So, people looking for cool new albums from the past 5 years or so:
Astra: The Weirding If you like stuff that sounds like Pink Floyd, I mean really sounds like them, this should be an auto-buy.
Beardfish: I run hot and cold on these guys. On the one hand, their singer's not so hot and their "we're hip and with it because we use curse words!" lyrics are beyond awful. On the other side, they are, instrumentally, one of the most amazing bands out there today. I only own their latest, Destined Solitaire, but what I've heard from their earlier albums is actually better.
Bigelf: Cheat the Gallows Their sound's changed little over the years—sort of Pink Floyd meets Deep Purple with psychedelic Beatles-era songwriting—but this album's as good as anything in their catalogue and would make a good place to start.
Big Big Train: Not your ordinary neo-prog band...not anymore anyway. Their latest two albums, The Difference Machine and The Underfall Yard, are both seriously great and highly recommended.
The Dear Hunter: Act III: Life and Death I don't really care for their singer, but what I've heard from this album is one of the more exciting "modern" prog releases out there.
Minimum Vital: Capitaines The latest by this French folk/symphonic/fusion group is honestly one of the best of their career. I expected to like it, but not for it to be this good.
Moth Vellum: I can't recommend these guys highly enough, especially if you're into the classic Yes sound. They mate it with classic Brian Wilson pop songwriting/Beach Boy harmony vocals and a modern touch making this really something special. It's a pity they only made the one album.
TEE: The Earth Explorer Superb instrumental flute-driven album from Japan.
There's some other good stuff out there I could recommend, but that ought to be enough to get you started.
edited 27th Aug '10 2:06:29 AM by Bananaquit
If you like your prog upbeat and folky with bursts of jazz fusion and orchestration, you could definitely do worse. I started off with For Girls Who Grow Plump in the Night and was initially disappointed, then went through a period where I couldn't get enough of the album and played it once a week. For a while, I even wanted to emulate Geoff Richardson and learn to play the viola!
Pure Reason Revolution and Oceansize are great, in case no one's mentioned them.
http://www.last.fm/user/BlueGhost60I don't mind progressive rock. As far as the major seventies bands go, Jethro Tull and Genesis are probably the ones I enjoy the most. Additionally, I will concede to liking Yes (Relayer was the first prog album I heard), even though they exhibit the problems outlined below.
As for modern prog rock/metal, I think that a lot of bands have the same problem that sometimes undermined Emerson, Lake and Palmer. They tend to exhibit unparalleled virtuosity, but it comes at the expense of really enjoyable songs. Take Dream Theater, for example, who are some of the best musicians I've heard but generally have kind of naff and somewhat uninteresting lyrics.
edited 5th Sep '10 7:07:29 AM by TheGloomer
Speaking of Oceansize, I just found out they have a new album. It's called Self Preserved While The Bodies Float Up. Getting it now. :o
http://www.last.fm/user/BlueGhost60I absolutely love Rush. Not all of their albums are prog, but Hemispheres is their unsung masterpiece, which I think is even better than 2112.
Yes is good too. The Yes Album, Fragile, and Closer To The Edge have the classic lineup and sound fantastic. Haven't ventured further than that in their disco.
Porcupine Tree is okay. I like Deadwing pretty good, but their other records typically have just one or two songs I like. Mew isn't quite progressive rock but they're well worth checking out. Ling Tosite Sigure is a Japanese band that compacts the complex, twisting song structures of prog into the guise of high-strung indie rock. Midsummer is one of my favorites, an obscure California band that's the perfect blend of prog, shoegaze, and post-rock.
PRR’s The Dark Third is good, but I rather went off them after I saw them *ahem!* “live.” I should probably listen to their second album at one point, but reviews have been less than flattering.
edited 8th Sep '10 11:34:36 PM by Bananaquit
AWAKEN YE MAN, FROM THINE SLUMBER
can I get any good instrumental Prog Rock / Space Rock albums?
edited 22nd Oct '11 9:42:57 PM by BlixtySlycat
go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imaginePink Floyd were instrumental?
I have Dark Side of the Moon, but...
go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imagine![]()
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If you're looking for good instrumental space rock, I suggest Planet X, which was fronted by former Dream Theater keyboardist Derek Sherinian.
Also, while I'm on the topic of Prog rock, I'm amazed that nobody has mentioned Flower Kings yet. They're quite a good prog band that takes quite a bit of influence from Yes, especially the Sum of No Evil, which I think is their own Tales From Topographic Oceans. Their most grandiose epic is the 59-minute "Garden of Dreams".
edited 23rd Oct '11 4:48:52 PM by x86x
Now listening to Birth Control's second album. Excellent prog rock: interesting compositions, soulful vocals and lots of exciting guitar and Hammond work. It's a shame they're so unknown - I only heard about them in the first place because Gamma Ray took their name from a song of theirs.
Mache dich, mein Herze, rein...Highly recommend Spock's Beard to one & all. They're all brilliant instrumentalists, and their songs are all listenable—even the lengthy epics never descend into noodling; they keep introducing fresh melodic hooks & ideas. Their magnum opus is Snow, but you also couldn't go wrong with V, Octane, or their '06 eponymous album.
The band's only problem has been underwhelming vocalists: Neal Morse was too bland and poppy, and Nick D'Virgilio's voice was simply weak. Haven't yet heard the new guy's pipes, but am hopeful.
What I've heard of Spock's Beard is cool. And I personally like Neal Morse's voice, even if it isn't super sweet sounding or technically impressive. His solo album Testimony 2 is also awesome and his stuff with Transatlantic is insanely epic. Really great composer and keyboardist, probably one of my favourite musicians at the moment.
Yeah, Spocks Beard is quite a good prog band. I got into them when I first discovered Transatlantic, which had Mike Portnoy from Dream Theater. Then I checked out the members of that group and their main projects, and that's how I got into Spocks Beard and The Flower Kings. That's basically how I search for modern prog nowadays, I search through the Transatlantic tree (as the Prog-Archives site calls it) because the members in Transatlantic are quite prolific in terms of how much music they've composed and how many projects they're in.I look up the members of those bands and see what projects they're in, and vice versa.
Can't wait for Spocks Beard's new album this summer, as well as a new Flower Kings album in June, and a new Neal Morse album this year. And I heard that Transatlantic may be working on some new material this year, so it ought to be quite exciting to see what comes out of that. So many bands I'm interested in are putting out albums this year, it just seems so crazy.
edited 27th Mar '12 4:55:22 PM by x86x2
Someone wake me from this nightmare, I've become my darkest fear...

Orne - The Conjuration By The Fire is a good album.