Less Weird RIO/Avant-Prog

Huge fan of accessible RIO/Avant-prog, the only problem is what is accessible to me may not be considered 'accessible' to you. Some of my favorites were already mentioned in previous posts:
The Residents - for instance "Commercial Album", "Duck Stab/Buster & Glen"
Cheer-Accident- all albums released between 2009-2019 are pretty accessible IMO. My favorites are "Fear Draws Misfortune" and "Putting off death"
News From Babel- "Letters home"
Camberwell Now - "The Ghost Trade" plus 2 EPs released on 1 CD as "All's Well"
U Totem - s/t
Thinking Plague - "Extremis"
Officer! - Ossification, Mick's Hobbs project who was also in the band the Work with Tim Hodgkinson and Bill Gilonis.
Unrest, Work & Play - Informs
Art Bears - all 3 albums are very interesting musically, Dagmar's Krause vocals are acquired taste IMO. Don't get me wrong, she is praised by many fans as the greatest voice of RIO, but I find her English with heavy German accent annoying.


Edited by enigmatic - April 20 2022 at 17:57

Edited by David_D - April 20 2022 at 14:10

I don't know if Dead Can Dance can be classed as "Less Weird Avant Prog", but I really like the "Summoning of the Music Video". 

Birdsong of the Mesozoic

You do accept the principle that some avant is more 'accessible' than other avant, right?

Logan wrote: ^ I mean that they can be both weird and accessible at the same time*, but of course there are many diverse ones who might put out a weird album and then a different accessible one, or on one album it might have a weird songs and a different accessible song. I label albums and tracks, not artists so much (of course some are part of music and movements, like RIO, and are most associated with certain styles). An act (band/artist) might put out an avant prog album and then the next is primarily yacht rock, for instance, but then I would consider the yachy rock album if not avant yacht rock to be that relevant to this even if the artist is often labeled Avant Prog. * of course what is accessible depends on the listener, and this can be true of what is considered weird too. Sometimes weird just means unfamiliar (like Chinese opera might be weird to the average Nashville raised country and western music fan even if the music is not inherently weird -- intended to be bizarre).

Nogbad_The_Bad wrote: 3 Mice Aranis Julverne

I wish that I'd mentioned Aranis.

That said, if you're the kind of Progger hoping that this will sound akin to the love child of James LaBrie and Neal Morse, then you are likely to be disappointed.

Cheer-Accident is one of a different ilk that could work (depending on the track). Thinking Plague's A History Of Madness is quite accessible, and not that weird as I recall.

And Factor Burzaco's debut as I recall (quirky, though).