On 08-11-97 MATHIEU BOUCHARD wrote to KENNETH NEWMAN... 
 
 MB> Echolyn was quite a bad prog revival. 
 
        It didn't help that Sony had no real committment there, 
        almost as if they wanted the band to fail so they could 
        write it off on their taxes.... 
 
 MB> :-) don't know il baletto di bronzo 
 
        If you can find their album _Ys_ I suggest you go for it. 
        It's one of the finest prog albums ever to come out of 
        Italy, and that says a lot. It's very ferocious and 
        exciting, with superb playing from all the instruments 
        and the material is very strong, no weak cuts. 
 
 MB> but it is possible that alt-prog 
 MB> bands don't want to be associated with classic prog. 
 
        Oh, more than possible, I think they avoid it like 
        leprosy. Primus admits to being Rush fanatics (and 
        there's the obvious Crimso influence) and Grimskunk admit 
        to a fondness for Uriah Heep but that's about it. Of 
        course, there's always Mr. Bungle, existing out there in 
        its own dimension, drawing alt fans into some warped prog 
        cesspit. 
 
 MB> At least Claude 
 MB> Rajotte seems like one of the most anti-prog guys around, though his 
 MB> position about it is quite unclear (sometimes talks about prog 
 MB> influences with enthusiasm, sometimes talks about prog as if it were 
 MB> total crap, without much details). 
 
        I thinks there's always been a profound ambivalence 
        towards prog in Quebec, on the one hand its so deeply 
        ingrained in the popular music culture of Quebec, and on 
        the other hand musicians want to move forward and may see 
        being tagged with the prog brush as weighting them down 
        or burdening them with the past, it's perhaps tied to 
        seeing prog as excessively "hippy" and not sophisticated 
        enough. 
 
 KN> Same story with Miriodor, haven't heard Hoyry-Kone yet, 
 KN> though I've gotten into other Hungarian music lately. 
 
 MB> It's not hungarian, it's finnish. :-) 
 
        For some reason I constantly confuse Hungarian language 
        and Finn, perhaps because they are both utterly 
        incomprehensible, perhaps even evidence that earth has 
        been visited by intelligent life from other planets. 
 
 MB> btw, Miriodor and H”yry-Kone often sound alike. But not that often. 
 
        90's RIO with an edge? 
 
 MB> Happy Family's 2nd album, a little softer than the first (grin) 
 
        Yeah, right.... :-) 
 
                                Cheers, 
                                Kenneth 
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