1983: Art Zoyd, Codona, Eskaton, News From Babel

Inspired by another 1983 poll (Genesis and Yes), I focused on four albums that I have listened to many times over the years.

Some samples for those who don't know all four albums:

Art Zoyd:



Codona:



Eskaton:



News From Babel:

NFB, no doubt, with or without Bob.

One of my favorite AZ albums so it definitely wins this one.

AZ for me, a great album.

Logan wrote: Man With Hat wrote: It's almost AZ by default for me, but even still...it's quite a good album on it's own.  I love so many Art Zoyd albums, but Les Espaces Inquiets ranks amongst my personal favourite Art Zoyd releases -- "Migrations" in particular would give me shivers. hellogoodbye wrote: NFB, no doubt, with or without Bob. I have the compilation album Sirens & Silences/Work Resumed on the Tower/Letters Home so when I listen to News from Babel I get to hear the Robert Wyatt tracks, but yeah, I love the music with and without him in NfB. I love all four of these albums, although when it comes to Eskaton, I do tend to return to 4 Visions and Ardeur more. From experience, I seem to be a very rare fan of Codona in the forum, but then the Indo-Prog/Raga Rock category generally doesn't seem to get much recognition around here (glad that Clivage seems to get a fair amount of love in the forums, though, even if it's from the same few regulars, which includes me). I always hope that my polls will turn some people onto the music, but my tastes commonly tend to be a little off the well-beaten path. Such music won't get the recognition from the general PA audience that, say, 80s Yes and Genesis, or Asia, will -- wich is not to say that there's anything wrong with such more commercial music (I don't think that the Avant-Prog oriented ever really dominated this site even if we have had some very vocal people of that ilk).

 

I had to listen to the other three to get to know them, well thanks for highlighting them to me, but none of them comes close to the mighty AZ.

Of these, CoDoNa 3 is my favorite--maybe even my favorite CoDoNa album.

I don't think that it's the first time during our 13 years at this forum. Certainly you've had many options in polls that I had not heard, but in polls with many options it becomes more likely that I will have heard something. There are quite a few albums over the years that I have discovered thanks to polls including various ones that I've discovered or re-discovered thanks to your polls, so thank you for that.

My tastes can be fairly arcane, as can yours, although all of the bands in this poll have made various polls of mine over the years. Art Zoyd, as I've often said, may be my favourite band of all, and of these albums Les Espaces Inquiets has got the most attention from me of these albums in the fora over the years.

As a general note: For those looking into hearing Eskaton or even looking into exploring Zeuhl, I'd suggest starting with 4 Visions. That and Dun's Eros got me into Zeuhl. Eskaton was one of my very first Zeuhl discoveries (back in 2004 or 2005), even before getting into Magma.

With Art Zoyd, well I guess most at this forum might know the band somewhat, and where to start depends on taste. I wouldn't normally recommend the album in this poll to start as it is not one of the more accessible ones, I would think (I think "Migrations" might be pretty accessible off it, which is the track I listed in my opening post). I used to be addicted to this track when I discovered Art Zoyd, but then it resonates with me and I don't think it would with most people:



If I had to choose one Art Zoyd album to keep, it would be Generations Sans Futur, though I love so many of the bands albums (I especially like all the ones upto the end of the 80s and the 90s albums Faust and Haxan).

With Codona, the third is my favourite, but I really like the first as well (I'd recommend it to fans of Don Cherry and such jazz).