Progressive? Alternative? What's the Difference? chat & forums.

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lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 20 (view)

Progressive? Alternative? What's the Difference? Posted: 12/19/2007 10:53:52 PM
Progressive and alternative are just two adjectives, really. They can mean a lot of different things. Originally, progressive was used to describe the more experimental music being played by psychedelic bands in the late 1960's, when the music aspired to be something greater than trippy pop music with their song structures and concepts. The term "progressive" eventually was stretched to accommodate a lot more during the 1970's and beyond, and included a lot of pretentious and showy sorts of things as well as silly and adventurous stuff. It's such a broad term now that to say you are a fan of "progressive rock" doesn't really give a concise impression. It doesn't have a very precise genre definition that something like "rockabilly" has. In the 1990's, there was a rather uncommon radio format on a handful of commercial (but not pop/top 40) stations that they called "progressive" or "modern rock" which was unrelated to the progressive rock bands. It featured more underground artists, a lot of post punk and related stuff, new wave, a lot of British stuff from the 1980's and early 1990's, modern independent rock bands who weren't signed to major labels, etc. "Alternative" is something different; it all it really means is "underground" or "not mainstream." It's not a musical genre or sound. A lot of the acts played on the "progressive" or "modern rock" radio format could be classified as "alternative," because it was not popular with the masses, it was more of an underground thing enjoyed by non-conformist college students, people of various non-mainstream subcultures, free-minded individualists, etc. Unfortunately, sometime in the early 1990's, a coule of the bands known as "alternative" became mainstream and hugely popular. Their sudden popularity wasn't the bad thing; the bad thing was that the advertisers/marketers/record companies/etc. continued to market the acts as "alternative" when that wasn't the case. They tried to turn "alternativeness" into something the masses should want to consume. They basically destroyed the meaning of the word and tricked people into thinking that what "alternative" really was was the sound of these few bands (and their soundalikes) that had recently gotten hugely popular. There never was a musical genre called "alternative." Since the beginning of popular music, alternative has meant non-mainstream. If a new sound or genre was created by some alternative artists, and that new sound became popular, the genre was referred to by it's name, and it became mainstream. But in this case, instead of calling the sound of these bands by what they were (or creating a new term), they decided to hijack the term "alternative" and forever(?) pollute it's meaning. If a radio station advertises itself as being "alternative" or playing "alternative rock", it is completely meaningless. They are just playing mainstream rock. They just want people to subconsciously feel good about it. It seems now since the term "alternative" was diluted and hijacked by the mainstream corporations, the alternative music scene is now more commonly referred to as being "underground" or "independent" music, so as not to be confused with mainstream corporate music that is fraudulently marketed as "alternative." So nowadays, when you hear the term "alternative", it's not an alternative to anything except perhaps pop stuff like Britney Spears, or commercial rap, or classic rock by long-time established artists (Tom Petty, Rolling Stones, etc.) etc.

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 6 (view)

Uploading pics Posted: 11/18/2007 8:22:34 AM
I'm having the exact same problem... No one seems to know what's going on... Oh well Size down, convert to BMP, try uploading again ---> Images: Image Types

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 883 (view)

Image Problems Posted: 11/18/2007 1:14:32 AM
Same problem here... I have 6 images on my profile, the pic i'm trying to upload is a GIF, 99kb in size, I browse, find the pic file, hit upload, and it acts like it's uploading and the screen refreshes, but the picture doesn't show up at the bottom of my pictures list. Size down, convert to BMP, try uploading again ---> Images: Image Types

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 20 (view)

are XTC still around Posted: 11/4/2007 9:27:35 AM
Yes they are still around. Some of the members have been working with the band Pugwash from Dublin Ireland, I HIGHLY recommend their stuff, so do an internet search and listen to some soundclips! Search for [ Pugwash "Thomas Walsh" ] because he's the mastermind behind the band and a really great bloke in general!

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 4 (view)

the best of jazz? Posted: 11/4/2007 9:24:15 AM
I'm a fan of swing, both big and small band stuff. My fave band is Jimmie Lunceford & his Orchestra, but Duke Ellington's band had some amazing stuff especially in the early 1940's. As for small bands, the Gramercy 5's handful of 1940 sessions are just amazing stuff, featuring harpsichord instead of piano. My fave current band doing this sort of stuff is Ondrej Havelka and his Melody Makers. They are based out of Prague in the Czech Republic. You can find their website pretty easily by doing an internet search. Were you looking for specific musicians who I think are the best, or specific bands?

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 14 (view)

The Traveling Wilburys Posted: 11/1/2007 8:13:35 PM
Ringo's real name is Richard Starkey, Jr. , not Mark. And it's Jeff Lynne. People seem to love to leave the last 'e' off, but I've never seen "Geff" before in any context....

lunarpollen

Joined: 6/15/2007

Msg: 6 (view)

control Posted: 11/1/2007 8:05:40 PM
I saw it this past Saturday. I enjoyed it. Although they had Hooky playing a real Rickenbacker bass (it's well-known he used a Hondo Rickenbacker copy) and Ian playing a modern-day Eastwood copy of a Vox Phantom instead of a real Vox during the "Love Will Tear Us Apart" studio bit... No one would have ever had to notice except they had the headstock right up close in the shot where you could clearly read "EASTWOOD" and that kind of destroyed the mood for me a bit. Haha I know, I am picky! :P

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