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space rock. Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music [8] that primarily developed in the United Kingdom [9] through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Initially termed "progressive pop", the style was an emergence of psychedelic bands who abandoned standard pop traditions in favour ...
- 3 min
- Jon Dolan,Brandon Geist,Jon Weiderhorn,Ryan Reed,Kory Grow,Reed Fischer,Richard Gehr,Dan Epstein,Will Hermes
- Happy the Man, ‘Happy the Man’ (1977) Formed in a James Madison University dorm room, Washington, D.C.- based Happy the Man recorded three venerated, mostly instrumental prog albums in the late 1970s, striking a seductive middle ground between sax-driven jazz-fusion lunacy (circa Zappa's One Size Fits All) and synth-heavy meditative twittering.
- Ruins, ‘Hyderomastgroningem’ (1995) Beaming down from the far reaches of the prog-rock galaxy, this Japanese drums and bass duo slam together mathematically improbable meters and dissonant blasts of rhythm with nonsense wails or demonic growls.
- FM, ‘Black Noise’ (1977) Superficially, Toronto-based FM had a lot working against them: Aside from Rush, Canada was never a prog hotbed, and the band released its debut album in 1977, as many of the genre's originators were fading.
- Crack the Sky, ‘Crack the Sky’ (1975) American rockers aren't known for their prog ambitions, and the bands that did push the boundaries usually slipped through the commercial cracks.
- Premiata Forneria Marconi: Photos of Ghosts
- Marillion: F.E.A.R.
- Badger: One Live Badger
- Genesis: Selling England by The Pound
- Procol Harum: Exotic Birds & Fruit
- Marillion: Misplaced Childhood and Clutching at Straws
- Rush: Hemispheres
- Yes: Tales from Topographic Oceans
- Camel: Mirage
- Supertramp: Crime of The Century
The Italian band Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM) was the first second-generation prog band, cutting their teeth on Jethro Tull and King Crimson covers. By the time of their American debut, they’d found their own style, with a strong sense of pastoral melody and European folk influences (their heavier rock side would come out in time). Purists prefe...
Marillion’s second incarnation with singer Steve Hogarth is still a bit underrated, despite his being in place since 1989. Though they’ve done pop on occasion, the Hogarth-led band took its cue from the Brexit and Trump era to go conceptual once again in 2016 (the title stands for “F… Everyone and Run”). F.E.A.R is less about specific politics than...
Perhaps the most obscure entry on a list of greatest prog rock albums, Badger was keyboardist Tony Kaye’s short-lived post-Yes band, along with Jon Anderson’s pre-Yes bandmate David Foster on bass and vocals (Anderson produced this live album, from a show that Yes was headlining). Kaye plays some of his finest recorded solos and the rhythm section ...
Though they were through with side-long tracks, Genesis’ imagination continued to run wild on Foxtrot’s followup, with Peter Gabriel inhabiting a rogue’s gallery of characters and the band’s playing getting more muscular; “Firth of Fifth” and “The Cinema Show” became oft-played career standards. And wonder of wonders, the whimsical “I Know What I L...
Though many Procol Harum diehards will always prefer the Robin Trower era, the band was even grander on this later effort with the equally fine Mick Grabham on guitar. The first half of Exotic Birds & Fruitreaches a heavenly peak with the extended ballad “The Idol,” and Side Two offers “Butterfly Boys,” one of the funnier slaps a prog band has ever...
Original singer Fish’s tenure with Marillion, which only lasted four albums, ended with two conceptual epics. Misplaced Childhoodis often considered the peak, since it had two indelible singles (“Kayleigh” and “Lavender”) and dealt with the timeless prog theme of loss of innocence and the end of a pivotal love. Yet Clutching at Straws is in retrosp...
Hemispheres was the deepest into prog that Rush ever got, with a side-long piece full of interlocking musical themes and a fascinating storyline (about two civilizations that represent the left and right sides of the brain). Flip it over and there’s “La Villa Strangiato,” Rush’s longest, trickiest, and most impressive instrumental. There are also c...
History tends to give this one a bad rap: With four side-long pieces based on Hindu Shashtric scriptures, it’s got to be dense and impenetrable, right? Wrong: Most of Tales From Topographic Oceansis as gorgeously melodic as anything Yes ever did, and the band charges hard, newly fortified by drummer Alan White. To name just one moment, Rick Wakeman...
At this early stage, Camel was perched midway between prog and fusion: Their second album Mirageis two-thirds instrumental (the next, The Snow Goose, had just one brief vocal), and it’s largely hinged on the interplay of keyboardist Peter Bardens and guitarist Andy Latimer, both dazzling soloists. But Mirage also has “Lady Fantasy,” their most roma...
Though it produced a major UK hit (and one that predated punk) with “Bloody Well Right,” Crime of The Centurywas actually Supertramp’s deepest album, with songs about a tortured soul’s descent into madness: “Rudy,” “Hide in Your Shell” and “Asylum” form a highly emotive and rather dark trilogy. It makes it even more surprising that Supertramp becam...
- Brett Milano
- 5 min
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Jun 7, 2021 · Progressive Rock Guide: A Brief History of Prog Rock. Since the 1960s, progressive rock has pushed the boundaries of rock n' roll music to incorporate longer song forms, conceptual lyrics, and advanced composition techniques.
- Brett Milano
- 6 min
- King Crimson. Robert Fripp’s brainchild never had a permanent lineup or sound, and he was never enamored of the term prog rock. Nonetheless, no band has more consistently embodied prog’s exploratory spirit.
- Yes. For all the twists and turns of their career, Yes have remained synonymous with prog rock, and their classic run of albums – from The Yes Album to Going for the One, give or take a few – remain among its most glorious moments.
- Rush. Rush started life as a hard-rock trio and when pushed, they’d still insist that’s what they were. But they spent their full career actively progressing, taking whatever sounds caught their fancy and doing it their own way, before bowing out with arguably their most ambitious concept album Clockwork Angels.
- Van der Graaf Generator. Fronted by the singular Peter Hammill, Van der Graaf Generator was always a band for deep thinkers: Their lyrics probed existential crises, or looked into the darker corners of relationships.
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Heavy Prog defines progressive rock music that draws as much influence from hard rock as it does from classic progressive rock. In simple terms, it is a marriage of the guitar-based heavy blues of the late 1960s and 1970s - artists such as Cream, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath - and the progressive/symphonic movement represented by King ...
