Progressive Metal
A subset of Heavy Metal which combines the musical intricacies of Progressive Rock with the heavy, guitar/drum-driven sound of metal. Progressive Metal may also include more overt flavorings of Classical music, such as operatic vocals or symphonic arrangements. A concrete definition of progressive metal is hard to pin down, so the status of many bands as progressive metal can be ambiguous.
Also, see Technical Death Metal and the "Avant-Garde/Progressive Black Metal" section in the Black Metal article.
Notable artists and bands in the Progressive Metal genre include:
- The 3rd and the Mortal
- 30 Seconds to Mars (also classed as Alternative Rock, Alternative Metal, Post-hardcore, Progressive Rock, Space Rock, and Emo)
- Agalloch
- Aina
- Akercocke (also classed as progressive black metal, Progressive Death Metal, blackened death metal, and probably a number of other things)
- Amorphis (First album was straight-up Death metal, and their second album was Melodeath/DoomMetal. However, from their third album on, they've been prog metal)
- Alchemist
- Arcturus
- Atheist
- August Burns Red (mixed with Metalcore)
- Ayreon
- Baroness
- Battle of Mice
- Between the Buried and Me (mixed with Metalcore and Death Metal)
- Borknagar
- Circus Maximus
- Conception
- Cynic
- Death, the first Death Metal band, gradually moved towards prog metal the further along they went with the band. By their last album, The Sound of Perseverance, they were most definitely a prog metal band.
- Dream Theater
- Edge of Sanity
- Epica, one part progressive metal, one part Symphonic Metal.
- Faith No More
- Furyu
- Fates Warning
- Freak Kitchen
- Gojira
- Ill Nino (Enigma only)
- Isis
- Liquid Tension Experiment
- Mastodon
- Megadeth, although they are best known as a Thrash Band, the experimented with prog elements quite frequently in their music
- Meshuggah
- Mudvayne
- Mutyumu
- Nevermore
- Opeth (mixed with Death Metal)
- Orphaned Land
- Pain of Salvation
- Pelican
- Periphery
- Porcupine Tree (starting with In Absentia and getting heavier ever since; formerly Progressive Rock / Psychedelic Rock)
- Queensrÿche
- Riverside
- Savatage
- Seventh Wonder
- Shadow Gallery
- SikTh
- Sonata Arctica, started as a power metal band with some progressive elements, went pure progressive with Unia and fused power and progressive evenly with The Days of Grays.
- Strapping Young Lad, though they also have obvious Thrash Metal roots.
- SYL singer/guitarist Devin Townsend's solo albums are more unambiguously this.
- Symphony X (crosses over with Power Metal and Symphonic Metal)
- System of a Down
- Threshold
- Tiamat (Only Wildhoney is properly part of this genre, but some of their other albums have prog elements.)
- Tool
- Tourniquet ( also Thrash Metal)
- Voivod
- Watchtower
- X Japan
Tropes that apply to progressive metal
- Epic Rocking: Good luck finding a progressive metal band that hasn't ever used this trope.
- Trope Maker: Probably Queensrÿche or Dream Theater. Fates Warning or Watchtower would count if you don't consider either of them to be Ur Example instead.
- Uncommon Time: Used frequently. Again, pretty much all bands in the genre have used this trope at least occasionally, although some are more blatant about it than others.