Prog Music - Philosophy VS Actual Practice?

[Meteo Xavier]

In the many concepts and directions I'm trying to juggle for future projects, one is the possibility that a couple of labels I have some connection to might refocus into Progressive music. Initially I think this would be awesome because then I could stretch out and expand my compositions.

Problem is, even though Prog music is supposed to be, in philosophy, a rejection of limits in a composition, the actual prog product as applied to the niche tends to heavily favor artists and projects that sound like ELP or Dream Theater. The irony of trying to call yourself a "progressive" artist is to sound like you came straight out of 1971 England, or else you're not prog. I don't have guitars and I have no interest in doing 30 minute compositions of 15 different time signatures, 120 drum fills and seeing how much I can WANK out on a Hammond organ. The prog music everyone drifts to is all about the wankery, it's not about how interesting, creative, or melodic you can make a composition.

And here's where everyone says, "so just make the music you love", well, yeah, that could work if I didn't care about how little attention my music got, but I do. I didn't spend all this time and money learning to how to do this just so I could say I do music, I did it so people could actually listen to it. My first attempt at philosophical prog "Espers" got an extremely cold reception from journalists BECAUSE I had no limits on style or composition, they wouldn't even take it because "eh, it's too ambient to be new age", "it's too new age to be ambient", "I... guess it's kinda prog, but this isn't really prog at all". The business reality is I have to create a product targeted audiences actually want, not just to appease myself, but the label heads releasing it.

So I figured here was as good a place to ask as any other since all my prog leaning mostly focuses on Genesis, its offshoots, and Motoi Sakuraba. Do you think I can really do compositions without stylistic limits and market it to prog channels, or do I have to do prog music like everyone else does before it even has a chance of getting any attention to it?

[Meteo Xavier]

The kind of music I REALLY want to do and market will sound like a mixture of the following:

So with lots of Omnisphere type synths, world music influences, epic melody structures, orchestral, etc. And I wanted to focus on environment, melody, energy and thick soundscapes, not showing off how complex and insane I can make an arrangement.

[lazygecko]

Some people like to evoke the defining acts of the 70's prog period, right down to the instrumentation and production styles. That's totally fine. I think there's plenty of progressive acts today that tries to do something new instead.

The complexity just kind of comes with the territory. I think very often people will dismiss this kind of music as wankery and being advanced just for the sake of it. Which I don't think is true for the most part. Trust me that there's way more insane stuff out there if that's what you're after in the first place. In particular I think a lot of the flak Dream Theater gets is just mindlessly regurgitated statements.

[Meteo Xavier]

Well my question was does it have to be so dependent upon the complexity? I wanted to simplify it down to something more generally enjoyable. I listened to Karn Evil 9 last night and thought "**sus, do I really have to do something like this? Is this something people listen to more than once a year?"

[lazygecko]

I think the core traits of the genre are the multiple time signatures and key modulations you'll often find in the genre. If that's what you define as complexity, then yeah. Some can be very blatant about it, but it doesn't have to be. The changes can be so seamlessly woven in you don't even notice them.

[Argle]

It's funny, the bands that are "progressive" rock and metal are retreading the same ground for the last 4 decades. Don't get me wrong, it's one of my favorite genres, I just don't think the name makes sense anymore. I wouldn't know what else to call it, though.

But no, OBVIOUSLY you don't have to be overly complicated. Good luck marketing the sound of any of those Youtube videos, though. The only ready made demographic are fans of those video game soundtracks. Anyway, these days you're sort of lucky if anyone listens to your music at all.

[AngelCityOutlaw]

In a lot of that kind of music, it's more about the illusion of complexity rather than actual complexity.

If you really pay close attention to bands like Dream Theater, Pagan's Mind or Symphony X, there are lots of repeated parts that just have some minor, but noticeable change to them. Most commonly, the drums allow you to create complex sounding pieces just by changing what beats are stressed. It can make it sound like you changed time signatures or tempos when it actually didn't.

For example, say in the verse you have this bassline which is just steady eighth notes and a back-beat on the drums and the whole thing is like 8 bars long. On the last 4 bars, just try getting rid of every second snare drum hit and diminishing the eighth notes to sixteenths and then a gallop rhythm the next bar etc.

Little things like that can make it sound a lot more complicated than it really is.

It's funny, the bands that are "progressive" rock and metal are retreading the same ground for the last 4 decades. Don't get me wrong, it's one of my favorite genres, I just don't think the name makes sense anymore. I wouldn't know what else to call it, though.

Yeah, this.

[Meteo Xavier]

In a lot of that kind of music, it's more about the illusion of complexity rather than actual complexity.

If it still takes an ungodly long time to compose, I don't really see the difference. I've figured out ways to fake complexity, but even that can get difficult to do in a DAW and I'm pretty tired of putting extraneous energy into it where it won't pay off later.

Good luck marketing the sound of any of those Youtube videos' date=' though. The only ready made demographic are fans of those video game soundtracks.[/quote']

That can't be entirely true, that stuff works outside the videogame medium, I just used those examples because they were closer to what I wanted to do than the prog ones.

Although I'm now starting to see the logic gap there.

[lazygecko]

The origin of the term progressive rock is disputable. I think it had less to do with the musical qualities in themselves. In the 60's radio stations would start adapting a "progressive rock" programming template which would have liberal-leaning political discussions inbetween the music being played. Same thing with AOR which started out as a radio concept but today pretty much means very 80's style melodic rock.

[AngelCityOutlaw]

If it still takes an ungodly long time to compose, I don't really see the difference. I've figured out ways to fake complexity, but even that can get difficult to do in a DAW and I'm pretty tired of putting extraneous energy into it where it won't pay off later.

What you're basically saying is that you want to compose music where the genre's most identifiable trait is its complexity, but don't want to put in the effort and time to achieve that complexity.

[Meteo Xavier]

What you're basically saying is that you want to compose music where the genre's most identifiable trait is its complexity, but don't want to put in the effort and time to achieve that complexity.

Well, that's my question. Is Prog about music without limits, or is it about achieving complexity? That's what I want to know before I dive in there, but in my research so far, the philosophy seems to rub against the actual practice (hence the topic title).

[SnappleMan]

It does not take a long time to compose. It takes YOU a long time to compose. You need to get that straight. Some prog musician might take a week to write what you can write in a day and visa versa. It all comes down to what comes naturally to you, and real progressive music is about going naturally from beginning to end without thinking about staying within a genre or following some existing set of motions.

I can write a prog song in a day, "simple" pop song in a month. Complexity comes in different shades. Someone might find it complicated to write a song with varying time signatures and modulating keys/melodies, but someone else might find it just as complicated to write a simple song with a good hook.

As far as the perception of modern prog music goes, you're best off focusing on rhythmic variation, as the harmonic elements tend to stay pretty common among most prog bands today. And whatever harmonic integrity there is is masked under djenting guitars and annoying screaming vocals. So yeah, rhythmic variation and non-standard instrumentation will create good solid prog.

[AngelCityOutlaw]

Well, that's my question. Is Prog about music without limits, or is it about achieving complexity? That's what I want to know before I dive in there, but in my research so far, the philosophy seems to rub against the actual practice (hence the topic title).

I don't think it was ever supposed to be "music without limits" really. A lot of the early bands just wanted to take their genre further than the pop standard.

For example, Rock music was typically just 4/4, pentatonic, twelve-bar blues tunes that went for 2-3 minutes. Prog. bands thought "Hey, what if we used scales, harmonies, song structures, instruments and time signatures that you don't usually hear in this kind of music?"

Like people said here in this thread, it was "progressive" for its time, but is now just what you expect from that kind of music. It's no longer an "idea" really; it's just another genre.

[Meteo Xavier]

So basically 2, maybe 3, votes for focusing on complexity then, if I'm gathering responses correctly.

[Meteo Xavier]

I don't think it was ever supposed to be "music without limits" really. A lot of the early bands just wanted to take their genre further than the pop standard.

Where I get my reference there is from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_Rock.

"[Progressive Rock] does not refer to a single style but to an approach that combines elements of diverse styles. Jerry Ewing, editor of Prog Magazine, explains that "Prog is not just a sound, it's a mindset,"[10] and Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci points out that it is defined by its very lack of stylistic boundaries."

So that's where I get my confusion. To me, there is a world of difference between music without limits and focusing on complexity as a qualifier.

[AngelCityOutlaw]

but what is "music without limits" exactly?

[Meteo Xavier]

but what is "music without limits" exactly?

...umm, at the risk of sounding like a douchebag, I think it's self-explanatory. I don't have limits as to what constitutes a quality composition and arrangement. I can be as complex or simple in parts as I want and use of any sound or instrument is ok so long as it gels well with everything else. The qualifier isn't on how complex it is, but if I can just give it an overall high quality and balance.

This is what Genesis and it's alumni, Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, Steve Hackett et all brought to the prog table and it worked for them (I take after Steve Hackett's compositional focus most strongly), and I used to figure it worked ok with them until I tried to market ESPERS.

[Frederic Petitpas]

I think you shouldn't care too much about the style. I don't know what "prog" is but if you talk about limits, I certainly know that you impose your own.

Where are your limits set at ?

[jnWake]

If you're looking for progressive music that doesn't only focus only on the complexity, you can always look at the less metal ones. For example:

Spock's Beard:

, Thoughts

The music is quite complex (not the wankery stuff you find in DT though ), but it has a lot of the things you want to do, like not focusing on a particular style and having "no limits" (notice how much the songs change!).

Frost*:

.

I'll admit that Frost* has more nifty solos and stuff, but their focus is more on the soundscape than anything else, especially on the song I listed. The band is pretty much synth focused, even though the second album has more "standard" songs.

You can also go to the poppier side of prog with bands like Marillion (my favourite band!):

,

. Amazing band, I won't even bother trying to describe them because I'll probably do it badly

EDIT: If you already know this bands, ignore me. In any case, more people can get to listen to this awesome music!

Edited September 11, 2013 by jnWake

[Meteo Xavier]

I think you shouldn't care too much about the style. I don't know what "prog" is but if you talk about limits, I certainly know that you impose your own.

Where are your limits set at ?

I addressed this earlier.

Frost*: Hyperventilate.

I actually heard this last night. This track was pretty cool and a good direction I wanted to pursue. Then the rest of the album...

This is a bit closer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEhG40Lco00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgZA6onmV7Q&list=PL8D4857FB3AE7D51B

I fuckin' love this album and the artistic, compositional aim is what I'm after, not recreating the sound themselves. Every song on here cannot be confused for another and it never really gets so complex that it feels like he's just jacking off his music chops. If I could do something like this replacing the need for live guitars and vocals with modern synths, ambient flourishes and frenetic electro-world percussion beats and grooves, I'd be sittin' pretty.

[Meteo Xavier]

http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=95112&PN=1

Apparently I'm not the only one thinking about this. Maybe I have some hope after all.

[Furilas]

Do you think I can really do compositions without stylistic limits and market it to prog channels, or do I have to do prog music like everyone else does before it even has a chance of getting any attention to it?

It seems to me that it's a matter of staying persistent. As in any genre, there are a lot of prog fans for whom something that doesn't fit their expectations of "prog" will fly right over their heads. But a certain few will stop to listen and eventually (it is to be hoped) get hooked and start passing on the buzz. If that persists, the ball will get itself rolling. Of course, you then have to ask yourself if you have that time or patience to spare. You can continue to compose outside of conventional ideas of the genre, and I applaud you for doing so, but I imagine it will take a lot longer to gain repute for it.