went in America. The Rock with all of those "wilde things" was all around, but Prog Rock in England was an unhappy island of solitude.

The situation with Prog audience in England at that time, mainly male, were nothing better. Almost all of that English hardcore Prog crowd were - for the girls - sexually unattractive boys, from the middle class, without a chance to find a girl for some sex and fun before marriage - the girls were just ignored them. And then the young English "progheads" were run away into pessimism and melancholy of the music and lyrics of early 70s English Prog Rock, garnished with that imaginary world of "demons and wizards", what all together was some kind of a "refuggee camp" for them. And that's why Zappa, with his own style of Prog Rock, with his music and lyrics, "was not regarded as Prog Rock", as you said. And really, Zappa couldnt be anything like that for the English "progheads" in early 70s, because Frank Zappa wasnt one who offers a shelter.

There is an element of truth in this. There was an item on BBC2's Newsnight some months ago and the cultural correspondent, Steven Smith referred to Prog as the sort of music that was beloved by men of a certain age who still lived with their mums. I wonder how many Prog fans were sexually confident and popular with the girls when they first developed their fascination with the music. I suspect not many.

Steven Smith would like to perpetuate a myth (like myths of dragons and elves in prog). What's this fellow done, musically (or sexually, for that matter)? Just another uptight elitist from Oxford who most likely was violated with a chair leg during initiations as a fresher in his first year.

Among other interesting things in Prog Rock Britannia, the bigs as Mont Campbell, Rick Wakeman, Carl Palmer, Phil Collins etc were saying something about that phenomenon.

9:28 - 10:06

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1DqvUS1vB8

0:00 - 2:00

Sventonio this is a brilliant documentary too with Syd Barret, David Bowie, Roxy Music and Genesis too :) here Phil Collins even said that were boring except Gabriel in appearance and they had no idea he would appear on stage with a fox on his head and a red dress

Seven Ages of Rock -White Light, White Heat, Art Rock part2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2b93MHtWIo

Thank you Kati, I didn't saw that video before

Toaster Mantis View Drop Down

Forum Senior Member

Joined: April 12 2008
Location: Denmark
Status: Offline
Points: 5898

Posted: May 17 2015 at 05:53

Somewhat off-topic: Am I the only one who thinks Miley Cyrus' new image, at least as presented in Wrecking Ball, kinda resembles a pop version of 1980s hardcore punk group The Plasmatics' late frontwoman Wendy O. Williams?

(not in astronomical range of being safe for work)

"The past is not some static being, it is not a previous present, nor a present that has passed away; the past has its own dynamic being which is constantly renewed and renewing." - Claire Colebrook

Windhawk

Special Collaborator

Honorary Collaborator

Joined: December 28 2006
Location: Norway
Status: Offline
Points: 11400

Posted: May 17 2015 at 07:17

Toaster Mantis wrote:

Somewhat off-topic: Am I the only one who thinks Miley Cyrus' new image, at least as presented in Wrecking Ball, kinda resembles a pop version of 1980s hardcore punk group The Plasmatics' late frontwoman Wendy O. Williams?

(not in astronomical range of being safe for work)

Ah, Wendy. She might actually have been an inspiration for a band that took that approach to the extreme. Presumably at least someone frequenting this forum have come across Rockbitch at some point, and their (in)famous Golden Condom Award.

Websites I work with:

http://www.progressor.net
http://www.houseofprog.com

My profile on Mixcloud:
https://www.mixcloud.com/haukevind/

Toaster Mantis View Drop Down

Forum Senior Member

Joined: April 12 2008
Location: Denmark
Status: Offline
Points: 5898

Posted: May 17 2015 at 07:40

Kesha is a fan of The Residents so it's probably not that far-fetched...

"The past is not some static being, it is not a previous present, nor a present that has passed away; the past has its own dynamic being which is constantly renewed and renewing." - Claire Colebrook

Dellinger

Forum Senior Member

VIP Member

Joined: June 18 2009
Location: Mexico
Status: Offline
Points: 12581

Posted: May 17 2015 at 22:06

Kati wrote:

Dean wrote:

Toaster Mantis wrote:

Regarding the entire gender issues thing, I'm not sure how correct it is because I know plenty of progressive rock fans who are in long-term relationships and contrary to popular stereotype also as many women as men who are into this kind of music. (including one of my exes!) Then again I get the impression the UK is rather conservative when it comes to gender roles compared to Continental Europe especially Scandinavia.

British sexual conservatism, (i.e. self-effacing reserve and repression), is another popular stereotype and one we are quite happy to portray to the outside world along with the stiff upper-lip and propensity to drink tea. Promiscuity in the UK is on a par with the rest of Europe, we just don't wave it around in public.

Fact! I painted an album cover of a woman (who does not even exist btw) wearing French knickers and a blanket but I got negative backlash for it and she is not even naked not slightly!

This makes me a bit upset because guns and violence are ok and acceptable but a sensual woman although she does not exist is taboo for some arghhh not fair and completely wrong, we have our morals and priorities twisted.

really

Hereby I doubt we have progressed, one has to think of earlier albums like Brand X among so many others

Is that Corvus Stone? I thought I saw you mentioned in the credits

Dean

Special Collaborator

Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout

Joined: May 13 2007
Location: Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 37575

Posted: May 18 2015 at 03:50

Kati wrote:

Fact! I painted an album cover of a woman (who does not even exist btw) wearing French knickers and a blanket but I got negative backlash for it and she is not even naked not slightly!

really

Hereby I doubt we have progressed, one has to think of earlier albums like Brand X among so many others

Kati wrote:

sensual paintings are too much for our prog community nowadays meanwhile the pop artists who sell cd's to 11 to 14 year old teenagers are selling their naked sexuality as a brand and image i.e. Miley Cyrus MTV video Miley Cyrus - Wrecking Ball https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My2FRPA3Gf8

Prog peeps are becoming conservative poops really, shame on all, even disregarding previous prog album covers.

Some people suck out the fun and free fab things in life, this is a shame!

I don't think it is so much about becoming conservative as about being liberal because the issue is not about sensuality or titivation but of exploitation and objectification. I get where you are coming from with the fact that the figure on the album cover is a fictional character so that cannot be exploitive of the lady in question (though arguing that it does not objectify women is perhaps harder to argue). To me censoring non-photographic figurative art is ludicrous but that does not mean the artist is automatically exempt from being censured for creating the art work in the first place. A harsh view perhaps, but freedom of expression comes at a price and that is the freedom to criticise. Ms Cyrus has not escaped criticism from liberals for exploiting her own body and from conservatives for being pornographic, even though much of it in the tabloid press and social media seems hypocritical rather than just critical, [they are exploiting Ms Cyrus's image to sell their message].

Whether it is conservative censoring or liberal censuring really depends on where you draw the line and on which side of it you then choose to stand. At what point does the use of a sensual image to convey a narrative become morally offensive/embarrassing and at what point is it the exploitive objectification of sex to sell a product?

From my centrist (liberal) view both views seem to be equally silly and equally as repressed and repressive; both reflect a disconnect from physical reality and a denial of what we are. We cannot and should not deny our own sexuality or what we find to be sensual or arousing.

What?

defectinggrey View Drop Down

Forum Senior Member

Joined: March 14 2015
Location: Spain
Status: Offline
Points: 104

Posted: May 18 2015 at 07:16

I grew up with Mersey Beat and RnB. Then I discovered three cliches, sex and drugs and rock and roll. Very successful with two of those but not so good with the third (ask my wife of nearly 40 years!).

The main point however is that myself and my friends enjoyed discovering all sorts of music and didn't bother too much about labels as long as it was rock.

Early bands we saw were Pretty Things, Nice, Hawkwind, Fusion Orchestra, Bowie, Egg, Stray, Free, Mott, Caravan, Yes, Audience, Gong, Gnidrolog, Bram Stoker, Little Free Rock, Barclay James Harvest, Groundhogs, Savoy Brown, Babe Ruth.

All in all a very diverse range and then there were the American Bands which you could obtain on record.

At the time we just liked getting stoned and listening to music. It didn't have to be Prog or Heavy or Blues it just had to be good!

Guldbamsen View Drop Down

Special Collaborator

Retired Admin

Joined: January 22 2009
Location: Magic Theatre
Status: Offline
Points: 23098

Posted: May 18 2015 at 07:21

defectinggrey wrote:

It didn't have to be Prog or Heavy or Blues it just had to be good!

Pretty much my philosophy as well, although I've learned to use the boxes in order to better communicate with folks over the interwebs. It's still down to the feel of the thing. If it's got some fire and passion, then I don't care whether it's prog, punk, disco, jazz, pop or avantguarde polka.

“The Guide says there is an art to flying or rather a knack. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.”

- Douglas Adams

Altairius

Forum Senior Member

Joined: February 14 2014
Status: Offline
Points: 187

Posted: May 18 2015 at 07:33

Horizons wrote:

I don't understand what is wrong with intentionally trying to be different. Trying to sound out of the box. Being complex to test yourself and your creativity. Wasn't that the point of the movement in the first place? To set your music apart and "break the mold of pop music"?

I'm not sure how someone even measures or judges a band's intention of creative motivation by listening to them?

You should try to make good music, and it will probably be somewhat 'different' if it's good. Bands that try to sound 'different' end up sounding contrived.

Slartibartfast View Drop Down

Collaborator

Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam

Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29625

Posted: May 18 2015 at 08:40

It happened to be at the right place at the right time, nothing more nothing less.

Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...

Slartibartfast View Drop Down

Collaborator

Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam

Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29625

Posted: May 18 2015 at 08:48

does the musid sound good or doesn't it?if you over analize it you are wasting my time.

Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...

Slartibartfast View Drop Down

Collaborator

Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam

Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29625

Posted: May 18 2015 at 13:46

Being around when it was. If it was around in the the 80's it would have been around in the '80's... If you could bother yourself to look there was plenty of good prop going on but then again that have been too much trouble...

Edited by Slartibartfast - May 18 2015 at 13:55

Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...

Slartibartfast View Drop Down

Collaborator

Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam

Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29625

Posted: May 18 2015 at 14:08

what killed prog in he 1970's as pathetic attempts to go commercial not punk

Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...

Gerinski

Prog Reviewer

Joined: February 10 2010
Location: Barcelona Spain
Status: Offline
Points: 5091

Posted: May 18 2015 at 16:05

You can only invent Prog Rock once.

Prog Rock is a genre which exploited a balance between ear-friendly rock and some more complex idioms in terms of composition, instrumental technique or instrumentation. That was done in the late 1960's and the 1970's, that's it. It can be repeated in many ways but it will not sound new.

There can be different new ways of being innovative but if they do not exploit the same principles, they will not be Prog Rock as we know it, they will just be new kinds of progressive music.

cleardot

Forum Newbie

Joined: May 26 2015
Location: NY, NY
Status: Offline
Points: 2

Posted: May 27 2015 at 11:56

Sorry if this old article has been posted a million times, for me it accurately describes the musical culture that spawned early prog.

http://www.oocities.org/sunsetstrip/8827/essay.html

The early progressives were not casual listeners of Stravinsky, Holst and Copland. Jon Anderson once stated he analyzed Petrushka and Rite of Spring to "understand how they worked". It paid off: Yes was Stravinskian without copying Stravinsky. The uniqueness and quality of 70's prog owed much to the listening work those musicians did, not to mention their high level of literacy. I'm glad it can't be reproduced with a set of "prog rules".

New groups like Buke and Gase, Victoire, Tuneyards are playing fantastic games with polyrhythm and structure but I do miss the long form works of those early bands. The nostalgia factor is real. But if I heard a band today as good as Genesis in 72 I'd know it.

Chicapah

Prog Reviewer

Joined: February 14 2006
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 8238

Posted: May 29 2015 at 15:02

I'm not going to read every post so this may be redundant but what made 70s prog unique was the fact that people were more willing to listen to an entire LP from start to finish than they are now. A 20 minute epic like "Close to the Edge" would get a fair listen more than once in the analog era and its memorable themes and dynamic movements would inevitably endear the music to even the most casual or pop-biased of ear. No doubt there are prog artists creating aural art these days that are just as talented as Yes, ELP and the like but folks are reticent to spend more than four minutes on a piece of music. And that's the shame of it all.

"Literature is well enough, as a time-passer, and for the improvement and general elevation and purification of mankind, but it has no practical value" - Mark Twain

Dellinger

Forum Senior Member

VIP Member

Joined: June 18 2009
Location: Mexico
Status: Offline
Points: 12581

Posted: May 29 2015 at 21:26

Chicapah wrote:

I'm not going to read every post so this may be redundant but what made 70s prog unique was the fact that people were more willing to listen to an entire LP from start to finish than they are now. A 20 minute epic like "Close to the Edge" would get a fair listen more than once in the analog era and its memorable themes and dynamic movements would inevitably endear the music to even the most casual or pop-biased of ear. No doubt there are prog artists creating aural art these days that are just as talented as Yes, ELP and the like but folks are reticent to spend more than four minutes on a piece of music. And that's the shame of it all.

So, you would say that what made prog great in the 70's was the audience more than the bands themselves? That's an interesting notions, and it rings some truth, but I'm not sure I'm ready to embrace it as the most important reason.

Intruder

Forum Senior Member

Joined: May 13 2005
Status: Offline
Points: 2084

Posted: May 30 2015 at 22:28

The above "audience" idea is interesting. Prog had a captive audience at the time. Then came the VCR....Atari....cable tv.....the great prog killers. Now those pimply faced kids aren't out grabbing the new Wishbone Ash, they're out scoring porn videos.....or watching kung fu on channel 11....or Richard Pryor....or Space Invaders and Breakout (a personal fave).....the power of the video image.....the interactivity of hand, eye and screen! To compete, things needed to get....shinier, prettier, younger, more watchable, more shocking! Easy to see why punk swept over things so quickly.....a great market grab scheme as it was the first real movement in pop culture immersed in video culture.....brilliantly used, as well. Music truly about the audience.....the fashion, hairstyles and attitude translated immediately. Hide you Yesshirts.....it's the punk hordes!

The rest is history.....prog became a niche market with bands either sticking to the old vein or incorporating mainstream elements....now we pick over the remnants and decide what is or isn't prog, but....of this I'm sure, from the mid 60s to the early 70, originality was rife....progressive music was the norm....."prog" was "art rock" and even Billy Joel was using Wakeman swirls in his songs. The "manufacturing" of music had begun but the music was still the primary force. Ahhhh, to be alive when FM mattered, when record stores were shrines, when rock shows weren't clichés...amazing time to have been a modern-day "prog" fan.

I like to feel the suspense when you're certain you know I am there.....

rogerthat

Prog Reviewer

Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
Status: Offline
Points: 9869

Posted: May 30 2015 at 22:37

Partly, it's a simplistic explanation. I am not quite so young anymore as I nudge 30 but I was very much in my early 20s when I got into 70s prog and had all the patience for CTTE, still do. My problem is entirely different from what he describes: over the years I have become very intolerant of cliches and that makes me hyper selective in modern prog. It would have been the same had I lived through the 70s. I just get to reap the benefits of the 'selection' that has been done by listeners over three decades and go straight for the classics instead of wade through a sea of mediocre albums to find that diamond in the rough.

But partly, it has a modicum of truth. Not so much in terms of patience but perhaps open mindedness. John Wetton in his 90s interview has said it was possible to get away with outrageous experimentation in live shows in the 70s whereas only very abbreviated, muted improvs would be tolerated today. There's too much of "I know what I like and I don't want anything else" in the air. Maybe music is now just a sideshow, a soundtrack to our computerised lives and this close minded stance is a symptom of that. But anyhow, when I was listening to Indian music as a teenager, I did not know that I would go on to like heavy metal and prog rock, indeed a whole host of Western music genres. I did not know when I got introduced to Metallica that one day I would develop the appetite for stuff like Morton Feldman or Terry Riley. So I can't make sense of this stance where listeners already believe they know what they want - only a jaded mind thinks that way. But there it is and it is not an environment that's going to encourage artists to be bold. Even if they are bold, it has to fit within certain patterns of weirdness/avant garde-ness/chaos. A band like Yes were bold within, largely, the framework of conventional melody. That kind of prog has disappeared. Possibly there is a dearth of new ideas to make conventional melody exciting but partly it is also a reflection of a myopic, misguided mindset wherein anything that sounds melodic is automatically passive and boring music.