Great Prog bands who weren't one of "the Big Five"

For a brief window in the early 70s, prog exerted a powerful influence on the rock music scene while winning over a healthy, enthusiastic audience. Most fans now identify the top progressive bands as such: Yes, Genesis, ELP & King Crimson. In the fifth spot, I usually see either Pink Floyd (who some claim weren't really prog at all) or Jethro Tull (who were sometimes prog, sometimes not as much).

Leaving aside these leading lights, who were your favorite lesser known progressive artists? Which bands delivered a significant body of work that helped to shape the progressive sound, even though they may not have been as broadly accessible? What is it about these bands that makes them worthy of more consideration in your eyes?

For my money, Gentle Giant embodied the best of the progressive spirit but though they earned a healthy cult following, they were a little too esoteric for mass consumption. They delivered outstanding musicianship that always served the songs without getting overly showy just for the sake of it. They developed their own distinctive sound, melding rock with jazz, classical, folk and medieval influences in a fresh way. They didn't typically indulge extended (some might say padded out) epics like Yes, keeping their compositions tightly focused yet still elaborate and adventurous. And they delivered an impressive string of solid albums right up through Interview, in my estimation, one of the best track records I can think of.

We can go with a pretty broad definition of prog here, but let's try not to go too far afield. I tend to emphasize the classic 70s era, but you can certainly feel free to recognize newer bands if you feel that they're delivering something special.

 

Le Orme

 

Of the UK/US bands, Gentle Giant would certainly be right up there with the ones who get forgotten but deserved to be as popular as the others.

I'd also vote for PFM (Premiata Forneria Marconi) and Banco del Mutuo Soccorso from Italy. Both bands managed to get some LPs released in the UK and the States, but I'm guessing their thick Italian accents coupled with dumb English lyrics (in PFM's case, no thanks to Peter Sinfield) kept them from being embraced by even some big prog fans. To me, each band's catalog is very much like Yes and Genesis - you get some absolutely brilliant, even perfect, albums, followed by some lesser more mainstream sounds and eventually they put out a bunch of poppy horse pucky.

 

For my taste, the so-called Canterbury bands (Soft Machine, Hatfield and the North, National Health and, on the fringes of the scene, Henry Cow) were right up there with the bands the OP mentioned, and at times better.

I agree about Gentle Giant.

 

This is easy.

VAN DER GRAFF GENERATOR.

 

CAMEL

Once called 'Britain's brightest hope' is generally overlooked/underrated

All the albums with the classic line up are nothing but beautiful masterpieces.
Even the wonderful 'A Live Record' is rarely named among the greatest live albums, and indeed it is!

Why on earth they haven't been picked up yet and remixed in stereo and 5.1 by Steven Wilson?

 

Nektar!

 

Atomic Rooster
Starcastle
Camel

 

Camel, Gentle Giant, Nektar and Caravan.

 

Caravan.
Barclay James Harvest.
Wishbone Ash.

 

Comus

 

This genre is not exactly my wheelhouse, but Ambrosia?

 

Gong and/or Steve Hillage.

 

Love the subject as Prog Rock has been one of my favorite genres since I was a teenager. I completely agree of the "Big five" assessment.
Added to that, I would say that the "Other Big Five" (in the sense of mostly consistent careers and , for the most part, "near commercial" appeal) would be:
-Kansas
-Van Der Graaf
-Camel
-Marillion
-Styx

Then, in another pocket I would mention the "international big five", meaning bands that did not come from either the US or UK and had some recognition outside of their home countries:

- Triumvirat (granted, an ELP clone, but they were so good)
- PFM
- Le Orme
- Banco
- Kaipa

 

Porcupine Tree

 

how about one last encore for this great band

 

For their first three albums, Curved Air...although really, it's all about the spectacular debut, Airconditioning.

 

Brand X

 

Camel, Focus & Utopia

 

Ftr I get why some say Pink Floyd is prog rock, but it's never been a persuasive argument to me.

Conversely since I do not think it essential to meet the definition of a prog rock band that it have keyboards, I would put Rush in that category (not that I am a fan - count me as one put off too much by Geddy Lee's weird voice).

 

My top 4 choices as well.

 

Kansas would be the next one for me. And really #5 as I don't consider Floyd prog.

 

No mention of Rush yet?