Overall, it's a shame that bands like Dredg, Oceansize and Fair to Midland got so overlooked that they were basically forced to quit the bizz. I miss all those bands.
God. All three of them are in my top 10 favorite bands of the post-2000 era, and Oceansize is probably #1. And all three of them basically burned out after barely managing to sustain a starving wage through their music. It's disgusting.
Good proggish rock bands that didn't establish themselves before 2000 or so were all doomed from the start, as that style of music was completely cast out of the mainstream/radio, and the older generation that has sustained Deftones/Tool/et al. largely never bothered looking for interesting new music in their adulthood. That's my take, anyway.
Although, you do have a few like Coheed or Porcupine Tree who fared better. I feel like they only survived by pandering to the classic prog-nerd audience who worship Floyd, Rush, King Crimson, etc., whereas bands like Oceansize and FTM were strictly forward-looking and didn't pay homage to that tradition. I love Coheed and appreciate PT, but it's kind of annoying how that nostalgic prog indulgence tended to be rewarded commercially moreso than really inventive stuff. Oceansize basically did everything PT/SW do well, but threw in a shitload of innovation and diverse experimentation on top of it, so I'll never grasp why their audience stayed so much smaller.
