Well currently I'm listening to Ayreon's Into the Electric Castle; pretty entertaining stuff, even if a bit cheesy.

So do you have an opinion of Echolyn yet?

I was curious to see what Echolyn sounded like as Seba Aethiad kept mentioning it. I listened to both samples on progarchive. It sounded very neo-prog to me. Seeing as the albums were 1990s and 2000s, I didn't expect to totally love it myself (sorry, not a big fan of neo-prog), but it was OK. I don't think I would buy the albums myself, but I could see other people loving it.

I'm going through alot of material on progarchives and keeping track of bands that catch my attention. I'll post my favorites here when I'm done.

Echloyn somehow reminds me of dredg(in some places), though I can't really point it out. I too like it, but am not blown away as yet. Maybe I would have to give it a few more listens for it to click or maybe neo-prog. isn't entirely my thing .
Any more good bands you've got tucked up in your playlist seba?

Well, if melodic neo-prog isn't your thing, then we can go in the complete opposite direction w/ some neo-zeuhl.

Check out Bondage Fruit...I mention them quite a bit around here but I'm not sure if anyone's bothered looking into them...

Alright. I've gone through all of the symphonic progressive rock on http://www.progarchives.com/. What I did was go through all the bands in that section, and downloaded the samples that were there. There were quite a few bands that I would have liked to listen to, but no samples were available. My opinions are totally based on the few samples that were there as I had never heard of these bands before. I made a few notes as I went along. Here's the ones that caught my attention the most.

Ange
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=595
- French prog rock
- Strong vocals

Anglagard
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...asp?band_id=18
- Great guitar and piano playing
- Great riffs, often changing moods

Ars Nova
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...asp?band_id=28
- Lots of keyboard, ELP-ish

Carpe Diem
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=843
- Variety of instruments
- Nice vocals

Cervello
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=568
- Especially liked the flute

Citizen Cain
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...asp?band_id=61
- Peter Gabriel comes to mind listening to the vocals
- Fairly good riffs

High Wheel
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=149

Landberk
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=196
- Somewhat moody / ambient
- I really liked the bass sound -> souds very full
- Vocals were nice

Novalis
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=596
- Reminds me of King Crimson somehow

Renaissance
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=603
- Much different from what I usually listen to
- Female vocals were good
- Great piano, and orchestra

Triumvirat
http://www.progarchives.com/Progress...sp?band_id=392
- Sounds a bit like ELP
- Emphasis on keyboards

I plan to make a few purchases: probably some Ange and Anglagard for now.

Hi Seba,
there seem to be no Bondage Fruit albums available at the moment. Do you know where to get them? The only one I have is Bondage Fruit IV, which really is mind blowing. Although not for every day use.

RHCP - The Zephyr Song

"I Still Love You" by The Vejtables ,, (from a S.F. area 60's rock mix tape I created many moons ago)...


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"Bloom" - Didier Malherbe