Byron (June 2010)
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Topic: Byron (June 2010)
Posted By: toroddfuglesteg
Subject: Byron (June 2010)
Date Posted: June 19 2010 at 14:01
|
There are some bands in ProgArchives database who due to various reasons does not get the attention they deserve. I have to admit this is one my main motivation when I am compiling this ProgArchives interview database. I believe all good bands should be heard. One of these bands are Byron from Romania and I am delighted to bring this interview with them. With some support and very hard work, Byron has all the right attributes to make a name for themselves. Let's hope we in ProgArchives can give them a small push. I contacted them for their story. Dan answered my questions. ##########################
 Forbidden
Drama from 2007
Forbidden
Drama is an album I wrote in 2006 during my departure from Urma,
while I was looking for fine musicians willing to join my new
project. It was a time of meeting new people and old friends
together. They all inspired me to write new material.
On
December the 1st we had our first club gig in Bucharest (it was sold
out) and we played the album almost entirely. The people’s reaction
was surprising. They listened. There was silence on a Friday night in
a club. Strange.
In
January we had all the songs prepared and we started looking for a
studio. Which is not an easy task in Romania, I assure you. I mean we
have a lot of studios, of course, but generally not well equipped and
usually managed by people who are not really sound engineers. We
don’t have a sound engineering school either. Anyway, in the end we
were lucky enough to meet Victor Panfilov, a 43-years old quantum
physicist & philosopher, who also played guitar in a metal band
and had a studio pretty well equipped in his own house. And he really
knew how to use it.
We
finished the album in 7 months, we worked as hard as you can imagine,
paying attention to every single detail. We started in March and
finished in September. The studio was paid by some of my friends
(Victor made a big discount for us anyway, he was already involved
big time). Meanwhile we found a label willing to manufacture and
distribute the record (another friend of ours knew the owner and
invited him to a gig).
The
artwork was done by some other friends who had a design company,
Verticals.
We
released the album in October 2007 at Fabrica (The Factory), a new
club in Bucharest then. Again, we were lucky enough to know the right
people - we received a sponsorship from two major companies in order
to have a national tour.
 Acoustic
Drama from 2008
Acoustic
Drama is an unplugged version of Forbidden Drama, released on DVD.
For years I dreamed of recording a real unplugged concert with a real
piano, acoustic guitars, upright bass and a string quartet, with nice
guests in a small special place. So this was my dream coming true. We
played in the Butcher’s Bastion in the medieval fortress of
Târgu-Mureş city. There is an alternative theatre club there called
Teatru 74 (Theatre 74). The bastion loft is barely touched by
modernity, with few wires, some spotlights and 74 seats.
We
rehearsed almost two months for this gig, making different versions
for the songs, adapting them for acoustic instruments, writing scores
for the string quartet, changing the initial vision. Two new songs
were chosen to be some kind of a teaser for the next album. We had
two guests, major artists in Romania, who sang one of our songs and
one of theirs.
We
did this completely independently, and the footage turned out really
good. By the way, it was edited by Victor, the sound engineer I
mentioned before.
The
artwork was made by 6fingers, our keyboard player.
We
released the DVD in October 2008 at Palatul Copiilor (Children’s
Palace) in Bucharest, re-doing the show entirely on a proper stage
this time. Two weeks before that, 8 of the songs were played on MTV
Romania in prime time, thanks to Codrut Dumitrescu, our manager since
day one.
In
December we had a little tour (4 cities) with the whole production,
sponsored again by a major company.  A
Kind of Alchemy from 2009
By
the time we were mixing Forbidden Drama, I began writing a new album,
focusing my attention in two different directions. I finished it more
than a year later.
We
recorded it in the summer of 2009 in the same studio. This time it
only took us two months, but I can assure you it wasn’t easy to do
it this fast. We spent many nights at the studio. And somehow we
managed to release it in October, the same month our fans have gotten
used to receiving new stuff from us. A tradition of sorts.
The
artwork (we chose to make a bigger package for it, a DVD-sized art
book) was again made by 6fingers, who had really outdone himself,
making a different graphic concept for every song.
The
release party was huge, in a new Bucharest club called The Silver
Church.
The
following tour was the first independent one, without any
sponsorship, probably because of the economic depression.
How
is your creative and writing processes and which themes do you deal
with in your lyrics ?
For
me it’s enough to have an idea like a musical theme or a good
lyric. The rest is craft, experience, artistry. Usually it takes me a
day or two to write a song, but writing an inspiring theme can take
up to a month.
Regarding
lyrics, I’m very influenced by my environment, I’m usually
writing about society and mankind. I like to have a major theme for
the whole album, but I don’t write that kind of concept albums some
old bands used to do. I don’t like to have a continuous story, I
like to walk between states of mind, to make them grow in a direction
or another, but at the same time having an axis to spin around.
I
have to mention that 6fingers wrote a song for each album. The other
guys contributed only with arrangements. You
are a bit of a strange bird in the progressive rock landscape due to
the commercial successes of your independent released albums in your
homeland. Albums I am listening to now and feel really deserve a lot
of respect also outside your homeland. How would you describe your
music and which bands would you compare your music with ?
Our
music is a cocktail made of all the beverages we ever liked. I don’t
think you can actually call it progressive, maybe you called it like
this because of its diversity. I usually call it rock-oriented music.
I don’t know how to compare it to other bands, but I can tell you
that we listen to a lot of music from different genres.
Oh,
and we still don't have any commercial success worth mentioning. We
still play clubs and search for the money needed to make a new
record. But we’re doing it, no matter what. This world was never
fair anyway.
The
ex-Stalinist state Romania is perhaps a bit of a mystery to us all
with Count Dracula and Transylvania as perhaps your best known
cultural contribution to this world. How is the music scene in
Romania and life in general ?
Yeah,
Bram Stoker did it to us. We had a lot of important cultural figures
here apart from that famous fairy tale. International ones too –
Brâncuşi, Enescu, Eliade, Ionesco, Cioran, to name a few.
These
last 20 years we've tried to erase the communist scar from our face
and be more than just some freaks from Transylvania. We didn’t
finish the task, but we’re still working on it. It’s incredible
what dictatorships can make of the people.
The
musical scene here is rather small, the biggest stars play at
weddings, the mentality in general is somehow wrong, everybody’s
trying to make a lot of money overnight (there are exceptions, of
course). The underground scene is tiny but pretty nice, we have some
notable bands, almost all of them are copying someone from the West,
but still, they play from their hearts. As
I touched upon at a couple of questions ago, you are pretty big in
your homeland and your music should do well everywhere. Do you have
any plans to play gigs and market your albums in the rest of world
like your fellow countrymen in Negură Bunget have done ?
We
would surely like to, but we're not familiar with this road or any
person who walked it. We've only played once outside Romania at a
festival in Sarajevo.
We
sent materials everywhere, at most European festivals, at every label
we considered it was worth the try. No replies besides the automatic
“thank you for your email”. Considering this, I concluded that
the only possibility for us to market albums or play gigs outside
Romania remains chance. But our music is available in digital format
outside Romania in the usual outlets: Amazon, iTunes, Bandcamp etc.
What
are your plans for the rest of this year and next year ? We
have some projects in progress, including a new album for the autumn.
What
are your five favourite albums of all time ?
Peter
Gabriel – Up
Led
Zeppelin III
My
Brightest Diamond – Bring Me the Workhorse
dEUS
– In a Bar, Under the Sea
King
Crimson - Thrak
Anything
you want to add to this interview ?
Yeah,
I would like to mention the other guys: Costin Oprea – guitar,
Cristi Matesan – drums, Vlady Sateanu – bass, 6fingers –
keyboards, and the crew: Clara Litescu – live sound, Tibi Nedelcu –
lights. A big thank you to Byron for this interview and to my fellow collab harmonium.ro for making me aware of Byron and their music. Byron's PA profile can be found http://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=5080 - and their homepage is http://www.byronmusic.ro/ - Forbidden Drama (2007) is available as a free download from http://www.mediafire.com/file/ennrmzickmy - A Kind of Alchemy (2009) is available as a free download from http://Forbidden%20Drama%20%282007%29%20available%20at%20www.mediafire.com/file/ennrmzickmy%20%20Awww.mediafire.com/file/bxgjinm2hcd - |
Replies:
Posted By: seventhsojourn
Date Posted: June 19 2010 at 16:45
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My favourite discovery of the year so far... thanks to Alex for the recommendation |
Posted By: harmonium.ro
Date Posted: June 20 2010 at 13:03
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Great interview, thanks Torodd! Of course we have the typical case of the progressive musician saying "progressive? what's that?!"  but 4 of Dan's favourite albums can be
found on this very site! I do agree they're not a "retro" band, trying
to recreate a certain style/sound, though. Great modern music. BTW Dan is being modest about the status of the band in Romania. Last autumn both Kumm and byron launched their new albums at the Silver Church club and they both gathered a crowd of over 1000 people. For Romania, that's massive for a non-commercial act. Actually, they would be "mainstream" if the media wouldn't completely ignore them and anything that's not stupid dance music, Balkan soul-pop etc... IMO Dan is one of the key members of the modern Romanian musical scene. He is the best rock flautist I've ever heard, an amazing vocalist (even if an acquired taste), a great songwriter (see especially the byron albums) and an incredibly charismatic performer. Speaking of his flute playing and since he discussed his time in the band URMA, here's Dan playing flute and doing backing vocals for this band: I've been thinking of suggesting this band to PA, too, but I didn't make up my mind yet. |
Posted By: harmonium.ro
Date Posted: June 21 2010 at 07:25
And here is a most awesome track from the DVD, with a great vocal performance from Dan on one of their ballads:  |
Posted By: warrplayer
Date Posted: June 21 2010 at 10:13
I will second this with no hesitation. Just discovered them through this site yesterday. GO LISTEN NOW. These guys are obviously not concerned with fitting into some specific category just with making killer music. They need to be playing major festivals! |
seventhsojourn wrote:Posted By: The Truth
Date Posted: June 21 2010 at 11:09
Forbidden Drama is amazing! You guys should be proud  ------------- http://blindpoetrecords.bandcamp.com/" rel="nofollow">  
|
Posted By: Conor Fynes
Date Posted: July 07 2010 at 18:13
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Forbidden Drama is a fantastic piece of work!
Byron are definately up there as one of the newer prog bands to look out for!
|
Posted By: harmonium.ro
Date Posted: July 08 2010 at 04:09
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Thanks guys, your feedback is most welcomed!
|
Posted By: Nightfly
Date Posted: July 08 2010 at 14:01
| A great band, hope they come to the attention of a few more people. |
Posted By: memowakeman
Date Posted: July 16 2010 at 14:27
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Cool band, I've downloaded their albums and enjoyed their music. Great interview! ------------- Follow me on twitter @memowakeman |