Did you go through a prog "evangelism" phase?

Interesting question, I think: what's your Bible when you evangelize?

Yes, I went through a very active evangelism phase a long time ago. It was quite frustrating. I did a complete about face and just enjoyed the music I liked privately on my own terms. You can have some pretty nice friendships though when you run into people with similar tastes.

^ I've done that once with a friend - as students. He plugged in his iPod and played Dream Theater's last album, and everyone was telling us to turn this "screamo death metal" off. Lol.

Prog purism really isn't my cup of tea. To me, prog is simply a means to an end, a possible way to fuse often diametrically different styles. As soon as things get formulaic, as it's the case in many Neoprog bands, I'm not gonna be into it. There's so much awesome stuff to explore in jazz, alternative HipHop, classical music, electro/minimal and folk. With an open mind and open eye you can talk to many people about music, and with a little patience you're sure to be successful in making them familiar with at least some of the music you listen to.

Evangelism is a one-way street, but giving your friend a copy of your favorite Genesis record and receiving a copy of his favorite Del Tha Funkee Homosapien's tape - that's how things should be. You might not like all of the stuff you get, but after five mutual recommendations an overlap is often found!

Cool shot! He reminds me of Alex Lifeson during the Hemispheres tour. lol!  Did you ever meet anyone in this life that saw the prime lineup of YES? Howe, Squire, Anderson, Wakeman, and Bruford on the Fragile tour? The lineup that was pictured in every rock magazine in America? There is 1 track on YESSONGS featuring this unit. I have yet to hear a full concert of this band. I think this is ironic since YES are the most popular prog band in histpry and the unit which made them famous has no concert footage or live recordings available to their fans.

@Toddler: only few concerts of that line-up are available. I can only recommend the 1971 Gothenburg/New Haven concert with Tony Kaye - great sound quality, IMO even better than parts of Yessongs.


Edited by Einsetumadur - September 23 2012 at 15:25

Looking back I probably did, to my friends' dismay, and would happily and naively play some of the best Prog I owned to all, their faces turning white with horror as they realized it was us and two hours of turgid pomp.   Good times.
  

I struggle with this a lot. about 3 years ago, when I was getting closer to prog, I wanted to spread the word to everybody I knew. I wanted all my friends to have the same feeling of discovering life in music. They ended up hating it and exactly what you said, they hated it and turned their backs. It is rather quiet among my friends now. 
Great forum, I thought that I was the only one.

 I have a few friends who like Rush, Floyd, Tull. Any more progressive than that and they are turned off. Just told my friend to look up Van Der Graaf Generator. I am still going through an evangelism stage though.  

Edited by Astral Traveller - September 21 2012 at 15:16

I feel like going through a prog evangelism stage right now!!!

I.Q 's THE SEVENTH HOUSE.

Listened to it last night and I was thinking why not share the beauty with others.

Dayvenkirq wrote: menawati wrote: They laughed at me for liking ... King Crimson haha. Huh? Did you recommend the '73-'74 efforts to them?

I realised early on that prog wasn't cool with the masses. Was a 14 yr old during NWOBHM and the only thing prog related that my contemporary headbangers could stomach was a bit of Marillion and some 2112. They laughed at me for liking early Genesis, Yes and King Crimson haha.