New Prog for Dummies

If there's one genre that has suffered the stigma of critics even more than 1970s progressive, it's the prog that came after it. Where the former was mocked, pilloried, blamed for every sin and lapse of taste imaginable, the latter was simply ignored altogether, and it hasn't even benefited from the rehabilitation that the old school has enjoyed roughly since the rise of the internet.

Yet the new progressive landscape has been, and still is, rich in bands and releases, internal currents, and above all diehard fans, enthusiastic and attentive to every new and old proposal that emerges from the scene. It's precisely the unconditional devotion of these fans - often singularly devoted to this kind of music, and largely unaware of the post-'77 upheavals in the rest of the musical world - that has allowed the genre to develop and thrive despite the indifference shown by other listening communities. And yet it's exactly this phenomenon that makes it extremely hard today, for anyone trying to approach the genre, to untangle the dense web of titles and line-ups, almost all invariably praised within the circle of fans, but often with no resonance whatsoever outside it.

As die-hard fans of progressive from its heyday, and omnivorous listeners of pop music in general, even for us writing this piece today, engaging with the new progressive field has been no easy task. It's been a years-long journey, pursued on and off with no fixed direction: purely sporadic curiosity about this or that name stumbled upon by chance was the only real spur pushing us into this galaxy, alien in so many ways - a musical place where, according to the locals, everything should be splendour and wonder, but which to outsiders more often than not seems to reek of amateurishness, self-referentiality, lack of ideas, and kitsch.

And yet here we are, almost without realizing it. There was never - except in these very last few weeks - any intention of drawing up a "map" of our explorations, nor at any point a will to create a complete, and - even less! - objective overview of the new progressive territory. What we're offering readers, then, is simply a selection of the best things we've come across along the way, a little "for dummies" guide, since that's more or less how we see ourselves too - hopefully useful to anyone who fancies taking a look at the genre but doesn't know where to start.

In our overview, we've tried to cover fairly evenly the nearly forty years separating us from the twilight of the original progressive era, making room for several different strands and, in particular, not limiting ourselves solely to the historic neo prog school of Marillion, Pallas and IQ. Our choices were guided by nothing more than our own taste, and the wish to make room too for names that - though little celebrated even among the most devoted fans - struck us as potentially interesting for listeners with varied musical tastes.

We've also chosen to focus only on acts that debuted after 1980, and not to venture into areas where the prog component is a minor ingredient within other, already strong aesthetics: progressive metal, avant-prog, the "indie prog" of otherwise excellent acts like Mew or Everything Everything (broadening the scope in that way would have made the goal of a short list impossible, and diluted the basic aim - focusing on the heirs of prog d'antan). Some exclusions may also raise eyebrows - major acts, or scenes like the Italian one - but rather than "lie" in the name of representativeness, we preferred to stay true to the spirit of the project: to offer readers the names and records we believe in, the ones we love and that, driven by the utmost honesty and a touch of idealistic naivety, we hope can win over new admirers.

Twelfth Night: "Fact And Fiction" (1982)
Among the acts classically associated with the early-Eighties neo-prog scene, Geoff Mann's Twelfth Night are certainly not among the best known. Nevertheless, their formula is one of the most successful and original of the period, and strongly representative of the connections between neo-prog and new wave. Sharing with the greats of Seventies prog the elaborate, dynamic structures of Genesis and a vocation for darkness and theatricality typical of Van Der Graaf Generator, Twelfth Night nonetheless adopt a sound construction close to the dreamy, layered darkwave of Chameleons and Sad Lovers And Giants, contemporary bands that would be a natural listening path for any prog lover. On what is their finest album, this combination results in chameleonic pieces, at once dramatic and luminous, steeped in romanticism and evocative power. A record that can unite in appreciation both die-hard prog fans and waver types of a very different opinion on the value of the progressive endeavour.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Pallas: “The Sentinel” (1984)

Hailing from Aberdeen, Scotland, Pallas are among the founding fathers of neo-prog. Their debut, "Arrive Alive", was recorded live and given away as a flexi-disc with "Kerrang!", before being reissued multiple times with unfortunately altered tracklists. An evocative record marked by the sound of the Mellotron, it was nonetheless hampered by poor recording quality. That problem was fixed for "The Sentinel", a studio album backed by Emi with Eddie Offord at the mixing desk. The label certainly made its demands felt, forcing the band to drop a colossal suite dedicated to the civilization of Atlantis and to replace half the material with more commercial songs. Luckily for us, a compromise has rarely sounded so inspired: triumphant synths, brooding atmospheres somewhere between fantasy and sci-fi, effects indebted to new wave, arena-ready vocal harmonies, and no shortage of admiration for Yes. The 1992 CD reissue includes the tracks rejected by Emi and a tracklist faithful to the original concept.

(F. Romagnoli)

Marillion: "Misplaced Childhood" (1985)
An enduring symbol of the neo-prog era and its brief chart fortunes, "Misplaced Childhood" is an album of rare melodic and evocative qualities, a blueprint for countless neo-proggers to come. The number two spot reached by the single "Kayleigh" on the UK charts is undoubtedly down to the media and commercial conditions of the time, but its unique ability to fuse pop songcraft with Genesis-inspired prog arrangements still astonishes. Far from being a mere "pop rehash" of the old glories of Gabriel and co., "Misplaced Childhood" is an album deeply rooted in its era, reinterpreting its moods and stylistic tics in an original and innovatively progressive key. Echoing guitar textures, powerful, driving bass, and atmospheric synths are elements that clearly bring the record close to the new wave of bands as different as Simple Minds and Cure, and cast the long-maligned Marillion as one of the boldest bands of their time.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Asturias: "Circle In The Forest" (1988)
The music of Japan's Asturias revolves around the taste and personality of composer and multi-instrumentalist Yoh Ohyama. Their decidedly atypical formula draws on the melodicism of Camel and the composed new age of Mike Oldfield, focusing on instrumental vignettes poised between neo-progressive and classically derived pop minimalism. The debut "Circle in the Forest" and its follow-up "Brilliant Streams" (1990) are the most significant chapters of the band's career. Structured in similar fashion around a handful of short, homogeneous compositions and one longer, more dynamic closing track, they're built essentially around piano and keyboards, but also feature important guitar contributions in a Fripp-like vein. The slight preference for the first album comes down to its greater variety, its substantial input of timbres and rhythms typical of the contemporary electronic scene, and the way certain passages anticipate the nascent world of video game music.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Devil Doll: "The Girl Who Was… Death" (1989)
Utterly alien to the schemes of neo-progressive rock, the music of Italian/Slovenian outfit Devil Doll is an unprecedented fusion of gothic rock, symphonic constructions, horror-movie tropes and sporadic industrial forays descended from Laibach. All of this while candidly embracing kitsch, and without shying away from including elements typical of the heavy metal of the day: distorted guitars, frantic drumming, and the shrill, cartoonish voice of the mysterious Mr. Doctor, somewhere between growl and sprechgesang. The most direct comparison for the album's 66 minutes and 6 seconds - a duration that's certainly no coincidence - is nonetheless with cult names of Italian dark prog such as Goblin and Antonius Rex. Indeed, it's only been known for a few years that behind the name Mr. Doctor lies Mario Panciera, owner of some 40,000 records ("almost everything that exists in the following genres: beat, psychedelia, progressive, glam, punk, new wave, post-punk") and a devotee of symphonic music and Italian film scores from the Sixties and Seventies.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Minimum Vital: "Sarabandes" (1990)
France's Minimum Vital are masters at fusing "world" melodic structures drawn from traditional Mediterranean music with the sonic and compositional forms of progressive rock. "Sarabandes", their second album for Musea, is a fine illustration of their formula. The sound is clearly rooted in neo-prog, with blazing, Hackett-esque guitars marked by heavy sustain, joined by synth flourishes that serve both melodic and atmospheric purposes. The songs' themes, however, are folkloric in nature, recalling "borderline" acts like Gryphon or fellow countrymen Malicorne more than the classic guiding lights of Eighties-Nineties progressive rock. Within the rich instrumental weave, various stylistic elements emerge, recalling now fusion, now the atypical new age of Mike Oldfield. The extreme sonic polish can feel almost jarring on first listen, but the kaleidoscopic opener "Le chant du monde" alone should be enough to encourage the curious listener to give themselves time to get used to the fullness of the tones.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Ozric Tentacles: "Erpland" (1990)

Formed in the mid-Eighties and led by guitarist Ed Wynne, Ozric Tentacles make entirely instrumental music that's impossible to pigeonhole. It's progressive rock, but one that escapes the dictates of neo-prog. Their sci-fi atmospheres bring them close to Eloy or the more polished records of Hawkwind, while their use of synths and samplers pushes them a step away from the British electronic scene (it's no coincidence that three of them went on to found the techno-trance project Eat Static). If in their more relaxed moments they brush up against lounge music, elsewhere they're a tumultuous jam band, and as if that weren't enough, they even draw on reggae rhythms and ethnic percussion. Wynne essentially operates in a dimension where time is relative and context superfluous - and with a fair amount of success too, given that in the mid-Nineties two of their albums cracked the UK top 20. To this day, "Erpland" remains their most representative work, even if the first stretch of their career maintains a fairly high standard throughout.

(F. Romagnoli)

Eris Pluvia: "Rings Of Earthly Light" (1991)
Among the earliest fruits of the new Italian progressive rock, the debut by Genoa's Eris Pluvia is also one of the scene's most original and poetic works. A magical record, made unique by suspended, placidly melancholic atmospheres and by timbral choices that run distinctly against the prevailing standards of the genre. Acoustic arpeggios, violin, flutes and saxophone are central elements of an unprecedented sonic balance, able to marry lightness with tension, extreme relaxation with rhythmic and melodic drive. The drizzly mood of the record, evoked by more than one title, is skillfully achieved through enveloping yet never intrusive keyboards, far removed from classic prog schemes and closer, instead, to new age solutions. The album's one flaw is the vocals, somewhat unclear and a little shaky in their use of the English language - a flaw that becomes a strength, however, in the kaleidoscopic title track, reinforcing the sense of precariousness looming over its spellbound aura.

(M. Sgrignoli)

After Crying: "Megalázottak és megszomorítottak" (1992)
Straddling the line between progressive rock and contemporary classical music, Hungary's After Crying forged an extremely personal style that can't be traced back to any immediate model. While their ambition, instrumentation and compositional references might invite comparison with avant-prog bands, the strongly communicative nature of their atmospheres and their distance from experimentation for its own sake instead mark them out as direct, if highly original, heirs to the spirit that animated the great names of symphonic prog. With a little imagination, their most representative album could be described as a chamber-music bridge between the King Crimson of "Islands" and the Talk Talk of "Spirit of Eden": rarefied, expansive, multicolored, yet at the same time taut and full of dynamism, "Megalázottak és megszomorítottak" ("The Humiliated and Insulted" in Hungarian) is a complex, fascinating work, one of those albums capable of casting a peculiar light over whatever situation you happen to be listening to it in.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Änglagård: "Hybris" (1992)
The band that came to symbolize the Nineties Scandinavian prog revival, Sweden's Änglagård arrived like a bolt from the blue in a landscape dominated by late-Eighties synths and an ever-growing pursuit of sonic perfection. Theirs is a sound that couldn't be more Seventies if it tried: Mellotron, Hammond and Clavinet take turns at center stage alongside acoustic guitars, flute and sharp, zigzagging electric phrasing, propped up by galloping bass and a percussive richness not heard, perhaps, since the golden days of Carl Palmer. The formula is a labyrinthine, blazing progressive folk, expertly aged and able to weave together such disparate legacies as Camel and Gryphon, Genesis, King Crimson, Gentle Giant and VDGG. Compared to the greats of the past, however, the compositional style is more suite-centric, focusing attention not so much on the melodic design of the pieces as on the atmospheres evoked and the flow of individual moments - a strength and a weakness at once.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Jadis: "More Than Meets The Eye" (1992)
Released once neo-prog had already run its course, produced by Steve Rothery - guitarist of Marillion - and made by a band sharing members with the well-known IQ, "More Than Meets The Eye" by England's Jadis bears every hallmark of a purely mannerist exercise. Without denying the obvious, it's worth stressing the record's extreme accomplishment and its distinct stylistic personality compared to the genre's cornerstones. Where neo-prog bands generally assign equal roles to voice, guitars and keyboards, in Jadis's case the whole formula is skillfully built around the multifaceted guitar work of leader Gary Chandler. A virtuoso who stays "true to the line" laid down by the Eighties' models, Chandler nonetheless shines through clarity, flair and melodic taste; never lapsing into showmanship for its own sake, his contributions serve now as melodic guide, now as crackling and original jangle/prog textures, slotting in with perfect balance into the versatile framework of the songs.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Levitation: "Need For Not" (1992)

Had it been a band born out of the murky neo-prog underground, it probably wouldn't have suffered the axe of the alternative critics, who wouldn't even have noticed its existence. Unfortunately Terry Bickers, voice and guitar of Levitation, had a past in indie-pop standard-bearers House of Love, so there was no way to escape unscathed (the rehabilitation of progressive rock would after all only happen in the second half of the Nineties, starting from the most inquisitive minds of the electronic scene). A brief but blazing experience, Levitation left us just two albums, among them this debut in which the guitars move between shoegaze, psychedelic vortices and compressions a step away from metal, while everything else is pure prog polish, from the drums' intricate patterns to the pulsing bass, from cosmic keyboards to vocal lines that at times recall Porcupine Tree. Don't miss the video for the powerhouse "World Around".

(F. Romagnoli)

Sergey Kuryokhin: "Sparrow Oratorium" (1994)

Dead of a cardiac sarcoma at the age of forty-two, Sergey Kuryokhin was one of the central figures of the Russian avant-garde. A virtuoso pianist capable of daring free-jazz experimentation, and occasionally a member of the legendary new wave band Akvarium, in 1994 he released his most complete work, "Sparrow Oratorium". Split into six tracks, it's an unclassifiable prog gem, flaunting minimalist synths, ambient touches, angelic female voices (soloist Martina Kapuro stands out), dissonant guitars, saxophone fanfares, obstinate strings and lively electronic rhythms. With one eye on new-age spirituality and the other on jazz dynamism, without forgetting melodies just a step from pop, the music tears down every cultural barrier. Just don't be fooled by the opening track, "Winter", a sort of industrial post-punk piece with an operatic voice, originally part of the film "Gospodin oformitel" (1988). Excellent as it is, it belongs to another era and doesn't reflect the rest of the album.

(F. Romagnoli)

Landberk: "One Man Tell's Another" (1994)

A Swedish quintet devoted to progressive rock, but with a modern sensibility that's anything but derivative, Landberk would go on in 1996 to release an album like "Indian Summer", a collection of velvety art-rock not far removed from the roughly contemporaneous records of David Sylvian. But it's this album, released two years earlier, that stands out for its prog attitude, with Reine Fiske's guitars flaunting a dry, jagged tone, as if transplanting Fripp's "Red" into the alternative-rock era. Simon Nordberg provides the atmosphere, unfurling carpets of Mellotron, while Patric Helje's emotive but never excessive singing completes the picture, weaving through walls of sound, imposing rhythmic interlocking and unsettling dissonances. Given the sadly negligible impact of their records, Fiske would later recycle himself as a guitarist and session player for countless local alternative acts, including Dungen, Morte Macabre and, more recently, Motorpsycho.

(F. Romagnoli)

Marillion: "Brave" (1994)

Whether you like it or not, Marillion are the band that embodies the term neo-prog. Since their career is split into two phases, with the change of singer marking the dividing line, one extra album needs to be included here. The third studio effort with Steve Hogarth in place of the departed Fish, and the band's last entry into the British top 10, "Brave" is a landmark album of Nineties progressive rock. Their main point of reference had by then gradually shifted from Genesis to Pink Floyd, as shown by the shimmering keyboards, romantic guitars, the rounded sound of the rhythm section, evanescent melodies and wide-open-space atmospheres. Yet Pink Floyd never made a track with a technical level comparable to "Goodbye To All That", and the single "Hollow Man", a slightly saccharine ballad, is perfectly balanced by the cathartic crescendo of "Living With The Big Lie".

(F. Romagnoli)

Porcupine Tree: “The Sky Moves Sideways” (1995)

The career of Porcupine Tree hit a turning point with "In Absentia", both because it sold more than a hundred thousand copies worldwide (a number well above the neo-prog average), and because it introduced some typically metal textures. It's clear that this injection succeeded in making Steven Wilson and co.'s formula considerably more palatable. Although the album is by now a classic and contains material of great value, it must be admitted that in flexing its muscles it lost a bit of the poetry that came before it. Poetry like that of "The Sky Moves Sideways", Porcupine Tree's third work and the first as an actual band, which still enchants today with its blend of Floydian guitars, glacial keyboards launching into endless glides, and rhythmic assemblies ranging from acoustic percussion to alternative-dance beats (the title track, from 8'25" onward, has a breakdown worthy of The Orb). At the heart of the tracklist is one of Wilson's finest atmospheric ballads, "The Moon Touches Your Shoulder".

(F. Romagnoli)

Pendragon: "La Masquerade Overture" (1996)
Active since the late Seventies, British band Pendragon debuted right in the thick of the neo-prog wave, and were instantly marked by the grandeur of their sound, overflowing with synths and Hackett-esque flourishes. It would nonetheless take them more than ten years to refine their formula and their compositional skills to a level matching the other greats of their era, and by the time the thoroughly accomplished "La Masquerade Overture" was released in 1996, the brief commercial fortune of neo-prog was already a distant memory. A shame, because in terms of melodic taste and tonal qualities the album is an absolute peak of romantically inclined prog. Nostalgic and dazzling, memorable in its themes and instrumental passages, epic and grandiloquent without ever coming across as emptily bombastic, the album exploits the technical refinements of the synthesizers and the production possibilities of its era to pull off a stunning tour de force of Genesis-style mannerism.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Anathema: "Judgement" (1999)

Anathema pulled off one of the most surprising turnarounds of the Nineties, abandoning the doom metal with heavy gothic overtones of their early albums in favor of a melancholic progressive rock that on one hand cast a glance toward Radiohead, and on the other anticipated the lush, refined output of the Kscope label's bands. "Judgement" is the album with which even the last metal temptations were purged, in favor of a sound dominated by atmospheric keyboards, hazy vocals and reverbed guitars that don't turn their nose up at sudden torrents of distortion. This new guitar tone crafted by the Cavanagh brothers proved clean enough to win over the nostalgics, violent enough to keep metal listeners interested despite the clear break, and articulate and grainy enough to attract ears devoted to indie rock. As if that weren't enough, the tracklist also includes songs like "Deep" and "Make It Right".

(F. Romagnoli)

Archive: “You Look All The Same To Me” (2002)

A band that's open by definition, with members coming and going, swapping instruments and taking turns singing, Archive are complete unknowns in their native Britain, yet they draw huge crowds in France, Poland and Greece, managing for almost twenty years now to produce albums with major-label-level sonic architecture, which is after all necessary for one of the most layered proposals in modern music. It's hard to say which is their best album ("Lights" and "Controlling Crowds" both have a claim to the title), but "You Look All The Same To Me" remains to this day their most famous, the one with the greatest symbolic value and, all things considered, the one that forged their distinctive formula, making possible the marriage of downtempo electronica and progressive rock. "Again", with its sixteen-minute ascent, tends to steal the spotlight, but the rest of the tracklist is worthy too, just think of intimate moments like "Hate" and "Need".

(F. Romagnoli)

Anekdoten: "Gravity" (2003)

Formed in Borlänge, Sweden, in the early Nineties, Anekdoten are a cult quartet well known in neo-prog circles for their Crimson-esque guitars and their heavy use of the Mellotron. While their first three albums reflected the moods of their time, occasionally nodding to grunge textures, the turn of the new millennium freed them from that baggage. "Gravity" is their most polished record up to that point, and although the guitar sound remains sharp and abrasive, it's by now free from surrounding trends. As usual, the Mellotron swells the arrangements throughout the tracklist, mimicking the sounds of strings, flutes and, on "The Games We Play", even a set of glasses. Slightly less beloved by fans than their other records, partly because of the almost pop nature that produced melodic gems like "Ricochet" and "The War Is Over", "Gravity" is instead a sharply focused work capable of squaring the circle for the band after a decade of exploration.

(F. Romagnoli)

Mars Volta: "De-Loused In The Comatorium" (2003)
The release of "De-Loused In The Comatorium" marks a before-and-after in the history of prog. Hints of a shift in post-hardcore's evolution toward increasingly complex forms had been around for a few years, but the emergence of such an original and mature result was a bolt from the blue. Within a few months, listeners who had never taken any interest in the genre became closely attentive to its fate, and swarms of young, enthusiastic bands would rush to explore the new progressive frontiers opened up by the Texan group. Mars Volta's is an unprecedented idiom, one that, rather than revisiting the greats of the past, reinterprets alternative-rock templates in a new and unmistakably progressive key. Impetuous, cerebral, labyrinthine, the album is a galaxy of zigzagging guitars, elusive lyrics, stereo effects and hyperkinetic drumming. A sonic journey with no equal then and none since, not even from its many imitators or from Mars Volta themselves.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Pez: “Folklore” (2004)

With fourteen albums released between 1994 and 2014, no one can accuse Argentina's Pez of sitting on their hands. Among their fans, there's a lively debate over which record is their best. The seventh album of their career, "Folklore" stands out for its accessibility and adherence to the tenets of progressive rock, whereas the band has ventured into harsher and/or more psychedelic territory on other releases. Arranged and produced with obsessive care, and never running past six minutes per song, the album offers acoustic romanticism, electric jolts and intricate rhythms, drawing on that lush yet melancholy melodic sense typical of the finest Argentine rock, the kind pioneered by artists like Luis Alberto Spinetta, Virus and Gustavo Cerati. Among the many solos, those by singer-guitarist Ariel Minimal on "Aprender, comprender, facultarse, darse cuenta" and "Caminar" stand out, arguably among the most moving in recent rock history.

(F. Romagnoli)

Gazpacho: “Night” (2007)

Based in Oslo and formed in the late Nineties, it was only with this fourth studio effort that Gazpacho truly caught the attention of the new prog rock audience - a small but famously devoted crowd. While the open song structures, interlocking parts and unreal atmospheres are fully prog, the anguished tone and vocal timbre betray the influence of alternative rock instead. The band has been compared to the second phase of Marillion in instrumental terms, but it's clear that singer Jan Henrik Ohme travels along the same lines as Radiohead and early Coldplay. The tracklist comprises five songs ranging from six to seventeen minutes, built on solid rock structures that favor gradual development and atmospheric pauses over sudden shifts. The arrangements draw on both acoustic instruments (piano, violin) and samples. In 2012 the album was reissued by Kscope, with a live disc added.

(F. Romagnoli)

Birds And Buildings: “Bantam To Behemoth” (2008)

American heirs to the "revivalist" school led by Änglagård, Birds and Buildings offer a fiery, largely instrumental brand of progressive rock, made distinctive by a rich tonal palette (woodwinds, trumpet and viola are just as central as the classic guitar, bass, drums and keyboards) and a surprising ability to fuse virtually any style of classic progressive rock into a cohesive whole. In the long tracks of their debut album, the epic scope and melodic power of symphonic prog blend inseparably with the darkness of dark-prog, the dense sound and rhythmic drive of the boldest zeuhl records, and the airiness and jazzy character of the Canterbury school. What makes such convoluted, daring tracks shine is a masterful production job, thanks to which every instrument can stand out without the overall blend losing either its warmth or its rough edges.

(M. Sgrignoli)

Wobbler: “Rites At Dawn” (2011)

A Norwegian quintet that, after ten years of activity, has yet to reach its fourth album, Wobbler is among the most beloved names for progressive rock diehards, at least in recent times. Without sacrificing a notable clarity of sound, the production steers clear of overly muscular guitars and gaudy keyboards. The guitars favor interlocking patterns somewhere between vintage Steve Howe and math rock, while the keyboards dive into analogue territory, digging up romantic sounds like Hammond, Mellotron and Rhodes. The songs are convoluted to the point of being puzzles, the vocal arrangements rich in luminous tonalities and emotional ups and downs, all of which has led to comparisons with Yes and Gentle Giant. This isn't a band interested in hiding its roots - quite the opposite, they seem proud of them, especially for having managed to bring back a sense of urgency and relevance to that kind of music. "Rites At Dawn" is their third album, the one with the shortest and probably most cohesive songs.

(F. Romagnoli)

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