Are you a prog head?
 

Are you a real prog head or are you "just" listening to prog because that is there you find the best music of today?

Some will properly say both. But if you should pick just one of them what would you pick.

For me its like this.
I am not really a prog head. For me prog can become very annoing and too "interlectual". When the prog is more important than the music "behind" the prog.

But most bands I've have picked up the last 15 years are prog bands. The reason is that it is in prog that I find most of the best music of today (the other places I find good music is mostly in indie and alt rock). I really enjoy the subgenres of space prog, hard prog, eclectic prog, metal prog and post rock prog. Its there I find a lot af good music.

But for me many these bands aint even that proggy and its just fine with me.

A good exsample of my taste in prog is Pink Floyd. My favorite band in the world. Yes they are core old space prog. But actually they are "just" also good mainstream rock that millions and millions of people can enjoy. From Meddle and forward they are not that proggy. I like that.

So how about you? Do you like when prog is very, very proggy (= prog head) or when its just good rock with some cool hints of prog here and there?

I listen to a great deal of Progressive music. The complexity is mentally stimulating. I would no longer describe Pink Floyd as being progressive however, as they have not 'progressed' for quite some time. It depends what you understand progressive music to be.

I do not find artists from the 70's to be progressing much recently? Is not the term progressive indicative of creating something new?

There's a whole plethora of schools of thought about what progressive means in terms of progressive rock. Originally, yes, it was taken to mean bands exploring outside their usual music, perhaps a rock band bringing in jazz or funk influences, longer and more complicated songs, but these days it's hard to be really progressive when most things have been done, and nothing really seems new and exciting.

So for the purposes of identifying or categorising prog rock, an admittedly simplistic description would be that it generally needs to have satisfy a few criteria:

1. Some sort of instrumental, usually in the middle of a long song
2. Lyrics that don't follow the usual rock ideals, like fantasy, psychedelia, dreams, or based on books or films maybe
3. Music that makes you think, with deep well-written lyrics
4. Accomplished musicians who can really play, and have often been classically trained
5. Some of their songs/albums tend to follow concepts or plots
6. Few if any simple love songs
7. Definitely not aimed at chart/radio airplay (though this may happen in spite of that)

That as I say is a pretty simple definition, and of course prog means a lot more than that, but I think it's a little unfair to say Floyd haven't done anything progressive recently: they are after all broken up now. And I wonder what artistes from the 70s you're talking about? Many are no longer around anymore.

Very good thread indeed! Well, all these genres and subgenres have got me pretty muddled. I'd just call it prog rock, or prog hard rock or, prog metal. The rest just baffles me. I think I am a prog rock head, but I'm not sure, and precisely because of all the genres and subgenres... I might just listen to rock while believing I listen to prog rock. The Aristocrats with Marco Minemann and Guthrie just blow me away. Madly so. Steve Morse's music is one of a mind-blowing calibre. Queen II (an unfairly unknown album) is a supreme one. The album "Sex & Religion" is another thing I absolutely love. So, am I a prog head? I think so.