Ange or Magma and tell us why 

Nogbad_The_Bad wrote: Magma all day baby

 

no doubt brokowski 

it took me a while to get into Magma, but with Ange it was instant love 

 

One of my guilty pleasures: Of the Ange albums I have heard, my favourite is not one of their 70's albums, but Moyen-Âge from 2012.

The same with me.

 

Funny you should mention that.  In 1974 I was living in Copenhagen.  I was dating a girl from France and early in the relationship she asked me what bands I liked.  I mentioned VDGG and she responded that I'd love Ange.  That was my introduction to Ange and she was absolutely right.

Cool.  I always thought Caricatures and Le Cimitiere Des Arlequins sound like they could've been recorded in the same studio with the same engineers/producer as The Least We Can do is Wave, H to He & Pawn Hearts.  After that, the Ange albums took on a brighter sound with Au Dela Du Delire, Emile, Mandrin & Guet Apens.  I think all 6 Ange albums are brilliant and a great starting place for any who haven't yet ventured into French symphonic prog 

Ange.

I admire Magma, but their music lacks themes you can remeber.

French is definitely my favorite non-English prog 

I started with Pulsar's Halloween, which has English lyrics which I couldn't understand anyway so I figured why not go for French prog with French lyrics so bought Ange's Par Les Fils de Mandrin.  That lead to more Ange and the rest of the Pulsar albums which opened the floodgates for Atoll, Arachnoid, Shylock, Elohim, Halloween, Quadra (with Christian on vox), Versailles, Memoriance, Et Cetera, Oniris, Carpe Diem and more.  

edit:  Oops, how could I forget to mention Pentacle and their excellent La Clef des Songes album produced by Christian 

I also wanted to mention that any Ange fans who haven't heard Mona Lisa should love them.  The debut album L'escapade is musically wonderful, but a little rough in sound quality/production.  After that though, the next 3 (Grimaces, Le Petit Violon... and Avant Qu'll ne Soit Trop Tard) are all excellent production and on par with the first batch of 70's Ange...highly recommended!

Dellinger wrote: ^ It sounds to me like you might want to check out Ange... I sure do want to do so (but haven't gotten around to it yet). It's one of the best rated bands from france, and I understand they have that theatrical vibe going on... often being compared to Genesis.

 

I just listened to their Au-delà du délire album, it's actually really good! But then I asked myself, "is it better than MDK?" and the answer of course was no(not that any album is). So vote goes to Magma here. Surprised how good these guys are though. 

why are you surprised? Ange is one of the best French prog bands. 

Is Au dela du delire better than MDK? Two very different albums and prog subgenres. Better how? Performance? Skill? Songwriting? Both albums deliver the goods. 

70s Ange is a must listen. 

I even enjoy some of their 80s stuff. More enjoyable (for me) than what some famous Brits did in that time 

About ten years ago I went to see Return to Forever at an outdoor venue(the opening act for those wondering was Bela Fleck). Anyway, I hear this guy speaking French to someone who is ostensibly his girlfriend on his way in the men's room. I then asked him if was familiar with Magma. His response was something like "of course, I've seen them live too." I said I have also. Then I asked him about Ange. Apparently I may have pronounced their name wrong since he at first didn't seem sure who I was referring to. He then said something like "oh yes, I don't like them too much though."  I guess maybe he wasn't much into symphonic prog although I did get the feeling he was a big prog fan in general. So that's that. 

I'm actually not familiar enough with both bands to vote but unofficially I'll say Magma. The few tracks I've heard by Ange sounded good though but I really don't know them very well(yet).

 

I don't mean this as a criticism YESESIS, but more something that I realized about myself and prog from your words.

  

I'm guessing you've listened to MDK dozens, maybe hundreds of times while listening to Au Dela Du Delire once before being pleasantly surprised, but deciding it could never compete with Magma.  I'm sure if I listened to MDK once for comparison, I'd be pleasantly surprised but convinced there's no way I could ever like it more than any Ange album.  I could be right, but I could be wrong and that's what makes prog so great!  For me, the number of 5 star prog albums that I didn't like until the 3rd or 7th or 13th listening is pretty large and still surprises me.  Some wound up being among my favorite albums (Lizard, Relayer, Still Life, Acquiring the Taste, The Lamb, Benefit, etc) where some never got beyond the level of a connection that never clicked (Scheherazade, Udu Wudu, Hot Rats, Images and Words, etc) and that's what makes prog so unique.  There's more to be found on repeated listening compared to most other forms of rock.  You hear Johnny B Goode or Jumpin' Jack Flash once and you pretty much got it, where really good prog presents layers and layers to discover/uncover with each listening.

So don't give up on Ange so fast my friend.  You may never like them more than Magma, but that pleasant surprise you felt on first listening may have planted a seed that will bloom in a few months or maybe a few years to a fully developed case of Ange mania.  Au Dela Du Delire indeed 

In my case, I listen to Magma a little bit more.  For instance, I listen to MDK a little more than I do Cimitiere, but not much.  I watch my Trilogie au Trianon & Mythes Et Legendes discs a little more than the various Ange live discs that I have, but not by much.  I'd say that I listen to my favorite King Crimson albums and watch King Crimson videos more than either.  But not by much.

Hey man, no you're absolutely right. I've only listened to that album once and listened to MDK LOT'S of times(for a while I was listening to it every day!) Actually the very first time I listened to it I didn't like it, but I started listening to it for meditation and BOY did it click! By the way, Udu Wudu and Hot Rats are both legitimately good albums, I strongly recommend giving them another try. But really good point, sometimes with prog it takes repeated listens(I didn't like Brain Salad Surgery the first time I heard it). So yeah good post and I have not given up on Ange, in fact earlier tonight I listened to Le Cimetière des Arlequins and liked it a lot as well. I'm liking these guys so far, for sure. 

Stop it lol. Yeah I was kind of surprised only because I thought that if they were all that good then I would have heard of them by now. But yeah I guess there's a lot of great non-english speaking music that I have yet to discover, Micky is helping me with that also. And I agree both albums definitely deliver the goods, big time. 

I like both these bands, I just had to make a decision for this poll and have been a fan of Magma for a while now while just starting to get into Ange. 

Cool.  Sometimes it's those albums that are the toughest to get into that deliver the goods as time goes on.  Cimitiere was my 2nd Ange album and I really love it.  I hope you dig into Ange and find lots of great French prog there.  I highly recommend starting with those 1st 6 studio albums from Caricatures to Guet Apens.  I really like a couple 90's Ange albums too (Les Larmes Du Dalai Lama and Nu), but for me it's those 1st 6 that really bring the magic 

I've got over 40 Zappa albums and have given Hot Rats lots of chances over the years, but other than Peaches En Regalia it just hasn't clicked...then again, it's been years since I've given it a spin so I'll give Frank another shot.  As far as Udu Wudu, I absolutely love De Futura so haven't given up on Magma just yet   

Have you seen this live version before...it's amazing!

Wow, yeah that's really good. Thanks for posting it. And for Ange, first 6 albums huh? I don't know if I'll ever like them as much as Magma.. or Zappa.. Gentle Giant.. but you never know. 

a favorite of mine of theirs...

Oh sh*t son! That was ass kicking, I might have to rethink this whole thing now lol. No, Magma's still Magma. Thanks for posting this. Poll is tied now! Some passionate fans on both sides here, should be interesting coming down the stretch. 

AND, unfairly so. ANGE has its roots in theatrical music, and you can go back to Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht and then, use their very own interpretation of Jacques Brel. 

European bands were much closer to the theatrical thing in Europe than they are given credit for ... OSANNA was also doing costumes and shows way before GENESIS, but no one here will give them credit, and everyone thinks that PG is great when he is, already, 2nd generation to the whole thing. 

This theatrical thing never took in America, because it was the country of the "stars" and the "hits" and has remained so to the point of killing a lot of music out of San Francisco, because it was not a radio cut.

ANGE, in a few videos on the net, does not look very good, mostly because the quality of things is really poor and sadly, it does not show the band at its best. But their first 5 albums rival ANY PROGRESSIVE band in quality and beauty. And, just to give you an idea of value and quality, EMILE JACOTEY was done almost 20 years before Roger Waters, and in many ways ... is a much better and more cohesive album than Roger's ... with the exception that almost everyone here likes the fame, not the music!

As for a comparison between the two ... I abstain ... I love both and can not make a determination. I cried seeing MAGMA in SF and 17 years later here in PORTLAND, and if I ever saw Decamps or Ange, I probably would do the same. I only wore out about 3 or 4 copies of AU DELA DU DELIRE and it's still on my list of favorite albums, if I have to choose them!

no doubt and don't forget that Genesis's theatrical schtick only came about when they realized they were boring as hell.. and were told so in no uncertain terms by their label... and after seeing Osanna knock them dead during an Italian tour.. they decided to try something that might keep their audiences awake and went the theatrical path.

Zero caparison with those who merely mimic and those whose roots, musical DNA are in it.

Hi,

Something is fishy in this comment. So you OK with listening in a different language (English) and not OK with Kobayan or Japanese or Italian, or German or Spanish.

We might as well state right now that the rules and definitions for "prog" and "progressive" can not be in any other language, and can not be theatrical and honest (ciao Peter Hammell!), and then different than what your tastes are.

So much for "tastes" being the definition of great music. 

The world is full of different bands with different languages. ONLY HERE ON PA, do folks state things like that as if there was no world out there, and all the other bands around the world were the merde of life!

Sorry, but I think the comment is not as well thought as you probably meant it to be.

I like their early albums a lot and would listen to them in order. "Caricatures" is a very nice album and shows them well, and "Le Cemetiere des Harlequins" is stronger, and shows that the band is not a fly by night, do not know what to do band ... and they ARE/WERE "harlequins" in terms of their music and subject matter for the most part.

"Au Dela Du Delire" is a masterpiece, and one side is redone in the TOME VI (a fabulous live album!!!!!) really well also. "EMILE JACOTEY"  I mentioned above, and recommend it a lot, although the spoken parts, which are really nice and emotional and make RW's version seem poor ... "Par Les Fils de Mondrin" is super nice as well, and these were the albums that were played on SPACE PIRATE RADIO the most from 1974 on, from this band, and later, many of the solo albums and derivatives from this band were also played. The Decamps solo albums are excellent and an actor's delight, something that is not often enjoyed by rock music folks at all! It brings out how good he made ANGE in its expression.

Depends on which you like better...PG era Genesis or early 70's VDGG 

If you're more into PG Genesis I'd go with Au Dela Du Delire.

If you're more into early 70's VDGG I'd go with Caricatures or Le Cimitiere Des Arlequins.

Might not be that simple.

London had the premier of MARAT/SADE in 1964, and it went on to become a very valuable symbol that had a lot of its lines used in rock music ... however, the costume parade and insanity was now on the loose when you see a video of that original performance (incredible cast!) ... and realize that things like cabbages were being used and cut on stage like heads in the days of the French Revolution! 

So, there would have been an important visual link here, and it's not like no one in London goes to the theater, since both the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theater are considered two of the most innovative theater companies in the world.

I really think that with Anthony Phillips, GENESIS was a bit more serious and "composition" defined and yes, some folks would have thought it BORING, because rock audiences were not known for sit down concerts like they did classical music in every university campus. The addition of costumes makes sense and it is possible/likely that GENESIS learned how to better interpret their music, or all of a sudden realize what they could do with it and come up with Jack the Knife, and so on, to be able to use these costumes ... but they were not new or revolutionary at all ... it was only the London reviewers and audiences that thought it was original, and totally ignored the history of theater in Europe ... somewhat similar to what many folks do here ... like the arts are not connected at all and they are.

However, the harlequins theme and stories and material that ANGE was doing was more honest than the little kiddie stories that GENESIS came up with and decided that they were more important, because PA says so due to its fame. Some of this even goes back to the Grimm's fairy tales originally published in 1812 ... and some of those stories were trying to turn the news of the horrors taking place in France and other places in Europe ... and of course ... Walt Disney corrupted several of those stories even more to the point that a lot of PA's ideals are just like a Walt Disney movie!

This history, is the part that Melody Maker and the other periodical would not discuss or include in their magazines, because they were an entity designed to push the sales of the albums for the record companies, and it worked to the point that even Virgin could corrupt (later) the concept and fool people and also get sales by the million.

Again, to my estimation, this was almost all a media manipulation thing, and if you look at theater and film, and literature, you will find massive differences as to make you wonder ... why is music, and specially rock music so far behind and late to the party?

Both ANGE and MAGMA fit into an area of creativity that is peculiar to France more than anything else. That one brought along a language for its own evolution was totally original, which was something that would make sense within a literary concept, but within the rock music, or jazz music scenes, was totally weird and off kilter, and even today, few can understand it, or appreciate it. I like to say that the French have a peculiar "I don't care" attitude in their many film satires, and this is something that you don't see in their rock music, but the attitude of how it is supposed to sound and be, is way different and you can go back to Richard Pinhas and his incredible discussions on EUROCK about his music and its political/social relevance, and you and I will go ... what? ... how? ... but it is very French and you can easily find that attitude in Jean-Luc Godard ... without the costumes ... he didn't need that to pull it off and did many times, all the way to things like ALPHAVILLE and even more later!

And this is the part of a lot of the folks that post here, that sometimes bothers me ... I won't vote if I have not heard some of the stuff ... but many folks here, won't bother, and will vote because they like one or the other, and not give the other a good listen.

And this hurts. WHY? Because it was that great adventure in listening and music, that brought us what we call "progressive" ... so, what the guy is saying is that he didn't like YES because he was too busy playing Led Zeppelin for the 132nd time! And he only needled YES once. ohhh wait ... after the hit, he needled it 4 more times to double check his liking of Led Zep!

All it shows, really, is that such a person is not really a qualified representative to vote in this particular poll.

For me, I was into ANGE much farther back than most ... I had a sister in Paris, and she had that album (and Alan Stivell!!!) and I listened to it (Caricatures) and she also had Aphrodite's Child (It's 5 o'clock) ... so by the time I heard Magma, I already had 2 Ange albums and saw the homage to Jacques Brel, and in my book, it showed this band far more interesting (specially lyrically!) than GENESIS. Magma came later, for me, and it was fine, and it was the vocal material that got me there. But while I love both, my heart is still much more centered on the ANGE folks, and if you want more theatrical stuff ... check out those solo albums ... at least 2 of them are a massive wow!