A many-headed beast: progressive rock as European meta-genre

Abstract

There has been a marked resurgence of interest in progressive rock music both commercially and critically, with a number of articles and books now reassessing its styles, meanings, politics and appeal. Despite this, there has been a tendency to define progressive rock through a ‘symphonic orthodoxy’ which preferences a limited, albeit highly successful, number of British groups operating in a relatively narrow sonic landscape. This article questions that orthodoxy by drawing on the lay definitions and understandings of fans to extend the definitions and geographies of progressive rock, and to characterise it as a European meta-genre. It examines the meta-genre's formative years at the beginning of the 1970s, and argues that progressive rock was inspired by the explorations of a European youth counterculture whose music was influenced by local socio-political and economic contexts, as well as by the music and attitudes of the American counterculture and of European Romanticism.

Une tombe en forme de Mellotron : déconstruire la mort du rock progressif

“…This question leads me to the second factor in the flop of prog: the "Anglo-symphonic stereotype", as I call it. My main reference here is another paramount article in which Chris Anderton 41 reports that the widespread conception of prog as typically British music characterised by a certain set of features (e.g. musical complexity, sophisticated arrangements often featuring orchestral sounds achieved using the Mellotron or actual acoustic instruments, fantasy lyrics, and references to classical, jazz and folk music) is in fact quite reductive: in describing only one particular incarnation of prog, British symphonic prog, it fails to describe the deeply diverse nature of progressive music as a "meta-genre".…”

Las Utopías y distopías en las músicas populares de la segunda mitad del siglo XX en el marco de los discos conceptuales de pop rock

“…Esta nueva visión artística se engrosa con Days of future passed del grupo británico Moody Blues, publicado en 1967 y en el que se narra el devenir de un día cotidiano. Por primera vez una banda pop es acompañada por una orquesta y este trabajo da lugar a la etiqueta de Rock Sinfónico para denominar a aquellos intentos de fusionar música popular con música clásica (Anderton, 2010;Hegarty & Halliwell; queta de ópera rock, además de ser uno de los primeros LP dobles que se publican consolida a este formato como preferente para el disco conceptual. En este trabajo se cuenta la historia de Tommy, un chico que desarrolla sordocegera psicosomática al presenciar como su madre y su amante matan a su padre, de manera que aprende a comunicarse mediante una máquina pinball (Imagen 8).…”

“…A partir de aquí el formato se populariza y se da una edad dorada especialmente dentro de lo que se vino a llamar Rock Progresivo, etiqueta heterogénea que abarca desde los desarrollos más cercanos al romanticismo musical del siglo XIX, conocido como Rock Sinfónico, hasta desarrollos cercanos a las músicas de vanguardia como la electrónica y las músicas repetitivas, como el Krautrock desarrollado en la antigua República Federal Alemana (Josephson, 1992;Anderton, 2010;Hegarty & Halliwell, 2011). En estos títulos y en otros muchos, el LP se convierte en una especie de novela musicada en la que tanto la duración de los temas como las portadas (normalmente abiertas) invitan y evocan mundos fantásticos y perdidos.…”

Curating popular music: authority and history, aesthetics and technology

“…Throbbing Gristle, for example, continue to release multiple boxed sets of live recordings through their own Industrial Records label, as well as through other independent companies. Anderton (2010) and Keister and Smith (2008) similarly argue for more inclusive understandings of progressive rock, whether in respect of cultural geography (Anderton) or affective musical content (Keister and Smith). While we might expect progressive rock in particular to favour the multiple release (given the genre's reputation in the 1970s for double and triple albums), the extent and longevity of Throbbing Gristle's reissue programme indicates that the exhaustive (or excessive) documentation of a group's performances is not peculiar to progressive rock and, perhaps more importantly, that there are listening publics interested in immersive, critical listening beyond those for progressive rock.…”

“…Holm-Hudson's (2002) collection similarly ranges ‘beyond and before’ in situating studies of the group United States of America and ‘math rock’ alongside those of King Crimson and Yes. Anderton (2010) and Keister and Smith (2008) similarly argue for more inclusive understandings of progressive rock, whether in respect of cultural geography (Anderton) or affective musical content (Keister and Smith). Holm-Hudson's (2008) monograph on Genesis contextualises the group's last album with Peter Gabriel within a political economy of record production and promotion that, instead of shearing progressive rock off from other musical currents, identifies economic and social confluences that enable a reading of the album as a precursor to the cultural and social commentaries within punk and new wave.…”