Progressive Metal

Progressive metal is, by nature, difficult to define with any one particular sound. This is likely why it is my personal favorite metal subgenre. It is characterized by complex, intricate, layered songwriting, with the musicianship displaying both technical proficiency and sense of interplay. Lyrical content is all over the place, but often held together by album-spanning concepts, often original stories or retellings of literary classics. Introspective, multifaceted, and ever-changing, this is progressive metal.

In the mid-1980s, progressive metal was on its first legs. Taking influence from melody- and story-focused heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden as well as thrash metal bands like Metallica. The very first progressive metal bands were simply technical thrash metal bands with a more introspective edge; bands like Voivod, Watchtower, and Deathrow were the primary forces. Similarly, there came a very grandiose yet simpler style that took much more heavy metal influence, leading to bands like Queensrÿche and Fates Warning. Progressive metal guitar virtuosos like Jason Becker and Vinnie Moore also began to arise in this time, leading to an eventual boom in instrumental progressive music.

Recommended '80s progressive metal listening:
1. Fates Warning - Awaken the Guardian (1986)
2. Queensrÿche - Operation: Mindcrime (1988)
3. Voivod - Nothingface (1988)
4. Crimson Glory - Transcendence (1988)
5. Watchtower - Control and Resistance (1989)

One of the most significant developments in the entire progressive metal genre was the introduction of Dream Theater. Known even today as "the" progressive metal band, these guys had everything. Whether it was crunchy metal riffs, 15-minutes of odd progressive time signatures, catchy pop hooks, or soaring melodies, Dream Theater could pull it off like none other. The combination of all these aspects was central to the development of the established traditional progressive metal style. Bands like Seventh Wonder, Psychotic Waltz, Vanden Plas, Symphony X, and many others would follow this blueprinted sound.

Despite the development of a central sound, progressive metal in the '90s still exploded into a variety of directions. Most of the more traditional sounding artists began to experiment with less flashy instrumentalism, instead focusing on the development of characters, stories, or atmosphere like Pain of Salvation, Ayreon, and Devin Townsend. Others combined progressive music with death metal, leading to a wave of bands like late career-Death, Atheist, Edge of Sanity, Cynic, and Opeth. Nevermore carried on the progressive thrash metal torch, though in a way fairly far removed from the Voivods and Watchtowers of the previous decade. Other bands like Meshuggah would carve a niche in intensely polyrhythmic music, creating thick, chuggy patterns of palm muted ones and zeros. This will be expanded upon shortly.

Recommended '90s progressive metal listening:
1. Dream Theater - Images and Words (1992)
2. Cynic - Focus (1993)
3. Symphony X - The Divine Wings of Tragedy (1997)
4. Devin Townsend - Ocean Machine: Biomech (1997)
5. Opeth - Still Life (1999)

In the 2000s, extreme progressive metal rose to the forefront. Existing bands like Opeth and Meshuggah led the charge, influencing countless other bands to create heavy, unpredictable progressive music. Among these were Mastodon (combining the sound with sludge metal and stoner metal), Between the Buried and Me (combining with metalcore),  Enslaved (combining with black metal), Gojira (combining with death metal and groove metal), maudlin of the Well (combining with avant-garde metal), Orphaned Land (combining with folk metal), and the biggest of them all: Tool, who introduced a layer of accessible alternative metal into the prog sound (along with Soen, Rishloo, and Porcupine Tree). As you could probably notice, the 'progressive' tag can go with pretty much any other style of music, allowing for a versatility that a lot of other metal genres do not have.

Recommended '00s progressive metal listening:
1. Tool - Lateralus (2001)
2. Opeth - Blackwater Park (2001)
3. Pain of Salvation - Remedy Lane (2002)
4. Between the Buried and Me - Colors (2007)
5. Mastodon - Crack the Skye (2009)

Another new style around this time is what has now come to be called "djent." Based off of the work of those polyrhythmic monsters Meshuggah, djent encapsulates the side of progressive metal that is far more rhythm-based than lead-based. The technicality in djent is a result of its angular rhythmic patterns and jolting changes in meter, rather than crazy shredding or long songs. The style has since broken up into three distinct scenes. The first is the metalcore-based bands, starting with artists like SikTh, Periphery, Monuments and Erra, and eventually leading to a wave of deathcore/djent bands like Born of Osiris and Veil of Maya. The second is the atmospheric style, staying closer to the progressive metal roots, with bands like TesseracT, Textures, Uneven Structure, and Skyharbor. The last, which will be elaborated upon further, is the instrumental wave, not-as-commonly-referred-to-as-it-should-be as "instrudjental," spearheaded by bands like Animals as Leaders, Scale the Summit, and Cloudkicker.

Recommended djent listening:
1. Meshuggah - Nothing (2002)
2. SikTh - Death of a Dead Day (2006)
3. Textures - Silhouettes (2008)
4. TesseracT - One (2011)
5. Periphery II: This Time It's Personal (2012)

The 2010s saw a natural evolution in all facets of progressive metal. First and foremost would be the apparent continuation of extreme prog. Bands like Enslaved, Ne Obliviscaris, Gojira, Persefone, Horrendous, and Between the Buried and Me all have pushed their sound further and continued experimenting, releasing both career- and genre-defining releases. Progressive post-metal is also a trend, with bands like the Ocean and Intronaut. Thy Catafalque, Devin Townsend, Diablo Swing Orchestra, Dir en Grey, and more continue to release creative and inventive slabs of avant-garde progressive metal.

The instrudjental movement is now booming as well, with a plethora of bands and even more solo artists beginning to release their "bedroom prog." Artists like Plini, Sithu Aye, Chimp Spanner, David Maxim Micic, Jakub Zytecki, Widek, and Nick Johnston all formed a sort of prog/jazz metal collective. Bands like Chon, Polyphia, Night Verses, Arch Echo, and Strawberry Girls introduce the outside influence of jazz fusion and math rock as well.

Most surprisingly, however, is the introduction of a traditional prog metal revival. While progressive metal undoubtedly took a detour through the extreme and innovative styles listed before, there is still plenty of fire left in the Dream Theater corner. Bands like Haken, Leprous, Caligula's Horse, Artificial Language, Threshold, Seventh Wonder, late career-Amorphis, Chaos Divine, and many others continue to write more traditionally-styled progressive metal. Progressive rock is also back in a big way, with bands like Agent Fresco, 22, Thank You Scientist, Bent Knee, all coming onto the scene, as well as seasoned bands like Coheed and Cambria and the Dear Hunter continuing to release masterpieces.

Recommended '10s progressive metal listening:
1. Enslaved - Axioma Ethica Odini (2010)
2. Leprous - Bilateral (2011)
3. Ne Obliviscaris - Portal of I (2012)
4. The Ocean - Pelagial (2013)
5. Haken - The Mountain (2013)

When your genre is characterized by new innovation and progression, it becomes very difficult for it to go stale. That's what makes progressive metal such a unique and engaging genre of music. It has no specific sound, but rather a collective of sounds that just don't fit anywhere else. It is defined by not being able to be defined, and that spells for a wonderful genre with lots of longevity. Saying that Queensrÿche and Enslaved are in the same genre may be a stretch for those that don't know just how vast the progressive music spectrum is, but for us (yes, you, dear reader), it paints a picture of the splendid blooming tree that is progressive metal.