Track 1 (Nagyvárosi Ikonok 1)

 

 

Track 2 (Nagyvárosi Ikonok II)

 

 

Track 4 (Nagyvárosi Ikonok IV)

 

 

Track 5 (Minden nap)

 

 

 

 

Track 9  (Íme, hát megleltem hazámat)

 

 

 

 

The YouTube sample in the original post was track 7 (Fekete hangulat). The 'Nagyvárosi Ikonok' album has 13 tracks in all.

Perhaps not Symphonic but PR

Sorry Fluiddruid, I'm a fan of Eastern Europe Prog, specially Hungarian and Romanian, but this band doesn't fit in Symphonic.

Iván

Don't send me the link to the genre's definition.

NotAProghead wrote: If this band is not symphonic I don't know what symphonic prog is. Don't send me the link to the genre's definition.

 

We have listened all the tracks carefully, and the three of us reached the decision that it's not Symphonic because there's a lot happening in there.

We know what we do, but to be sure, we check the information available so after deciding our votes, we verified other sites and found that the definitions of:

- Proggnosis

- GEPR

- Ground & Sky

Are similar to ours,except Ground & Sky, while Progressiveears doesn't define the band (Something haty happens when a band escapes to their parameters).

Iván

EDIT: BTW: The Vedres page says about TOWNSCREAM:

Other sources describe Townscream album as truly progressive and the word "symphonic" is used quite often. Or only "pure symphonic" sound without any other ingredients counts? 

By the way, Pink Floyd don't say they play prog either. 

Have you read the quotes?

The only one that points towards symphonic is  Ground & Sky, and we admited that in my first post.

GEPR says: Classical + chamber + Symphonic + Folk + Concrete Music

Proggnosis says: Jazz Fusion, Folk, Medieval, etc, doesn't even mention the word Symphonic

But most important, the author says "We were close to prog"

Now, if anothe team accepts them, it's OK with us, we only decide about Symphonic, where we believe the band goes is only a suggestion (opinion if you want),

But all the sites except Ground & Sky PARTIALLY

And I say PARTIALLY because  Brandon Wu from Ground & Sky doesn't mention Symphonic at all (Let's remember that Ground & Sky places three opinions about the band:

Brandon Wu wrote: Overall, I prefer the quiet, brooding side of After Crying to the bombastic keyboard-driven side. Seeing as how the majority of Nagyvárosi Ikonok consists of the latter, at first I didn't much care for it. However, the loud, aggressive pieces on here are superior to those found on  http://www.progreviews.com/reviews/display.php?rev=ac-fee" rel="nofollow - Fold és ég , and there are still some of those great quiet pieces. The highlights of the louder pieces for me is the cello playing, which is fantastic (truly riveting in "Fekete hangulat"), and some of the more experimental sections, two of which Bob mentions from the title track in his review above. I feel that some of the loud parts don't work too well, however; the vocalist, while he's absolutely great when singing restrained, quiet lines, sounds pretty strained when he gets more aggressive; and some instrumental parts sound a bit trite, especially in "Alászálla a poklokra". The bombastic four-part title track is less than thrilling for me, except for those two more experimental sections. My favorite tracks are, not surprisingly, the quieter ones: the vocal, flute- and acoustic guitar-led "Minden nap", the quiet vocal "Íme, hát megleltem hazámat", the slow, atmospheric, almost Pink Floydian "Így szólt a madár", and especially "Hajnali ének", which uses the melody from King Crimson's "Peace" (a melody that is passed between, and sounds gorgeous on, cello, flute, and trumpet). The closer is a bit louder but is perhaps my favorite of the loud pieces, with a great trumpet line, busy drumming, and a nice bass part. I would put this release a bit above the level of Fold és ég - even if I don't find it an absolute classic, it's definitely as good as most of the After Crying work from the last decade! http://www.progreviews.com/reviews/display.php?rev=town-ni" rel="nofollow - http://www.progreviews.com/reviews/display.php?rev=town-ni

At the end it's our call, and the decision is unanimous.

Thanks for the interest.

Iván

EDIT: Pink Floyd never said they played Prog, but Vedres Csaba says "We aspired to lay Prog but we were only close". That's a huge difference.

I hope another prog team will accept TOWNSCREAM, but I don't think your search for "pure symphonic sound" serves for good.

Whatever team accepts Townscream, is ok with us.
 

Hi Yam Yam, it's the first time I talk to you, so glad to meet you.

My impression and the impression of the team, is that Symphonic is not the most preeminent element in this band, I personally believe there's a lot of mainstream, plus Folk, plus Jazz, plus a lot more sounds, moods and styles.

Our duty is to accept them or not in Symphonic, and by unanimous vote we don't think they are Symphonic because Classical influence + Rock is not always Symphonic Prog.

The options for me are 

We would had loved to accept the band, but it¿s not Symphonic, only fantastic Prog.

Probably we will send them to Eclectic for analysis and hope they are accepted, and if not, they will have to go to Xover  and if not, to  Prog Related....And if they end in PR  I won't see that as an insult, because Prog is not an award, just a genre, we haven't created Prog Related to insult artists, just to add artists not fully Prog.

Glad to talk with you, and hope you understand our team's position and agree to disagree with us.

Thanks

Iván

The band are clearly prog or at least related to prog but they belong in a sub genre that suits them. Symphonic is not suited when you listen to the album as a whole, only parts sound like ELP due to the classical influences.

I hope they get accepted by another sub genre team soon 

Best

 

Thank you for your reply Iván.

 

I have every respect for you and your team's knowledge regarding what constitutes true symphonic prog, and fully accept what you say concerning this band 'Townscream'. I too did not consider it a genuine symphonic prog album, but thought from my own rather limited understanding of the sub genre that maybe it had more of this represented within the music than any of the other specialised sub genres that are available for us on progarchives. Herein lies the problem of course - our sub genres are all quite specialised, with the exception of prog related and to a lesser extent, crossover. Therefore when an artist such as Townscream with such a diverse range of musical styles pops up, we inevitably have a problem finding a suitable home for them. Other prog sites do not have this problem - they do not divide their database into specialised sub genres in the way that we do - they just add an artist if they are considered prog and that's it...job done! We try to go a step further and classify an artist more narrowly within the overall progressive rock genre which is one of the reasons why our site is probably the best and most informative of all of them. However, sometimes this can work against us, and an artist such as Townscream who cannot be neatly fitted into one of our sub genres can end up being lost to the site altogether, leaving a gap in our database which the other sites do not have. The point I was trying to make was that in a case like this we should maybe encourage the team whose sub genre is considered the most appropriate to relax their guidelines a little and try to accommodate the band rather than enforcing them rigidly and the band thus being rejected from the site altogether. Hopefully, either eclectic or crossover team will adopt this approach and the band will be added to one of those sub genres in the near future, but I often think that the approach of the prog metal team is perhaps the best in a situation like this. Karl (bonnek) once said in a reply to one of my posts, when I said I couldn't hear much metal in a band they'd just added: "if it's prog and there's a scrap of metal in it, then we'll annexe it". Sometimes, and certainly in cases like this, I think this approach is highly laudable - some my say that it devalues the integrity of the database to do this, but since none of the other sites seem to bother with prog sub genres anyway, I really don't think it matters.

 

Thanks again for your reply. I do understand your team's stance regarding the type of artists you are willing to accept, but I hope you can also see the problem we can sometimes end up with if every team on the site were to adopt the same approach. Prog artists that simply 'do not fit' anywhere are going to end up being missed out altogether, and that cannot be good for the site.

Yam Yam, normally no band is kept outside Prog Archives (If it's Prog, it finds it's place), but the fear of not entering to PA  doesn't justify to add a band to Symphonic that all the Symphonic Team  members and even Csaba Vedres believe is not even completely prog.

Csaba Vedres site wrote: Our music is perhaps the closest to progressive rock, with a classical-music flavour added by the two string instruments. http://www.vedrescsaba.hu/english/townscream.htm" rel="nofollow - http://www.vedrescsaba.hu/english/townscream.htm

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Iván

You can say I believe, or I think....But EXACTLY WHERE I EXPECT TO SEE THEM is not an opinion only.sounds almost as an order

Iván

Tony, I don't understand why can't we have our own criteria.

Two out of three sites say it's not Symphonic (They point towards Eclectic or Xover) and the three members of the team say it's not Symphonic, we have to fight the case. 

This is clear for us

Please, we have listened  all the tracks

Iván

As long as he write _where_I_expect_ I'd sat he's still only expressing his opinion. Would be different if he had written something like 'where anyone would expect'.

Please guys, we listen all the albums before we give an opinion, sometimes one track or two (As in the case of Guruh Gipsy also accepted by Eclectic), may sound close to Symphonic, but when you listen all the album, it sounds like something completely different.

Please Bonnek, Tony, NotaProghead, trust us, we know our job and we are very careful when analyzing a band. (Don't mention Yam Yam, because we talked a lot about the issue y pleasant and interesting PM's)

We may have different perspectives about where the band should go, but our only job is to say yes or no to Symphonic, and if you check Robert's arguments arguments, all of them are very close to ours (Including the Peter Gabriel lime music).

Thanks and patience for those who suggest bands, be sure we will always do our best.

Iván

Well, small conflict. 

I received some pretty strong PM's (Not from YAM YAM, he was very nice or from the guys I mentioned).

Iván

Iván, your post disarmes me, really. 

I have no problem if Townscream will be in Eclectic. But we definitely have different views, I feel this band is more symphonic than something else. This remark by Tony R shows that I'm not alone:

Tony R wrote: This band is a Symphonic Prog band if I ever saw one. For heaven's sake, this is like some mad dream....

 

In another post you've said that your team is going to move After Crying to different genre. I can't understand this. In my opinion this band is more symphonic than Yes and Genesis together.

No battles or scandal, I'm only trying to understand Symphonic team criteria.

Almost every site calls the Eclectic.

Robert from the Eclectic Team admits the band is not Symphonic:

Originally posted by Epignosis I agree with Ivan that Townscream most certainly is not symphonic prog.  What I heard consisted of pastoral folk, Peter Gabriel-like songs, jazz rock, and more.  I vote Yes.

What else do you ask?

Iván

Yes, but not at least 50% of the album.let me check:

I've already posted:

So it's not my view of Symphonic, it's the view of the people chosen by the site o decide this issues.

Iván

I don't believe so Dean, I wrote with Tony the Art Rock definition that included (Stiill have the original document)

The term Art Rock has evolved from being a synonym of Progressive Rock in the early 70's to being considered the borderline between Progressive Rock and mainstream in the 90's. However, the term changed again with the new century and these are the characteristics of the bands that will be included in this category: 100% Prog bands Bands that are beyond the limits of the sub-genre parameters or Bands that have evolved through their career so much that they crossed different sub-genres without any single sub-genre being preeminent over the rest or Bands that have characteristics of two or more different sub-genres and can’t be reasonably classified in either or Bands that simply are one of a kind and for that reason can’t be included as part of any sub-genre.

If you read, this clearly defines he parameters of ART ROCK.

And TOWNSCREAM is supported perfectly by N° 4

I believe Robert hasn't abandoned the Art Rock definition, but embraced fully

Iván.

This isn't about Townscream.

 

But as I said, I'll have to think about this.

Not that I believe Heavy Prog shouldn't be here, but I'm sure it's not derived from the Art Rock concept.

Iván

With the limited subgenres of the early PA Art Rock was the only viable home for heavy rock prog bands like Rush - the rest is history as they say. I suspect Art Rock suffered from being a dumping ground to some extent.

 

What's non-symphonic in After Crying?

Townscream, a different band, with different members except one and different music, is not in Symphonic

So, what else do you ask? 

Iván

They sound exactly as After Crying to me, have you guys listened to the whole album or just to youtube samples?

This is a progressive band IMO, if it was all like "Nagyvarosi Ikonok III" they could have fit into Avant, too.

Not symph? Fine, but please find them a place.

http://www.zappa.hu/?q=en/csabavedres" rel="nofollow - http://www.zappa.hu/?q=en/csabavedres