Its funny, with the exception of Can, not a single continental European band has been mentioned in the recent discussions of the greatest rock musicians.

Is it because they can't do it, or because they don't get the publicity? I suspect the former. British and Australian musicians absob American musical influences virtually from birth and vice versa.

I remember discussing this question with a German guy some years ago, and I remember him saying that german words are too long for rock phrasing - tru, but probably not the main reason.

What????

Are we forgetting Roxette? David Hasselhof? And Scorpion:

"Chorus:

Take me to the magic of the moment

On a glory night

Where the children of tomorow

Dream away, in the wind of change"

Air guitar heaven!!!!

There is the possibility that a lot of them don't want to do it and /or most people don't buy it.

Depends what sort of rock music you're talking about; needless to say if you're including Krautrock then nobody did it better than the Germans!

But if you want something more contemporary, what about all those Swedish death metal bands like Candlemass, Opeth etc? There's a big prog scene over there too. Don't they count as European?

I think they can do it... we just never get to hear most of it because we get fed a diet of pop pap by radio/TV. When was the last time you saw/heard Can on the airwaves? Sadly for the Europeans, I think they get fed the same or worse.

mortiis - went to see him at corp last sat he was great (from norway)

i also like rammstein (german)

The Hives, Eburg, the cardigans, sugercubes + bjork all north european musiscians.. but they all sing in english.
There are loads of french rock and heavy rock bands but we never hear them over here in UK

In germany a couple of months ago I was amused to hear on the car radio that every single song is a british band. Even in the breakfast room in a 3 star hotel full of late middle aged germans, the radio is on in the background quietly playing stuff like whitesnake/journey/chicago.

Later when with my german friends in their car I asked them why there wasn't more german speaking music on the radio, and they had a quick hunt around the dial, the only thing they could find was a rapper in a sort of eminem style and it was one of the most rediculous things I ever heard while he rapped and rhymed the word testosterone, with going home, jump her bones, and lots of german words which I couldn't catch
All germans have done at least 6 years of english at school, and therefore they prefer to use the lingua franca of pop and rock which is english.
This is a similar argument to the lingua franca of punk music has always been a cockney accent. Try singing a Pistols/clash song with a sheffield accent it just sonds totally stupid. Maybe german's fell the same about english, they would rather hear english sung.
The german government are talking seriously about imposing a quota, as they do in france on radio and tv, making sure that a certain percentage of all airplay is in the native language.

People only say that Europeans can't do Rock Music as their music doesn't get played in the UK. People are not keen on listening to stuff in a different language.

A band called BAP has been around for years and not only do they sing in German but also in the Cologne dialect. The Rolling Stones were that impressed with them that the ask them to support them on their German tour

Rammstein, who have recently found popularity in England, is a surprise though as they are known in Germany for their right wing lyrics in earlier stuff. They are trying to get away from that image now but they'll never be able to shake off that stigma in Germany.

Same thing happened to the French progressive group Ange really - good band but they largely refused to sing in English (I think they may have released an English language version of one of their many albums) so nobody took any notice.

I don't mean to be contentious, my Lord, but I mentioned Pierre Moerlen's drumming [French version of Gong], and Magma's Christian Vander was mentioned by Metalman. I do take your point though, Rock in its various forms is dominated by the UK/USA artists.

Aside from Can, Magma and the French incarnation of Gong, I would list Faust, Neu, Cluster [did some good work with Brian Eno], Einsterzende Neubaton [can't spell the name, I'm afraid], Etron Fou Le Loublain, and Univers Zero as interesting 'rock' based experimenters. Perhaps Focus too, might be included?

I have to go with Timo there, some fine examples.

And if by the term "rock" you would include bands probably deemed by the mainstream as Indie, there is some amazing stuff out there. I think the problem is they don't break the British mainstream very often so are not really remembered a lot of the time, with the odd exception of course. But at the minute European music is very strong indeed.

For Spain check out Siesta Records or Elefant Records

Look into Scandanavia and you cant go wrong with Labrador Records

Find me a band kicking around Britain as good at what they do as France's Stereo Total and I'll buy you a pint.

Look at Berlin for innovative music, the list goes on and on.

Then look at stuff like Manu chao...amazing.

This is just off the top of my head. I've been to quite a lot of musical events in mainland Europe and there are some really good bands/artists out there, but we only tend to hear them if they sing in English, and even then it's a minority.

Originally posted by timo

Aside from Can, Magma and the French incarnation of Gong, I would list Faust, Neu, Cluster [did some good work with Brian Eno], Einsterzende Neubaton [can't spell the name, I'm afraid], Etron Fou Le Loublain, and Univers Zero as interesting 'rock' based experimenters. Perhaps Focus too, might be included?

Nearly all of those feature in my record collection too (Einsturzende Neubauten I think were a bit punky for my taste, but I've not heard much of theirs so I could be wrong). Surprised you didn't mention Art Zoyd in the same breath as Univers Zero though... they're inextricably intertwined. What about Heldon, Kraan, PFM, Popol Vuh, Nektar (who admittedly were British really), Eloy, Grobschnitt, Birth Control, Guru Guru, Ashra (Tempel), and so on? Have you got them as well?

If this carries on I shall start to worry that I've got some sort of multiple personality disorder and I'm using two different names...

Originally posted by Deavon
What????

Are we forgetting Roxette? David Hasselhof? And Scorpion:


David Hasselhof???? Argh! :gag: I hope and trust that you're havin a laff, Deavon!

Another successful European band was Hanoi Rocks, from Finland. Not one of my own faves, but they had a big influence on Richey Manic, so they're ok by me! :thumbsup:

StarSparkle

hanoi rocks, hardcore superstar, backyard babies, clawfinger (swedish) urban tale (finland) rammstein (german)

they are a few i listen to.

oh roxette as well

Cheers Boyface, you are a man of taste and distinction.

Metalman, yes, we do seem to be rather similar. Out of your increasingly eclectic examples, I have Kraan, PFM, Heldon, Nektar, but none of the others. I certainly approve of a bit of Art Zoyd too.

My favourite music, to be honest, is Classical. I prefer Bruckner, Wagner, Haydn, Bach, Mozart and Sibelius to anything. Next would be John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Then Brian Eno, Robert Fripp, Jon Hassell, Steve Reich, Michael Nyman, Terry Riley. Then, lots and lots of the bands you like.

Timo,

Phew, you're not me then. Never really got into classical at all... I can listen to it happily, but if you asked me to identify what I'd been listening to I wouldn't be able to tell one bit from another unless it was something really well known like Vivaldi's Four Seasons. Bit of a closed book to me on the whole.

Anyway I'd better shut up now since I've exhausted my list of continental bands who can do rock music (back on topic there for a second).

Originally posted by timo
Cheers Boyface, you are a man of taste and distinction.

Metalman, yes, we do seem to be rather similar. Out of your increasingly eclectic examples, I have Kraan, PFM, Heldon, Nektar, but none of the others. I certainly approve of a bit of Art Zoyd too.

My favourite music, to be honest, is Classical. I prefer Bruckner, Wagner, Haydn, Bach, Mozart and Sibelius to anything. Next would be John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Then Brian Eno, Robert Fripp, Jon Hassell, Steve Reich, Michael Nyman, Terry Riley. Then, lots and lots of the bands you like.

My favourite music is classical too. I am surprised that Beethoven and Schubert are missing from the list. Beethoven, there's no need to roll over, your music really kicks ass.

I like Eno too. I have all of his early stuff, after he left Roxy Music. I also like the album he did with Fripp many years ago 9can't remember the title offhand).

There were two of them, No Pussyfootin' and Evening Star. When you listen to them now it makes you realise how far ahead of the ambient game Bob'n'Brian were. And if that wasn't enough Eno and David Byrne then invented the whole Enigma/Deep Forest genre with My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, another classic.

Metalman,
There are actually two more Fripp and Eno releases. One is a best of, which includes the material from No Pussyfooting and Evening Star, plus new material. The second [title escapes me] was reviewed in Q late last year. It has not been released yet, due to some delay. I heard a rumour it will be only released via the net. There are bootlegs too, of their Paris, Olympia gigs in the 70s. I have a tape of one somewhere.

Re Eno and David Byrne's so-called 'groundbreaking' use of cut-up tapes on My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, I recall at the time of its release [1981?], some criticism levelled at them. This came from certain NME journalists, who accused the pair of plagiarising Holger Czukay's similar use of tapes on Movies. As Eno himself has said, on occasion, innovation is an over-rated virtue. It is possible to take an idea and develop it into something much better. Besides, Czukay was trained in the use of 'magnetic tape' [as it is poshly called in 'classical' new music circles] by the composer, Karlheinz Stockhausen. Does it matter, as long as it sounds great?