 micky wrote:
Logan wrote:
No time to even read what's been said, but since coming here I've felt and expressed that Cream would be a worthy addition to the archives under Proto-Prog, but never started a topic on it because the full "Prog" additions deserve more concentration. I personally don't think that the blues elements should exclude the band, either.
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except for prog seemed to be.. at least in the formative stage an attempt to get away from the blues based riffing of the late sixties and incorporate art.. structure... and other influences in music. At least that is how I see it.
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You're correct to my knowledge; that was my understanding, and I certainly wouldn't recommend Cream for a proper Prog category. While blues was important to Cream (and how many blues covers did they do?), and some of the band's best work was sort of blues/ psychadelic fusion, the band was considerably more than just a bluesy jam rock band. Not only do I understand the band to have been influential to the progressive rock and jam scenes, but to my ear quite a bit of the music has compositional/ structural and instrumental similarities to Prog. I'd also say that they deviated from bluesy songs, but many such songs were not typical rock -- though had mainstream success. Can find songs with unusual time signatures (helps that they had a jazzy drummer), jazzy elements, and use of various non-typically rock instrumentation.
Personally, I think Wheels of Fire is a pretty progressive album of 1968, and while there is the typical blues-based music, music like Pressed Rat and Warthog, Anyone for Tennis, and Passing the Time which opens in a bluesy fashion show something of the whimsy quite commonly found in Prog (and Proto-Prog). Rather bombastic songs like Tales of Brave Ulysses (off Disreali Gears - 1967) and White Room have something of an early prog pedigree too.
Anyway, for tall this talk, it's been ages since I last listened to Cream, though I once loved the band, so perhaps I'm going on memory too much and I didn't know Prog so well then.
Perhaps people don't think Cream influential enough to Prog bands (and I suspect it may be more influential to Prog-Related ones lol) and not simailar enough in sound to those bands in Proto-Prog that set the standards (yes, I think the old if x is valid for inclusion then y does too argument, if relevantly used, has merit).
Ah well, this was bit of a waste of time typing as I don't really anything worthy of noting.
If this site sought to be the most comprehensive Prog, Prog Related, and Proto Prog (term I'd change) resource on the net, then Cream's, inclusion, I believe, would be highly warranted. I like the idea of a pre-Prog category as it can help trace the development of progressive rock, but as it is now it is so disorganised, which is fine in a way because more work should be put into working with Prog bands/ artists. The choices just appear so arbitrary at times. It only natural that people will ask if x is here why not y? And as long as it's not a case of apples and oranges, then it's fair.
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Cream: Proto-Prog?
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