ITALY
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Category: Progressive Music Lounges
Forum Name: Prog Music Lounge
Forum Description: General progressive music discussions
URL: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=8887
Printed Date: August 09 2025 at 15:46
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Topic: ITALY
Posted By: Parker
Subject: ITALY
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 19:10
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Is Italy PROG CENTRAL? Because on the Growing Up Live DVD it was a sell-out, co-operative crowd. I 've also heard that a lot of people there like prog. Is it true? ------------- Former Username -The Prog Man "The Carpet Crawlers heed their callers: You've got to get in to get out" |
Replies:
Posted By: kirklott
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 19:37
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Italy is where Genesis had its first break through, with Gabriel. It's always been a prog hotbed. ------------- "Progressive rock is the key to the continuance of human evolution." - Charles Darwin |
Posted By: CrazyDiamond
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 19:42
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I'm Italian, I live in Rome, and I can tell you that prog is almost a sub genre. I like prog, but for example my friends say that I'm mad. Last year I brought them to a Genesis-cover band concert (The Musical Box), and they wanted to leave after 5 minutes! The guitar solo on Firth of Fifth? CRAP!!!!! As a matter of fact Italy is full of new progressive bands, taking inspiration from the past or trying to put their new ideas in music. But there are also prog events, with a big afflluence of people. It's very strange how the young masses here ignore the beauty of MUSIC, and instead of progressive rock (OR GOOD ROCK IN GENERAL) they prefer DISCO or HOUSE MUSIC, RAP or HIP HOP. I think it's a common phenomenon all around the world, people see Britney Spears at the top of the charts and believe that a n.1 song is the best a human being can produce in music. Am I wrong or is the same in other countries? ___BYE___ ------------- 
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Posted By: Paulieg
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 20:31
| It's the same here in the United States. Cable is full of MTV,FUSE, MTV2( like we don't have enough mtv already ), etc. bullsh*t. I can't stand the crap the masses listen to. It's the same with the radio stations. All they play is rap bullsh*t. I can't believe the crap that sells. The videos are horrible. It's all about the money you got, the girl you got, the guns you got, and how tough you are. It's all about image and posing bullsh*t. These guys all must be so insecure that they have to flaunt this type of bullsh*t on tv videos. It's sick. It makes me want to puke. None of it is about the MUSIC. It's such a sad state of affairs. By the way, I'm a big Italian progressive rock fan. Today I was listening to the Metamorfosi album, Inferno. What an album. The Italians are great musicians. They put so much passion into the art of music, yes I mean MUSIC, not the crap on MTV. I'd love to go to Italy and see Banco, PFM, La Maschera Di Cera, etc. perform. I'll get off my soap box now. It just pisses me off that the music industry is in such a sad state of affairs. Thank God for Prog. |
Posted By: Beau Heem
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 20:42
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Italian prog - good - definitely essential - but of course enjoyable - at any rate The amount (and the quality) of prog composed and played in Italy is astonishing, even though some might argue that where the Italian 70s prog acts are known, they tend to be a bit overstated (especially against other non-english-speaking stuff). The Italian prog scene of the 70s is the only one that can easily be compared with the english scene - these are, after all, the only countries that managed to give birth to a multitude of well-known and well-liked groups that aren't over-the-top-freaky (as most of the well-known, say, French prog acts are) or more krautrock driven (as, naturally, the german scene, which was also born considerably later than its english and italian "cousins"). Whereas the Italian prog heritage seems to live on in fresh (though, IMHO, ever too often uninspiring), new prog bands (which, no doubt, have also listened a fair deal of uk prog), the english scene hasn't got such a following (at least not to the same extent - or at least they are ignored by the devil of the industry). Perhaps this has to do with neo prog not being such a great hit in Italy, I don't know. My opinion, however, is that neo prog has almost killed the chances of prog rock's revival... If we consider the number of ppl living in a country, the most productive areas of prog rock in the world (in quantity as well as quality) are definitely the uk (especially England), Italy and Scandinavia. If we consider kraut rock and psychedelic electronic music as prog, German-speaking Europe surpasses the above mentioned by a distance - but being "the younger cousin" of the prog tradition, the German scene isn't really comparable... Please, ppl, disagree, so that we have a nice little conversation here Cheers -Beau ------------- --No enemy but time-- |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 20:57
so, would it be fair to say that young italians are becoming "americanized" as far as music is concerned ? if so...what a terrible tragedy  italy has a very rich tradition musically. having recently discovered these wonderful italian progressive bands (therefore, knowing what italian musicians are capable of producing) i would tend to agree that it is a very strange thing about the young masses ignoring beautiful music. |
CrazyDiamond wrote:Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 21:02
amen and amen  i'd love to go to italy too...just to go there. |
Posted By: Prog_Traveller
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 21:27
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I've often wondered how popular prog is in Italy or is like in the US where just a select few people know about it's and far from the mainstream. Do they have prog cds stores in Italy or at least a prog section in the cd stores? Can you go in and buy Banco, PFM, Le Orme and Area cds?
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Posted By: HeirToRuin
Date Posted: July 18 2005 at 21:29
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OMG EMPTY TREMOR
------------- ARTEMIA - http://www.reverbnation.com/artemiamusic" rel="nofollow - http://www.reverbnation.com/artemiamusic L.i.E. - http://www.reverbnati |
Posted By: Stiefel
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 02:51
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Posted By: Eetu Pellonpaa
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 03:02
There's also very good food, fine film directors and beatiful women in Italy! 
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Posted By: stonebeard
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 03:06
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to call Italy "prog central" may be a bit of an overstatement. a topic awhile back that Ivan started suggested Quebec to be the prog captiol of North America. This may be true. But I think that prog really gained speed in England. All of the greats originated in England: Genesis, Yes, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, King Crimson. That should warrent England to be in the race, if there is one, that is. ------------- http://soundcloud.com/drewagler" rel="nofollow - My soundcloud. Please give feedback if you want! |
Posted By: BiGi
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 03:24
How can I disagree?
I live in a small town nearby Turin and here the situation is more or less the one depicted by Crazy Diamond... Luckily many friends of mine dig the same bands I like, and so I can share my experience with them! But if you are in a band and try to walk in the Prog Fathers' footsteps you are sentenced to fail: no one will ever give you a chance onstage!  ------------- A flower? 
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Posted By: luc4fun
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 03:57
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During the Golden age of prog, this genre was very popular in Italy, and many italian bands were having big success even abroad (see Orme, PFM,Banco on top). As read in other post, even groups like Genesis, found their success in Italy, long before than in their own country. Nowadays prog music has lost its appeal especially on young generations, and italian groups find their success more abroad than in Italy. Of course there are lots of prog fans still, but most of them belong to the generation grown up with the music of VDGG,Genesis,ELP,Pink Floyd, KC etc. (people with grey hair..)
------------- Site Admin at www.progrockwall.com the first social network for Proggers! |
Posted By: paulindigo
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 04:05
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I was amazed to see lots of young people at the VDGG gig in Milan
last June, many of them also seemed to sing along to most of the songs... kids are rediscovering the Great Ones from the past (Led Zeppelin, Doors, Who), so I think there's hope for prog too! |
Posted By: MorgothSunshine
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 04:41
Yes, and bands like VDGG were very popular in Italy, even more than in England!!!...what a great period ------------- For every truth even the contrary is true... 
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Posted By: MorgothSunshine
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 04:53
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The problem is the industrial music system, in Italy Dream Theater "Octavarium" hits chart position #2!!!!! And MTV? just ignored it (they don't have a video, so they don't exist)! No one mentioned Dream Theater! On the TG on the national TV they showed an Anastacia's video!!!! Why the hell??? They showed it on the TG because no one was liking the song, so they had to push it! You must hear Anastacia or similar "artists" because musical industry invests in it!!! ...and probably that's the reason why musical industry is in depression. But i will always have prog in my heart!!! We have a mission guys, we will keep prog alive!! ------------- For every truth even the contrary is true...
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Posted By: BiGi
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 05:03
My opinion is: nobody should make music for a living! As a consequence, no one should expect making money out of it...first of all the recording companies! 
Take the big money out of music (BAN the phrase "Music business"!!!) and you'll see quality rise! ------------- A flower?
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Posted By: luc4fun
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 05:20
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One of the problems (I believe worldwide) is that image has taken priority on quality. Prog music is where you must show what you are able to do.You cannot pretend!
------------- Site Admin at www.progrockwall.com the first social network for Proggers! |
Posted By: CrazyDiamond
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 08:53
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I totally agree with you, guys. Dream Theater doesn't make a videoclip? They are completely ignored by the masses. Now, we aren't talking about LIKE / DISLIKE Dream Theater, I think we all know that almost every band on this website is greater than any other band or singer appearing today on an MTV show.The big big problem is Top of the Pops and similar WHERE ARE WE GOING? As someone often says in this Forum, I repeat sadly KEEP ON PROGGIN' (referred to those who can still play good music.. ) ___BYE___ -------------
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, oh my God, Posted By: lmollea
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 09:21
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Hi italians!
Why prog fails? Because although Italy has a great music tradition and history (we could remember for example that half of the most importan XIX century Opera composers were italian: Verdi, Rossini, Puccini, just to name a few), we lost completely our love and interest for MUSIC! I will be a little bit "unpolitically correct", but the hype prog had in the '70s was because prog was considered as "protest" music, not simply music and experimentation in sound. The word was "protest" not music. Nowadays Eminem is seen as "protest" music and so it's why he's popular. Probably you would wonder why Britney Spears or Blue are popular. I don't know, but I think MTV plays its part. MTV is seen as a "protest" television, focusing on music and the message is that music is only a mean of "protest", so only what MTV transmit is seen as music. I also think the majority of italian listener have no real musical interest, music is just a social mean of making contacts: no-one listens to IQ or Steve Hackett or Brahms (classical music for me suffer the same illenss in Italy) because it would be difficult to find someone with the same tastes. So everyone listen to the same songs. --------------------- Semm che, semm che settą giņ in del bar / a cercą l'universo nel bucčer del Cynar cosmonauti al tavolino cun la sigareta in błca / che vemm a cambią el mund apena finissum la sambuca |
Posted By: Jon The Impaler
Date Posted: July 19 2005 at 11:29
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I go down the gym 2 or 3 times a week and they have some music channel on - its bloody awful ..... full of the likes of Justin Timberlake ( whata ridiculous voice !) and other such dross ...I know its Justin Timberlake because it said so underneath on the video. Its either that or rappers or the likes of Britney , or the worst of all ........ Kylie Minogue . ------------- Its expensive being poor |
Posted By: Grace Flower
Date Posted: July 20 2005 at 12:27
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I come from a little town near Pistoia, Tuscany. I must say that in Italy many people DON'T UNDERSTAND ANYTHING ABOUT MUSIC!! ------------- don't touch my prog! |
Posted By: King of Loss
Date Posted: July 20 2005 at 12:35
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Precisely, its like that all over the place. But I must say Octavarium at #2 in Italy, very good indeed |