Grateful Dead for Prog Related?

Oops.   Sorry I mis read something

Edited by Valdez - June 23 2025 at 10:55

Mellotron Storm wrote: I feel they don't belong here. But maybe if I was a fan I wouldn't be saying this. Maybe prog related but then again... I just don't feel that they belong. And I did own a few of their so called key albums back in the day which I have since given away. To each his own I suppose. We all fight for our favourite bands to be on here.

Hi,

To make PA a better place with a more interesting and detailed identity about what makes "progressive" music in any language or idiom, I think that you have to be able to look at music and having a reasonable understanding without it being your "favorite". In other words, a more reasonable amount of objectivity is necessary, in order to make the PA ideas better, and not just an Internet fame and hit thing.

The idea and fact that helped start it, was the it was not "commercial" or defined as a "hit song", is something that is totally forgotten, or ignored these days, and the style of listing and showing these is likely to be something that we would not do in the old days, although this would easily be dismantled as an argument depending on the quantity of the bands listed ... we didn't have 100 bands or more every month ... we had 10, maybe 20, and there was nothing written about most of them!

And a whole lot of us loved them, and today, these are revered and appreciated, but no one is wanting to help with the effort to show how the music survived, for which the wily ways of radio, and specially FM Radio in America, are a most important piece of information. There even were a lot of differences in the FM radio dial across America, but the horrific, and destructive example, took place in LA ... and was ignored across the country. On that day, corporate seized control of music again (they had it before via the movies and their stars), and turned many of the FM stations into classic stations, playing the same hit songs over and over on tape. The days of a DJ were over, and it ended up looking like no one wanted to hear stoned out idiots picking up young girls anyway, and playing loud rock music to show they were cool!

NOTE: This is important today, with so many corporations buying out a lot of artists' catalogues left and right ... and it means they will play whatever they want when they want, and if they want to bury someone, they will! But, I'm not sure that we will criticize folks selling their work like it has happened. I can hear it now ... "love is the drug" twice every hour!

But, through all this stuff, which was there before, the music survived. And is still appreciated, and this begs for a better discussion and a clean up of all the ideas, as an artistic movement, not a singled out hit song. These days, the ideas of an artistic anything is one of the biggest turn offs for internet folks. The only art that matters for them is how the number of hits that the pod cast gets ... to the point where RB is worried about the number of hits and signed fans.

Someone joked one time in a movie about burying someone ... go ahead ... they will be bigger and better yet! And I, somehow, think that the GD has the quantity and quality to make something like this take place. And it still being appreciated after all these years ... is neat ... far out ... and worth while the listen, be it this or that kind of something or other.

Edited by moshkito - June 23 2025 at 09:06

Cream absolutely influenced prog, you can hear it (e.g. Tempest just as one example). So I would not object to them being in the Proto-prog category.   Quicksilver is a different matter, and as they did not influence prog (to my ears), I'd have to hear a largely progressive album from them which I am not aware exists.

To reiterate, when all is said & done, I don't think the Grateful Dead would be an astute addition to any category on PA.   

Brian Wilson & Brothers, aka The Beach Boys are another matter and the evidence for Protoprog is abundant and evident.   In fact they were the first true progressive rock band.

I would always push back against this notion. Never been that keen on 'experimental' and the word 'progressive' can refer to the way a piece of music progresses and not about whether the artist is progressing. It gets highly subjective. Ie 'bad' experimental versus 'good' conventional music? Experimentation is good in itself but can be horrible to listen to. Conventional music can have no unique or experimental qualities but still be good to listen to. I still think we need a strong historical understanding of prog rock and why it exists. I tend to see The Grateful Dead as a band that existed in its own space. They had little to do with the movement that was lead by ELP, Yes, Genesis and King Crimson. They will always be the 'big four' for me. The US bands tended to be more jazz fusion orientated and that is not at all surprising either. Psyche was a hangover from the sixties and largely about hippy dippy culture and especially drugs. The UK prog movement was more formal and conventional and very much middle class and 'safe'. I think many folks have a hard time with this idea and want it to be a more edgy thing. It wasn't.

I guess it's progressive in a   Number Nine ... Number Nine   sort of way.   To me it's more experimental than progressive.

Edited by Atavachron - November 21 2024 at 20:05

^ But Cream and QMS are demonstrably not progressive.   The Dead's material was less demonstrably not progressive, and because they survived long past those other bands they had the time & chance to at least expand and grow.   When I would see Cipollina playing solo, though an awesome guitar player, he was the same blues-rock artist he'd always been.   Same with Clapton, in fact they are both painfully non-progressive and they wouldn't have it any other way.

There is in fact a difference between artists who maintain their allegiance to a specific musical tradition, and those who have the opportunity to reexamine and liquidate from time to time. The Dead may not have been progressive rock, but, as I say in my Robert Plant review for Principle of Moments, they certainly were digressive rock.

I stand by my evaluation that in the end, the Dead should probably not be added.   But it doesn't change what they were.

No for me. Long songs with a lot of jamming do not necessarily mean the band is progressive. If that were the case, I would suggest The Allman Brothers were far more "progressive" in how they made progressive blues, and their elongated jams were heavily jazz inflected. You are opening a can of worms here.

Time is not unlimited for any of us unfortunately. Admins (in the way we use titles at PA) made it that they don't need to listen at all, but instead the process involved others knowing the material, seeking outside consensus, and then presenting the arguments to the admin. It helps when people are detailed but also streamlined and economical. The most relevant to a Prog site albums can be brought up, the most relevant music from albums, and then the most relevant info suggested (related acts, influence, similar cases etc.). Simple works best. Like they might teach in Arguments 101 (and not in the Argument sketch), a good argument is where the premises that support the conclusion are relevant, sufficient and acceptable. While it has been an expectation that a Special Collab brings a case to Admin, everybody who wants to can have part to play in the process by offering arguments for or against, providing relevant info and material....

In this particular rejected case, I would call it Dead in the water, which might make some grateful. I figure one an celebrate, discuss and enjoy a band whether it's added to PA or now. Adding band does nor make it any more Prog or better or worthy of appreciation from a global perspective.

Ahh, late preparing breakfast for my son, bad dad. he loves to compose music on the piano, by the way. He takes after my dad.

Captain Midnight wrote: The Grateful Dead deserve a spot under prog related imo,

The Grateful Dead were not a prog-related band. Only Progarchives' psychedelic rock section could be a suitable place for the Dead if they merit inclusion.

FYI: I will move this from Suggest New Bands to General Music discussions. This has come up again and again, been rejected, and this thread does not meet the requirements for a new topic in this forum (see this topic for detaila on making topics in the Suggest New Bands forum -- https://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=122381 ).

I don't know Grateful Dead well, and was not an admin when it was formally rejected but I have followed topics on it before. I have heard Blues for Allah and Terrapin Station.

By the way, this site goes back before M@x was involved to 2002 at least. Population started with the original owners, they left, Prog Lucky bought it, and then he had M@x, who is web developer come on as partner. A lot was added before M@x and at one time anyone could add bands. The way things work were restructured by 2004, and then we had gatekeepers and quality control. M@x was not allowing all in, and his mind was changed on some by collabs when I was new to the game here.

This site has "evolved' over the years with how things work and what has been includable. I would say that we have been more open over the past eight years, say, than before that, while at the same time we upped some expectations due to the flooding of topics.

I agree that one should not need a new release for a re-evaluation if it had been formally rejected. And in fact this has been overturned or ignored various times over the years that I have belonged to this site when it comes to cases. Think more to the spirit of the law than the letter of the law and I expect teams to try also think, what makes sense here? Best to ask Admin and others in those cases if okay.

A band/artist may not have been properly evaluated originally, a poor presentation may have have been offered, the wrong material may have been evaluated, there may have been problems getting the music to the teams to listen to, team members sometimes do have bad days and make mistakes (we are all human), and importantly, personnel related acts may have been added in the meantime. One thing with Prog Related and Proto-Prog has been that it's not just about the music, it's about presenting good arguments, getting support from the public and collabs, and spelling-out clearly the relations to bands included in Prog categories. Some of the worst arguments have been of the "X and Y are here and therefore Z should be here" when X and Y don't even bear much in the way of relations at all (not in terms of sound, genre, personal relations, history....). That kind of thing hurts the case in people's eyes.

I don't expect to see The Grateful Dead in PA, partially as I have not been convinced of the arguments for it in the many times it has come up and that there has been significant people against it.

Oh, and Site Admin formally did not exclude bands based on sound they heard for years and is still officially the policy, it was not based on their listening, but instead the decision was based on evaluating the arguments that were presented by the sponsoring Special Collaborator and from reading the arguments in the threads. I would say that if people are to bring up bands for inclusion in PR and PP in Suggest New Bands, try to present a really knowledgeable and logical case in the topic, research any of the old topics on it (if one is unlocked still, things would automatically lock over time, use that) and try to tick off as many boxes as possible such as impact, similar bands included in Prog categories, similar cases, personnel relations as well as links to the music that has the strongest relations to Prog and discussion of the albums that are most relevant to a Prog site.

EDIT: By the way, while we have been more relaxed with it in some ways, here is the Official Prog Related submissions policy: CLICK to read here

Edited by Logan - November 20 2024 at 09:00