Foreign music

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best Beligian band?

Has to be Siglo XX

Has to be either K's Choice or TC Matic for me. But it says a lot when I can only name 2 names to choose from ...

(I could add Monza here but they sing in Dutch and are only known in the Flemish region of Belgium, even in Holland where the same language is spoken they have little fame... great band though so yeah, make that 3 good bands I can name)

Not familiar with Siglo, can you give me a link where I can hear some music from them?

Sometimes even better then the original. Not exactly new, but I love the afro pop from Guinea/Mali sort of area how they mix cuban rhythms with griot and lovely synth guitar five finger styles. The sound was party due to the way their played have more in common with their traditional string instruments or however they decided to teach themselves, and also the fact they were using cheap Japanese guitars that were not well known. It is also a bonus that they couldn't Spanish.

That music works really well with noise. Black dice have been heading in that direction for a while.

I'm also into free improv and conctrete. Music can be made with anything.



I'm a big fan of Ravi shankar, and always liked the sound of the sitar, sarod, tabla, bansuri, mridangam, etc in Hindustani and Carnatic music. When I mention him I usually get the same predictable response. Granted to some it sounds like strangling cats, when sober. Maybe it is the strangling cats aesthetic than draws me to it, but seriously it is really great stuff. I wouldn't listen to cat being strangled when I'm stoned anyway. As for Ravi, he had very little to do with that anyway.

I'm not really into filmi/bhangra at all, so each to their own.

I saw him for his farewell to Europe gig at the barbican. He absolutely rocked. This was likely his very last gig in Europe, probably the one his last big shows ever before he dies. At one point I thought he might die on sage of a heart attack. But he totally surpassed all expectations. Despite being quite fragile sounding in-between ragas, when he was playing he seem to generate so much energy it unbelievable. You could just see his little foot tapping, sticking out of his matchstick white pantaloons off the end of the plinth. It was a constant throughout despite really complicated rhythms in Indian classical, which can have anything from 3 to 108 beats to the bar. He had someone tune his sitar in-between every raga, which I thought was very rock and roll.

There was an awesome bansuri (flute) player. This guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QuDEx3_Ygo

Last edited by 0_equals_true on 13 Aug 2008, 3:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

They always had quite a small following. They pretty much came up with the doom wave sound of cold wave music.

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu ... =162102040

Profile says: SIGLO XX hail from Genk, a depressed industrial city in Belgium.

Heh?? I have been there numerous times, it is a really nice and colourful multiculture city. Not depressing at all

But hey, listening to this music, this sounds really not bad. Sounds cold and gloomy, quality darkwave. Thanks for pointing at this, I am going to check more of them.

You'll like this
http://www.gamemusicjukebox.com/?id=94

The music from We Love Katamari.

hee..maybe it was like that in the early 80s. Or it could be that that fan just thinks Genk is depressed.



The were a forerunner of darkwave. They indirectly influenced industrial IMO, even though most people wouldn't recognise the name. Their sound is more of a natural horror than other well known cold wave band of the time like Trisomie 21, which are more goffic in a way. End of Data could have a certain apocalyptic charm but that was more stylised (not that I mind).

Have you heard of other Belgian coldwave band that are still around like Polyphonic Size or The Breath Of Life? It is interesting to see what directions they have gone in since.

No, Breathe of Life is the only one I knew. You even surprised me with Siglo XL. Gothic and wave are a very small minority in Belgium, and a largely underground thing without many bands that make this sort of music. Hence why I am so surprised to hear Siglo XL, but it was a very pleasant surprise as it sounds really good. Finally some good music to discover from my native country Are they still existing? The Breathe of Life (who are from the French speaking part of Belgium) are still actively touring.

Genk is very multicultural, with a large number of Southern European and Middle Eastern immigrants, and some North Africans. It is a colourful little city with a lot of new commerces and bars in the town, and a lot of rebuilding. Maybe it looked gloomy back when Siglo XL started though, that was just after the mining was done and when unemployment was huge. So it may have looked gloomy back then, probably that is also the reason why the town has seen so many modernisations and new buildings rise: to wipe away its gloomy past. I first visited Genk during the mid-nineties when I was like 13 or 14 years old (I am from Ghent myself, which is a 2 hour drive away from Genk) and it looked very colourful then. I have visited Genk plenty of times again later on, and never felt like it had something gloomy. But again, the town has been heavily modernised, probably in an attempt to hide the gloomy past? It did have lot of unemployment once the mines closed.

'fraid not they evaporated in the late 80s, near really did full on touring. Have a listen to their back catologue though. Front 242 are still around.

One of the biggest one hit wonders in Europe in the eighties was a French language song. Look up "Voyage Voyage" by Desireless, a singer from French. Was a huge hit in all of Europe and Asia, even in the UK where normally French language music rarely becomes a hit. After only one album she became a recluse however and seems to live a very quiet life on the country with a lifestyle inspired by some oriental religion (buddhism?). Anyhow, Voyage Voyage was a HUGE hit, even in countries where very few people understand French.

oh yeah that is a classic hit. It doesn't matter if they chart though, music get recycled people get hold of lit somehow.

I think there will be more space for French speaking hip hop , RnB, house.

French is the perfect language for hiphop and rap as most French sentences contain many words but are easy to pronounce in a rapid way. French hiphop is good, usually very multicultural as well because often it is made in the banlieus (= slums) populated by immigrants. Hiphop in France still has its original feeling of complaining about the poor conditions people are living in, compared to the hiphop from many US bands which has no social-political message at all anymore.

Voyage Voyage is a blissful song, you just drift away while she sings. The song also literally sings "Voyage, voyage, et ne jamais reviens" which means "Travel, travel, and never go back". That is my motto in life really.

one of my favorites is Misha and Natalia from Russia
a Russian folk group
ABBA from Sweden
Genesis from england

Addition to my earlier post: one of the other few Belgian bands that are actually good and accomplished something, is Bruges-based punk band Red Zebra.

Here is their video for "Spit on the City":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1RBHVshLuw

Here is their cult song "I can't live in a living room":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhCLwGt-mM4


The band is still going but nowadays is forced to perform on school celebrations and local fares in order to get enough funds to keep the band going... Such a shame. Never really got the recognition they deserved. But the Belgian music scene is dominated by a whole other type of music, while mainstream TV and radio in Belgium rarely promote the more alternative bands that exist in the country.

I really like The Pillows, they're living proof that not all music from Japan is visual kei