The evolution of a creative band

pianoman wrote: Sorta unrelated, but you do have to consider that in the 70's Prog WAS commercial

Pianoman said something interesting here. Do you think his way? If we find a conclusion to this we'll maybe find a conclusion to the main topic.

The_Jester wrote: pianoman wrote: Sorta unrelated, but you do have to consider that in the 70's Prog WAS commercial Pianoman said something interesting here. Do you think his way? If we find a conclusion to this we'll maybe find a conclusion to the main topic.

Well, considering the sales figures for bands like Pink Floyd, ELP, Yes, JT and Genesis I'd say they were very commercially successful.

cstack3 wrote: pianoman wrote: Sorta unrelated, but you do have to consider that in the 70's Prog WAS commercial Exactly!  When I was about 17 years old, I'd get into the jalopy car and turn on the lovely, low-tech AM radio.  A typical playlist on the local Chicago stations would include: Yes - "Roundabout" ELP - "From The Beginning" Moody Blues - "Rock'n Roll Band" and "Knights in White Satin" Focus - "Hocus Pocus"  Flash - "Small Beginnings"  Jethro Tull - "Living In The Past" This was all interspersed with pop by Michael Jackson, Elton John etc.    But, as someone pointed out, "no King Crimson."  Somehow, they missed the Top 40 action.

Interesting thread certainly and some very thoughtful posts to date. It strikes me that the responses will be dictated by how we interpret evolution i.e. some think of such as adaptation to market forces (like Genesis and Yes becoming more radio friendly in the 80's) or as MarkOne highlighted just to survive as viable artists by whatever means available. Others take the view that to evolve means to expand, surmount or (gulp) progress beyond the limits imposed by mainstream market forces (which of course requires either shedloads of wonga or the sort of seismic shift in the musical landscape brought about by someone like the Beatles or Crimson)

Skägget wrote: Evolution of a musician or a band doesn't have to go only one way all the time either. I mean, why should a band in the prog genre just evolve into more complexity. Then they would actually stop evolving because they would only do what they know they can do and perhaps define themselves more but stagnating in evolution. Why can't some people understand that if you have been doing complex music for 10 years you might hear a bob dylan song that has three chords in five minutes and hear the beaty of the simplicity, falling in love with this approach and begining to progress in that direction instead of just doing more complex songs. If proggression should only go towards more complexity it would at some point down the line pass a point where it would not be listenable no more.

I agree with the thoughts here and especially with the last line but can't think of many prog rock bands who adapted well to the pop format, barring Genesis and even they were no longer as interesting as they used to be in their prog avatar (and yes, great pop can be more interesting than prog precisely because it is so much more to the point).  Yes worked it well on 90125 by combining some of their proggy aspects with a certain catchiness and accessibility their music always possessed.  Both however went very commercial and I think commercial pressures did play a part there rather than falling in love with simplicity because it is not SINCERE pop music like Beatles's Yesterday or Eleanor Rigby.  Mostly it's bands who are already good at working a pop format who do well even when they go more overtly pop. Pink Floyd circa Wall were more pop/rock-oriented than in their Atom Heart/Meddle days but they always had the knack of writing appealing rock songs so it was not much of a change for them.