The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
On a Prog kick
ninjai
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So I've been on a prog kick for a while, and I'm getting stuck on what I know. Need some suggestions.
Here's what I've got so far.
Beatles:
Abbey Road
White Album
Pink Floyd:
Anthology
Led Zeppelin:
I-IV
Physical Graffiti
Houses of the Holy (all of these on vinyl)
Dream Theater
Water Tension Experiment
The Mars Volta
Blotted Science
Animals As Leaders
Opeth
Between the Buried and Me
Orbs
Cynic
Scale the Summit
If you aren't sure what I mean by PROG go listen to this list and you'll get what I mean. Typically associated with prog are odd time signatures, 8-30 minute songs, often ambient and or soft tones, particular vocal styles, as well as ultra modern writing and playing techniques. (people try to differenciate prog rock or prog metal... Prog is really just progressive MUSIC, see "Animals as Leaders: Weightless") Best examples of progressive music is Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" and "The Wall" and for a more modern example:
Cynic
If you have progressive ANYTHING let me know what it is, and why you think its progressive so I can check it out.
Thanks.
Here's what I've got so far.
Beatles:
Abbey Road
White Album
Pink Floyd:
Anthology
Led Zeppelin:
I-IV
Physical Graffiti
Houses of the Holy (all of these on vinyl)
Dream Theater
Water Tension Experiment
The Mars Volta
Blotted Science
Animals As Leaders
Opeth
Between the Buried and Me
Orbs
Cynic
Scale the Summit
If you aren't sure what I mean by PROG go listen to this list and you'll get what I mean. Typically associated with prog are odd time signatures, 8-30 minute songs, often ambient and or soft tones, particular vocal styles, as well as ultra modern writing and playing techniques. (people try to differenciate prog rock or prog metal... Prog is really just progressive MUSIC, see "Animals as Leaders: Weightless") Best examples of progressive music is Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" and "The Wall" and for a more modern example:
Cynic
If you have progressive ANYTHING let me know what it is, and why you think its progressive so I can check it out.
Thanks.
ninjai on
0
Posts
Yes - Fragile
Pink Floyd - Animals
King Crimson - In the Court of the Crimson King
Rush - 2112
Newer, Heavier Prog
Tool - Lateralus
The Mars Volta - De-Loused in the Comatorium, Frances the Mute
Tool is fantastic if you like odd time signatures and a healthy dose of pretentiousness (as all great prog has)
If you really like odd time signatures and appreciate when songs are incredibly difficult to actually play, check out Meshuggah also
maybe i'm streaming terrible dj right now if i am its here
YES! and that reminds me of Abba and the Police too. SWEET!
I think the new Coheed could be considered prog, but I haven't spent too much time with it.
It is not prog rock, but definitely very experimental and unique music.
This is not the longest track on the album.
These two posts, and Kansas.
edit: I'd also recommend any of Gazpacho's three most recent albums (Tick Tock is probably their most accessible.)
Path of Exile: snowcrash7
MTG Arena: Snow_Crash#34179
Battle.net: Snowcrash#1873
Since you listed Opeth, surely you've heard Edge of Sanity's Crimson? 40 minute melodic death metal song, kind of proggy at times I guess. There's a lot of styles in there. Mikael from Opeth does some guest vocals. I love it.
My Backloggery
dredg's second album, El Cielo, was one of my favorite records in college and scratches a certain itch for progressive modern rock, though I really can't stand their guitarist anymore. Also, their subsequent records are a lot less interesting.
For more bands in the Blotted Science/Animals as Leaders spectrum, you might want to look into projects related to Colin Marston, one of the founding members of Behold... the Arctopus in which he played a 12-string behemoth of a guitar. He's played in bands like Dysrhythmia (instrumental electric Jazz/Metal) and Krallice (droning Black Metal), and some of the various players in those bands are also in bands like Zevious (not to be confused with previously mentioned Exivious), Orthrelm, and Kayo Dot (one of my favorite current groups).
For more progressive pop (well, as close to pop as this kind of music can get), my standby is Gavin Castleton, who's maybe most well-known at this point for his Zombie Opera, Home, but he's got a ridiculous number of solo albums that explore dramatically different styles, from the prog-rap of A Bullet, A Lever, A Key, to just a simple covers album done primarily with a looping set-up. He was also in an early progressive group with the ridiculous name of Grüvis Malt, who released two records I can highly recommend, Simon and Maximum Unicorn.
I could go on and on, but you can also explore the music blog I write for linked in my signature and probably find a bunch of likeminded stuff you'd dig. This mix would probably be a good place to start: Don't Be Such a Dissonancy
You might look into early Genesis too, when Peter Gabriel was singing for them.
@Metaghost Excellent post, I love dysrhymia and behold... though I wouldn't consider them prog as much as tech. I mean, behold is essentially Necrophagist with less death metal influence. I'll check out all those
and your blog
also Gojira and mastadon.
Also, for more Scale the Summit type stuff, Chon:
Cuz I do.
Also I would consider Painted in Exile prog, ranging from blues, to classical to metal, great stuff.
Also I can't find where to buy Chon.
King Crimson. Now, there's In the Court of the Crimson King, but the best is their 2000 Heavy Construkction live set. It's on another level.
That's because you can't buy Chon as far as I know. That track is from the 2008 demo, which you can download all over the place in various bitrates, like at their Purevolume: http://www.purevolume.com/musicofchon/albums/Demo+2008
I guess they're working on some new tunes, but they've been listening to too much crabcore and it's not quite as fun.
Zune pass for the MOTHERFUCKING WIN
@ninjai Listen to Isis. Now.
maybe i'm streaming terrible dj right now if i am its here
He did that with Astrid Van Der Veen, a famous Dutch singer who was 14 when the Ambeon album was recorded. Unfortunately the album is incredibly hard to find. In fact, after years of searching I still have not found one.
Ayreon, mentioned just above, is one of my favorites:
Arcturus definitely has a unique sound as well:
Pain of Salvation:
Shadow Gallery:
Wolverine:
Love ELP!
For paintings in progress, check out canvas and paints
"The power of the weirdness compels me."
Kevin Moore used to be part of Dream Theater then he went and did Chroma Key which is on my short list of best things ever
The Alan Parsons Project is just tremendous. Parsons did the audio stuff for Pink Floyd and The Beatles and then went and did his own thing:
Finally (because I could go on for a really long time about prog), Marillion is really great.
Another progressive band that Buckethead is in is Thanatopsis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=AvD-ck-_u1c
Another band that has been called Progressive from time to time is Mew. Whether you think they fall all the way into the category or not, Mew is fucking good.
That one is all I can think of right now.
Sorry I took so long to respond, but it just so happens that my mom came to visit, so I asked her what she'd recommend! She said... well basically everything in this section of the Wikipedia article (the stuff in the Deram Records section). She also said that among those, A Question of Balance is especially prog stuff. But any of their stuff is great.
- The Soft Bulletin
- Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
- At War with the Mystics
I own all three in a CD+DVD-Audio package, and the DVD audio includes a 5.1 mix of each album that includes some bits that aren't on the original stereo mixes. Also, you might want to check out their cover of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. It has a very different vibe than the original album, and I know a lot of Floyd fans hate it, but I still like it. And if you like its somewhat cacophonous sound, you might actually like their more recent album, Embryonic (which I liked a lot less than the previous 3 albums.)
I'd say that, for many of the bands listed in the OP, you could just go and listen to other albums by the same artists.
Another band you might want to look into: Deep Purple, especially the stuff that was made by the first two incarnations of the band:
Deep Purple mk1 :
- Shades of Deep Purple
- The Book of Taliesyn (possibly the weakest of these three albums)
- Deep Purple
The latter includes this gem:
April
Deep Purple mk2 :
- In Rock
- Fireball
- Machine Head (their most well-known album -- the proggiest track on there is probably "Lazy".)
I may have missed it, but I don't see any love in here for Jethro Tull. Anything from the 60's up until the mid-70's is generally good, and I don't remember ever listening to a particularly bad Tull album, either (though I haven't paid much attention to anything they've done since the 90's).
Albums of note:
- Stand Up (kind of proto-prog, bluesier and rockier... not as technical, musically, than what came later. Highlights include "Bourrée", and "We Used to Know", the latter of which uses a chord progression that is practically the same as the one in a huge hit by an American band who use a bird species as their name)
- Aqualung (highlights include the title track, "Locomotive Breath", and "My God". Recently re-released in a 40th anniversary package, including a new stereo mix that is a major improvement, compared with the remaster that came out in the 90's.)
- Thick as a Brick (The infamous album-length epic song. It doesn't get any proggier than that.)
- A Passion Play (Another album-length epic, although it's broken up by the pseudo-play in the middle. Not as good as Thick as a Brick, but still great, with some funny moments.)
- Other albums that I regularly hear about: Benefit, War Child, Songs from the Wood. They're not as memorable to me, but I still remember them as sounding pretty good.
Another direction you might look into: Frank Zappa. He has so many albums out that it can be hard to figure out what to check out, but here's some particularly proggy suggestions:
- Hot Rats (especially the opening track, Peaches En Regalia)
- Apostrophe'
- One Size Fits All (especially the opener, "Inca Roads", one of Zappa's best solos ever.)
- Joe's Garage (proggy highlights include "Outside Now", "He Used to Cut the Grass", and possibly Zappa's best solo ever, "Watermelon in Easter Hay")
Be warned: if you really get into Zappa's stuff after listening to these albums, you're in for quite a shock: the guy released close to 70 albums while he was alive, and since he died in '94, his family have been releasing more and more stuff, some of which is definitely worthwhile. In particular, after you listen to all of Joe's Garage, and to Inca Roads, see if you can find the track "Occam's Razor", which is a long solo that was released on a recent album. What you will hear then will sound familiar, and new, at the same time.
Check out my new blog: http://50wordstories.ca
Also check out my old game design blog: http://stealmygamedesigns.blogspot.com
-Freak Out! (Help I'm a Rock, Return of the Son of the Monster Magnet)
-Uncle Meat (King Kong, Dog Breath, Uncle Meat)
-We're Only In It For the Money (pretty much the whole album, it's not that long)
-Weasels Ripped My Flesh (Didja Get Any Onya?, Toads of the Short Forest, Oh No + The Orange County Lumber Truck).
You can also look up just about everything he ever did on Saturday Night Live.