By Brian McCollum, Free Press Pop Music Critic
Poor, poor progressive rock.
For two decades it has plowed onward, undeterred by critical sniping and lukewarm response from the populace. When It wasn't ignored, it was mocked.
Prog rock is the music of Rush, Yes, King Crimson and all the other bands who harnessed rock's energy, fancied it up, and learned to play their instruments really well.
Now it's itching for a comeback. Sort of.
A glance at Detroit's November concert roster might make you think it never disappeared. Prog rock long-timers Jethro Tull and King Crimson, fresh off new albums, are headed to town, and a three-band show this weekend at the Magic Bag Theater will showcase three of Michigan's homegrown prog rock acts.
Ian Anderson leads Jethro Tull into the Fox Theatre on Saturday. (That show is sold out.) The Motor City ProgShow '95, featuring Discipline, Tiles and House of Usher, kicks off at 6 p.m. Sunday at the Magic Bag. King Crimson--with Robert Fripp and Adrian Belew at the helm--heads into the State Theatre on Nov. 28.
In the rock world, where history works in cycles and vital movements wither as soon as fans smell "sellout," a prog rock resurgence--small or large--wouldn't be out of place.
"In the '80s and '90s, the perception of most people is that progressive rock died," says Detroit's Richard Kaczynski, keyboardist for the five-man House of Usher. "It didn't die--it just went underground. Now that the '70s sound has become popular again, a lot of the new bands have opened themselves up to that style of music."
In other words, while Nirvana, Green Day and their punk-'n'-grunge-minded brethren secured a superglue grip on the '90s rock scene--where minimalism and low-brow cool are prized above all else--high-minded progressive rock turned into the genuine alternative music.
Kaczynski describes the network of fans as a tight-knit club. Newsletters, fanzines and Internet sites have sprung up to support local and regional bands that pump out their product on a handful of small, independent labels.
Mike Portnoy is the drummer for New York's Dream Theater, the most successful breakkout prog band of the '90s. Even with his outfit's success--its second album went gold--he knows not to kid himself.
"History has showns that bands doing this kind of music don't end up on the cover of Rolling Stone or sell 10 million records," Portnoy says. "We'll never be on the level of a Guns N' Roses or Nirvana--the music can't be consumed by the mass audience."
Still, there are signs the MTV generation--known to sneer at earnestness and anyone who can't distinguish irony from an ironing board--has dropped its resistance.
Altern-rockers the Smashing Pumpkins stormed to No. 1 this month with a new double-album opus, a grand affair featuring strings, a vaguely esoteric concept and a ramblind title worhy of the best Yes epics. And recent discs from groups as diverse as Blind Melon and Dave Matthews Band show a bend toward the precise noodling and complex instrumental interplay that marked early prog rock bands such as King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer.
Though the mainstream audience may never be eager to swallow anything as high-and-mighty as, say, "Tales from Topographic Oceans" by Yes, listeners are apparently ready for musicianship that at least makes a stab at virtuosity.
"You're gonna start seeing bands that combine better production techniques and better musicianship into their stuff," says Joe Bevilacqua, program director for Z-Rock, WDZR (102.7 FM). "The same old chord progressions that Bush and Pearl Jam made famous just ain't footing the bill anymore."
Kaczynski says virtuoso playing isn't about showing off in front of an audience.
"It's a difficult tightrope to walk, keeping the energy that's essential to rock 'n' roll while flexing to do something that interests you as a musician," he says. "If you're playing music that's no longer challenging, why bother?"
But it's that tendency toward flashy chops that's made prog rock a tempting target for critics from the get-go, when bands like Pink Floyd and the Moody Blues first tacked artsy flourishes onto their psychedelic rock. The arrows came quick and easy: Pretentious. Overwrought. Pseudo-intellecto.
But to fans--mostly white male teens--prog rock was breaking boundaries and spicing the brew. If Chuck Berry gave you three chords and a duckwalk, prog rock promised a symphony and a flight to the stars.
It didn't always deliver. The early '70s, in particular, gave detractors just the sort of ammo they needed; obese albums like Emerson, Lake and Palmer's "Tarkus," which bumbled awkwardly through a sophomoric rock opera punctuated by flashy, soulless instrumental jams.
Seventies acts Rush and Yes were more successful, dabbling in mysticism, sci-fi and pop psychology as the music--replete with tricky time changes and intricate chord colorings--intensified. The fan base grew.
Prog rock's devotees know they're different. They figure they're more musically sophisticated than the average rock fan, and they welcome the lack of mass acceptance, Kaczynski says.
"There's always something really exciting about rooting for the underdog."