April 04, 2005

• Just because you prefer Britney!
• Well, I've always thought of many of the post-rock bands like mogwai, godspeed you! black emperor (or wherever they put that damn exclamation mark these days), decoder ring and so on have very distinct connections to prog rock. I have to say that prog wasn't all bad - despite its middle-class white stoner pretensions it was in itself a celebration of the possibilities of rock music - the intellectual, philosophical, referential/reverential heights that rock was (and is) capable of - as much as its antithesis, punk, was grounded in how raw, visceral and tersely expressive rock can be. Oh, sure, there were laughable projects - Rick Wakeman's Six Wives of Henry VIII is more than faintly ludicrous, whatever its musical merit; Jeff Wayne' s The War of the Worlds is hilariously earnest. I've not even plumbed the depths of GONG, despite the intriguingly named 'Camembert Electrique' LP that hovers guiltily at the back of my father's collection, although it is intriguing to note that snaggle-toothed hippie steve hillage now forms the basis of seminal psychedelic techno outfit system 7 Gah. There's an article in this somewhere. Just let me finish my overcomprehensive list of techno genres (self-link and don't you dare laugh) and my crazed holistic review of run the road...
• All the people I ever knew at school who were into Pink Floyd were metal-loving bogans (speaking as a former metal-loving bogan).
• Only Australians may comment in this thread, because we are the proggiest.
• no no no dj... we indie hipster grunge bunnies were all hanging round in seedy cafes with our double lattes singing along to 'wish you were here' while hot chicks played with our hair. no, really. damn, i miss those girls. what happened to my life..? it all seemed so easy...
• I really don't understand why Mars Volta is so popular nowadays. I mean, *I* kinda like it, but I like weird shit.
• Not really prog, but prismatic7's comment made me want to ask: Everyone here who ever got laid SOLELY BECAUSE you knew how to play "Stairway to Heaven", please raise your hand. *raises hand* okay, so really I just wanted to brag...
• Followup question: Who has gotten laid because they knew how to play Rush's "Freewill"? *crickets*
• kewl! I love prog rock
• So what's the Good Stuff nowadays? My short list: - Dream Theater - Spock's Beard - Planet X And, to a lesser extent: - Rush - Tool - A Perfect Circle - The Mars Volta - Liquid Tension Experiment - Symphony X
• Don Caballero.
• I have enjoyed reading about prog rock in The Letters of Gary Benchley.
• This post was too short. It should have had a thirty minute long mock-classical middle section.
• Someone make Wolof wear the wizards hat
• Odd that they mention Lacuna Coil - which isn't very proggish at all - but near-completely skip over the "symphonic metal" movement that's been gaining steam in Europe over the last decade. Groups like Lacrimosa, Nightwish, and Therion who've branched out to including full orchestras - and if THAT'S not prog, what is? (don't get me wrong, I love Lacuna Coil and have seen them live twice (*bragbrag*) but they just aren't "prog" by any definition of the term)
• "symphonic metal" God save us all.
• No joke, Wolof. Basically, a number of metal artists of various stripes and backgrounds have gotten tired of just crunching and have been branching out, in some cases with rather impressive results. They often display a bit too much fondness for Hans Zimmer \ Media Ventures, but still, they're off creating a highly interesting blend of rock and orchestral (and opera) which is coming into its own as a genre. Go look up some Nightwish (from their newest album, "Once"), Therion (Secret of the Runes or Sirius B), Epica (The Phantom Agony), or Within Temptation (The Silent Force) to get an idea.
• Indonesian Prog Rock. I love the album covers (scroll down), what can I say. I have no idea how you'd get a hold of a copy of any of it, though.
• Prog is back? I wasn't aware it ever went away. Favourite bands of the moment include Arena, Threshold, Kino and Marillion. I'm convinced that Radiohead's OK Computer and Mansun's Six were prog albums, even though they weren't marketed as such.
• Kill. Me. Now. I see you've saved the bitterest blow 'til last; tsunami, the Pope...now this. Thanks God. You're a real pal.
• God's causing the Rockalypse. The next plagues are disco, oompah bands, and John Philip Sousa.