My musical "taste" is best described as a strange combination between pseudo-medieval Folk and melodic Death Metal.

Finntroll
Children of Bodom
Fiddler's Green
Mediaeval Baebes
Korpiklaani
Svartsot
Arch Enemy
Eluveitie
Manau
Tri Yann
Faun
Ingrimm
In Extremo
Equilibrium

I like many other Bands as well, but this list is enough and covers the Bands I like best.

This week, I have been mostly listening to Sandy Denny...................

Just in case you, or anybody else that might be interested, didn't know, there was a documentary about Sandy Denny on Radio 2 last Tuesday. Still available for listen again or BBCi Player.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00b0tfg

Very sad.

In no order whatsoever, though with my favourites on top:

Enya
Moya Brennan (Máire Brennan - singer of Clannad)
Clannad
Sarah Brightman
Loreena McKennitt
Mediaeval Baebes (duh )
Schiller (German DJ / Electronic wizard!!)
Enigma
Delerium
David Arkenstone / Diane Arkenstone (more the first one though!)
and there's more....

I also like general pop music (sometimes it's wonderful, other times cr@p) and some rock and metal (Nightwish primarily).

I'm very much into Vampires (Anne Rice, anyone?) and music that I associate with it...though I'm not one to roleplay them

Love,
Phantas

Not in a particular order;

Breaking Benjamin
Tool
Rusted Root
Cecelia Bartoli ( Not so much with the Broadway stuff )
Apocalyptica
Enya
Zeppelin
Handel
Soundgarden
Yes
Kate Chadbourne (Etain)
Bach
Hendrix
Rush
Rick Wakeman
Greenday
Peter Tosh
Red Hot Chili Peppers
Drop Kick Murphys
Vivaldi

These are my most loved bands, the font size shows you how deep is the love

Miranda Sex Garden, Sanjiva, Jordi Savall & Hespèrion XXI, Accentus Austria, Lisa Gerrard, Carbon Based Lifeforms,
Katie Melua, Brovarius, Adas, Mediæval Bæbes, Anúna, Dazkarieh, Delerium, Faun, Sophie & Ives, The Verve,
City, Poeta Magica, Terra Ambient, Wir sind Helden, Garmarna, Vox Vulgaris, Leonard Cohen, Secret Garden, Psalteria,
H.U.V.A. Network, Enya, Vas, Estampie, Espers, The Bothy Band, 2raumwohnung, Aes Dana (ambient), Creedence Clearwater Revival, Clannad,
Dorothy Carter, Stellamara, Cream, Renft, Crosby Stills Nash & Young, Loreena McKennitt

The not so well-known bands have urls with playable examples.

I've seen about 1500+ different artists, composers and bands on these three sites, but I'm really, REALLY curious if anyone on this forum is familiair with two bands I equally admire as The Baebes, and which are musically, to a certain level in a folkish context, quite similar.
The first one is the Belgian female triplet Laïs; especially their first two albums, which contain various acappella songs and also many different languages. (Their last album is more pop-rock with some experimental twists: a very brave and radical change, but not always for the good)
The other one is the female vocal duo Ygdrassil from The Netherlands (Groningen), which sadly broke up last year. One of those girls, Linde Nijland, released a Sandy Denny cover album a couple of years ago. Normally reason enough to be burned alive (Hands off from Sandy! It's blasphemy!), but she was equally brilliant... at least! The timbre, the timing, the fragility, the atmosphere: it was goosebumps all over... I've seen her name and Fairport a couple of times here, so everyone who's into Sandy: clicketyclick.

Regarding my musical taste:
I don't like dumb sing-along pirate radio songs from the rural area in South-West Drenthe, Holland, but what I do like is more difficult to explain.

Well... a long list including

Mediæval Bæbes, Steeleye Span, Fairport Convention, Show of Hands, Flook, Lau, Karine Polwart, Queen, Loreena McKennitt, Kathryn Tickell, Nightwish, Duffy, Enya, Kylie Minogue, Musica Donum Dei, Carreg Lafar, Kate Bush, and many others.

Broadly speaking, I like folk and traditional music, early and baroque music (although I tend to play that more than listen to it), and interesting contemporary music. I generally exclude most of rap, hip-hop, R'n'B and dance music from that though as I find a lot of it irredeemably dull or awful. I'm also not a particular fan of metal, although I did slip Nightwish into the list. They're not exactly the purest metal band though

No, not familiar to me. I had a look at them on Youtube but I'm not sure if I like them or not.



Yes, I've been a fan since I first heard them about 3 years ago. Coincidentally, to try and numb the pain of not receiving my copy of Illumination, I have been playing some of my favourite tracks from various artists. These include Troy, Femme Fatale and Valeri from Ygdrassil. Amazing vocal gymnastics on Valeri, I don't know anything about the technicalities of singing but that must be very difficult. It's a shame they broke up.

I have heard some of Linde Nijland's Sandy Denny covers, not Sandy but very good and, as you say, certainly not sacrilege. Fairport Convention and Linde Nijland are interesting names to say in the same sentence. Is a cooperation possible? Just a thought.

Genius thought! That I didn't thought of it... Then Fairport will finally be able to make their first good album in 34 years!

Anyway, nice to read that at least someone (on the forum) is (more than) familiair with Ygdrassil. I'll bet your Dutch as well, Barleycorn? I think Linde is one of the most gifted singers in Holland, in any genre. She should be at least as famous as [fill here your favourite artist].
I don't know if you know their last two albums as well, because I do also think 'Ygdrassil' contains some very beautiful songs (and also some less interesting songs), but their last two albums 'Nice Days Under Darkest Skies' and 'Easy Sunrise' were really superb. Very unusual to quit when you're at the top of your creativity, but the girls wanted to do something different after 15 years. At least something without each other.

Regarding Laïs: try this one and if you're still not sure what to think it, then it's probably not your box of Belgian chocolats. The video certainly isn't...

Hi EvilDrSmith, apart from Focus the only other Dutch group that readily comes to mind is TJANE & that is because some friends in Breda sent me a copy of their CD, MARK. It's not a bad album & worth listening to. Cheers,

Just listened to "Zeven Steken", "'t Smidje" & "De Wereld Vergaat" by Lais. They were rather good, a pity I couldn't understand a word being sung but the tunes were OK.
Thanks for the tip,
Cheers,

Hi Pat, thanks for trying out Laïs (although the YT-clip of 'Zeven Steken' was brutally interrupted at the last part of the song (the backwards tapeloop of their acapella voices) and therefore ruined the complete picture of the song... ). And if you have the time to check out Ygdrassil as well, this YouTube clip contains a solo version of one of my favourite Ygdrassil songs. I've listened to this song over a hundred (thousand) times, but I still get tears in my eyes when I listen to it. Just like now...

chrz!
Bas

Actually no, I'm English but I can see why you might not think so because Ygdrassil are pretty much unknown here, I think. I am aware of their last two albums but I didn't really know what they were like. Since you recommend them, I might order one of them but I'm more likely to order the DVD, Ygdrassil live at the Folkwoods Festival first.

Regarding Laïs, the singing just sounds a little bit harsh for my ear.