Emulating Classic Prog Is Not Prog |
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Dean
Special Collaborator Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 13:47 | |||
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What?
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Triceratopsoil
Forum Senior Member Joined: April 03 2010 Location: Canada Status: Offline Points: 18016 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 13:54 | |||
Maybe, but if your singer needs pitch correction they shouldn't be your singer .
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thehallway
Prog Reviewer Joined: April 13 2010 Location: Dorset, England Status: Offline Points: 1433 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 13:57 | |||
They shouldn't be anyone's singer........ but sometimes I like a nice out-of-tune blues or country vocal!
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Dean
Special Collaborator Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 14:20 | |||
Whether any singer should use autotune is not for me to decide. If they do and you can't tell then what's the problem? How many guitarists tune their guitars purely by ear?
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What?
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 15:14 | |||
That is not a MUSICAL definition at all. What does it say? It says it is a form of rock music that evolved in the late 60s and early 70s as part of an attempt to elevate the credibility of rock music. Music that elevates the credibility of rock music could be so many things. It goes on to mention broad musical characteristics but by no means are these any more than vaguely indicative of what constitutes prog. Notice also the use of words like "often", "generally", "likely", they all point to tendencies at the most. It's not possible to write a precise definition of prog because it can change form and shape without limits in theory anyway.
That is only because the term prog is an abbreviation of progressive rock and it is therefore seen fit to associate it with a) music that is at least somewhat rock based and b) rock based music that originated in the late 60s at the earliest. But the musical construct could be found in any kind of sophisticated/art music, often at greater levels of sophistication than the usual symph prog fare. Dave Brubeck Quartet and Stockhausen are two examples that come to mind as progressive music. That prog is used to denote only something rock based does not mean in any way that it is the only progressive music in the world. I have personally also argued, unsuccessfully, for the inclusion of artists that are not strongly tied to rock because I don't see rock as such an overwhelmingly important part of the puzzle even in classic prog. Sure, some bands like Rush lean heavily towards rock but some others like Gentle Giant draw into a melting pot of influences. Of course, as the definition of progressive rock supplied by this website demonstrates, it is more a historical thing and a connotation associated with the "movement" to "progress" rock and make it more sophisticated. Sort of like the term NWOBHM. It means nothing, it's just heavy metal. Queensryche sound very NWOBHM-ish in their early work but they are not usually called that because they are American. Regardless, the musical essence remains the same. So too, the concept of prog per se is very broad. And I must disagree on that note that those characteristics are fairly well defined in this definition. I can take specific cases and show how bands commonly referred to as prog, especially from 90s onwards, don't share some of those characteristics, but I think it's fairly obvious anyway. We cannot enumerate musical characteristics to describe all the music that constitutes prog, we can only indicate what it might be. You have mentioned in some other thread that it was easier to understand what prog was in the 70s but it's much more confusing when applied to the contemporary stuff. It's because prog was a concentrated movement in the 70s and there possibly was more 'cross-fertilization'. That movement more or less ground to a halt by the end of the 70s. A technical metal wave led by Rush initially and then by bands like Watchtower, Pestilence, Death and, finally, Dream Theater forms one axis of the new prog and the RIO movement started in the mid 70s continues underground and leads another. I am not so much abreast of what neo prog bands from the 80s are up to and I don't know to what extent there are strong ties between that and modern neo prog bands. There's a lot of other stuff that doesn't get slotted so easily and often not identified as prog by the mainstream, like Radiohead. So, the idea of prog, as in prog rock, essentially derives from the original movement. It is no longer relevant and is broadly applied to sophisticated rock music. For the sake of convenience in taxonomy, bands bearing resemblances to 70s prog get accepted in databases more easily than those that don't sound a whole lot like any 'known' prog. That doesn't mean that the former is more prog than the other, of course. Edited by rogerthat - April 29 2011 at 15:24 |
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russellk
Prog Reviewer Joined: February 28 2005 Location: New Zealand Status: Offline Points: 782 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 15:27 | |||
As with all debates of this type, both ends of the 'what-is-prog' spectrum present cogent arguments. That's why, I guess, most people understand that ProgArchives deals both with 'prog' - music with relation to 'classic prog' - and 'progressive' - music that progresses. There's room for both, but not so much for those that argue for one end of the spectrum or the other to have dominance.
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King Crimson776
Forum Senior Member Joined: October 12 2007 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2779 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 15:43 | |||
I don't know if the site would agree but I'd rather call them "sub-categories" of prog, rather than "sub-genres". I also don't think we need to consider "progressive" in music to mean "moving forward", because any music that is doing something slightly different from what has been done before is, in a sense, "moving forward". Some RIO/black metal/hip hop/dubstep hybrid is no more "progressive" than the latest Flower Kings album, because both are simply combinations of notes/timbres etc. that have not been used in quite the same context before. So essentially I find the notion that "progressive" means "moving forward" and the idea of "prog" as a "genre" to both be wrong. Instead I'd say "prog" = "progressive" and it means "music with an integration of popular and art music values/elements" (this can even cover "krautrock" or "post rock" if needed because those styles can be said to carry a heavy minimalist classical influence... and since minimalism and Baroque obviously aren't the same genre, neither are symphonic and krautrock).
Edited by King Crimson776 - April 29 2011 at 15:50 |
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cstack3
Forum Senior Member VIP Member Joined: July 20 2009 Location: Tucson, AZ USA Status: Online Points: 7229 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 17:38 | |||
Regarding Auto-Tune, check this out. I don't know much about the technology, BUT if it can be jacked with & used in creative ways, I'm all for it! I thought this treatment was pretty slick.
Mike Pinder modified the original Mellotron design to use tape loops for infinite sustain, Fripp/Hackett/Peter Banks used the volume pedal (originally used for pedal steel guitar swells) to achieve a violin-like tone to the instrument, and Jaco Pastorius yanked the frets out of his Fender bass, coated the fingerboard with acrylic boat-deck finish & was on his way to changing the world. Prog is characteristically defined by folks messing with their stuff. |
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Dean
Special Collaborator Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: April 29 2011 at 18:37 | |||
.
Whether Prog is a genre or a category is just playing with words - in the arts a genre is just a category, it is not the same as a biological genus where there has to be a genetic/generic relationship. So a genre of music need not contain generic styles of music, where there is generic (musical) similarity then they can be grouped together as a subgenres, but there need not be similarity between any two subgenres.
In your example minimalism and Baroque are not really on the same "level" - Baroque is a genre of Art Music whereas Minimalism is a subgenre of 20th Century Classical, which in turn is a genre of Art Music.
Technically the genre is "Rock" and the subgenre is "Progressive Rock", which has subgenres of its own such as "Symphonic", "Krautrock", "Zeuhl" etc.
The notion that Progressive Rock is "music with an integration of popular and art music values/elements" is not something I can agree with simply because I don't believe that Art Music values/elements are either necessary or there by intent in the majority of Progressive Rock, not even in Symphonic Prog where you would expect the highest concentration of these Art Music values/elements.
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King Crimson776
Forum Senior Member Joined: October 12 2007 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2779 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 00:16 | |||
I think what most people mean by "progressive" (when they are being too literal with the term) is "music that is doing something really novel, pushing the boundaries" and all of that. But I find this to be an inane concept, because any music that is at all different from what came before is doing this to some degree. So what would ProgArchives be about in that case, finding the music that is "the most" progressive? Do we have to invent a mathematical formula? I don't think anyone would like the implications of thinking of prog this way. I'm thinking of "genre" as a stylistic in which the music has enough definable features in common. Naturally this is a fairly malleable concept (who's to decide how much is "enough"?) but people can generally agree on what constitutes "metal" or "blues" etc... not so much with prog, and that's understandable given the ridiculous variety present on this site or even in less inclusive conceptions of "prog". As for "subgenres", well, you'd only use this if you actually *want* to divide up the music further (which is done to a hugely unnecessary degree in modern music, notably with metal and "electronic"). If we even want to deal in "genres", I don't think it's fair to call something as broad (in this site's conception) as "prog" a genre. I will say it does make more sense to think of prog this way than "music that moves forward" though. I have a hard time thinking of "prog" as simply a subgenre of "rock". This all is largely semantic, but take the music of Henry Cow for example; one could argue that it is closer to avant-classical than rock, but it has elements of both. I think that is why it is "prog", and to define it as such seems to tie together everything present on this site (or at least, better than any other conception of it). I've never heard anything I'd vaguely call "prog" which didn't have some form of "art music" inherent to it, which is why I think this has to be the unifying factor and what "defines" prog. |
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 00:56 | |||
[QUOTE=King Crimson776]
I'm thinking of "genre" as a stylistic in which the music has enough definable features in common. Naturally this is a fairly malleable concept (who's to decide how much is "enough"?) but people can generally agree on what constitutes "metal" or "blues" etc... not so much with prog, and that's understandable given the ridiculous variety present on this site or even in less inclusive conceptions of "prog". As for "subgenres", well, you'd only use this if you actually *want* to divide up the music further (which is done to a hugely unnecessary degree in modern music, notably with metal and "electronic"). If we even want to deal in "genres", I don't think it's fair to call something as broad (in this site's conception) as "prog" a genre. I will say it does make more sense to think of prog this way than "music that moves forward" though. [/QUOTE] Agreed, prog really emerges out of an amalgamation of styles. Sure, you could say that about the origin of many genres but the results in those cases are far more specific and determined. And in this way, the notion of moving forward also ties up with the idea of prog. Because it emerges out of a melting pot of styles rather than A style of playing, it is bound to change as the music changes. People should not be surprised that prog of the 90s does not have much in common with prog of the 70s because the music too is no longer the same, it has changed. That there are bands who prefer to continue playing in the 70s style does not make them more 'valid' classifications as prog. That's why I am at a loss when people dismiss the idea of Bjork as prog outright without even offering much argument in support (as if it's a completely ludicrous idea not worthy of rebuttal) because the concept of prog is simply not so specific and definite. You could listen to Linkin Park and flip, "Dude, this is not thrash metal!" but you can't do that with prog, something that sounds very unlike a lot of other prog music may still be prog in some other sense...maybe even a sense which is not covered by existing sub categories because there's an element of discovery inherent in constructing prog. Unrelated to this, looking at the OP, it is clear that what he has addressed is the prog listener's tendency to dismiss pop music as boring and lacking adventure and then advocating listening to bands reliving the adventures of 40 years ago. I don't think it is an empirical debate and more of a rant at some attitudes he seems to dislike. Edited by rogerthat - April 30 2011 at 00:57 |
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Gerinski
Prog Reviewer Joined: February 10 2010 Location: Barcelona Spain Status: Offline Points: 5154 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 05:19 | |||
It seems that even something so minoritary as prog rock has fallen prey of our contemporary disease: everything needs to change, fast, everything needs to be new and innovative, not even the good is allowed to last.
It makes me think of car design, I'm a lover of oldtimer cars, I find that (as a generalization) the most beautiful cars were made from the 50's to the 70's. Cars like a Jaguar XK150 or E-Type, Mercedes 280 or 300SL, BMW507 or for americans I may mention a De Soto Adventurer I, are still regarded (and I believe they will always be) as timeless pinacles of beauty and proportional harmony. And this was not only for luxury cars, many humble popular cars like an Alfa Giulietta, Lotus Elan, Simca Facel, MGB or a Triumph Italia were gorgeous and they are still today. Many of these cars were produced for far longer than 1 decade without barely any changes.
Today car makers rush to change their designs every year, the cars always have to look "newer", more modern, but that does not result in more beautiful cars (maybe only technically better), I really doubt that any cars from today (except maybe a few exotic supercars) will be considered as testimonies of sheer beauty 40 or 50 years in the future.
Do not be obsessed with change and innovation, if mankind has achieved something that feels good and beautiful, let it last, even if the broad style has been done before there are endless recombinations and possible variations and progresses which can always render the new work still interesting and worthy of admiration.
Don't get me wrong I do not reject innvovation at all, but I disagree with the OP who seems to state that anything similar to classic prog done today is not worthy.
Edited by Gerinski - April 30 2011 at 07:56 |
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 08:24 | |||
I don't think this is in dispute because if Textbook really believes it is feasible to keep on tearing apart the edifice once every few years, I highly doubt it is and I certainly wouldn't agree with that. But the disagreement here tends about what is an interesting recombination and what is not. I would personally at least want a new context for a reworking of the old. If the point is simply to evoke nostalgic memories of prog in its glory days, it is difficult for me to be too appreciative of that, being that I wasn't around then. |
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King Crimson776
Forum Senior Member Joined: October 12 2007 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2779 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 14:55 | |||
I don't know if I'd agree about "specific and determined", I don't see why prog would be any less so. The notion of "moving forward" could apply to any genre, and all genres *do* emerge out of earlier music, and hence a "melting pot" of sorts. I'd say there are degrees of "progness" if you will, and that Bjork certainly has elements which could arguably draw her into such a category.
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: April 30 2011 at 21:54 | |||
Because prog never really crystallized into distinct identifiable characteristics. There were some similarities between symph prog bands and therefrom the idea of prog as a genre seems to have gathered strength. But, what is the identifiable prog nuance, prog lick? There is such a thing in all genres, but not prog because it takes these things from other genres and moulds them for its own context. You know a blues track within seconds of starting to listen to. Likewise with metal. You can't do that with ALL prog music. Some prog evokes music previously identified as prog strongly and that is the only event in which prog as a genre works as a concept. In all other cases, all we are doing is going by broad patterns and classifying essentially sophisticated rock music as prog. |
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1791 Overture
Forum Newbie Joined: December 29 2010 Status: Offline Points: 33 |
Posted: May 01 2011 at 04:44 | |||
Don't buy this. Gentle Giant, despite their eclecticism, were a rock band, though and through. The confusion may come from the fact that Gentle Giant was very progressive, whereas Rush was if anything regressive (leaning towards late 60's hard rock, which may make people think of them as "more of a" rock band).
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: May 01 2011 at 05:24 | |||
I don't find a song like Just The Same rock through and through rock at all, nor others like Rancoteur Troubadour. If they had had an Afro American singer at the helm, at least parts of their output would have been recognized as funk. Even as it is, the funk element in their music is undeniable.
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Slartibartfast
Collaborator Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam Joined: April 29 2006 Location: Atlantais Status: Offline Points: 29630 |
Posted: May 01 2011 at 06:04 | |||
Think of classic prog as a foundation...
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Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...
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thehallway
Prog Reviewer Joined: April 13 2010 Location: Dorset, England Status: Offline Points: 1433 |
Posted: May 01 2011 at 06:36 | |||
Plain Truth is also funky! |
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
Posted: May 01 2011 at 10:03 | |||
Yes, and would probably also comfortably fit on a fusion album.
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