Is echolyn still active

[StillJZ]

[QUOTE=Sputnik;1206707]That's not really true. By the mid-90s there were tons of bands playing 70s oriented or influenced Prog Rock, some every bit as good as Echolyn. Had there not been, I don't think Sony would have signed Echolyn, who were, by some measure, at the vanguard of the movement at that time, but by no means the sole proprietors.

I don’t disagree. I probably know many that you are referring to. However, humor me with a few that you’re referring to.

[Sputnik]

I don’t disagree. I probably know many that you are referring to. However, humor me with a few that you’re referring to.

This is just from my collection of then contemporary bands that released albums between 1993 and 1997.

A Triggering Myth
Algaravia
Anekdoten
Anglagard
Antiheroe
Ars Nova
Banda Elastica
Barrock
Berlione, Il
Bi Kyo Ran
Birdsongs of the Mesozoic
Covenant
Deus Ex Machina
DFA
Fire Merchants
Fulano
Happy Family
Helmet of Gnats
Hermetic Science
Humahuaca
Landberk
Lapouge, Jean
Miriodor
Mongol
Mosaic
Nuova Era
Pangee
Philharmonie
Raison De Plus
Rejoice
Sinkadus
Spock's Beard
Tiemko
Townscream
Trono dei Ricordi, Il
Volare
Xaal

Bill

[Guitarplyrjvb]

Gee, I don't agree with this. Echolyn's "As the World" was not nearly as difficult to assimilate as the groups you mentioned. I believed that the record label thought that Echolyn might appeal to a more mainstream audience. They were essentially song based and didn't feature a lot of instrumental virtuosity like a lot of the old-line prog bands. There was certainly a lot of verbosity in the lyrics, much more so than the pop of the day, but no side long epics or too much dissonance to scare the general public away.

[zeprogmeister]

I played ATW a ton in the 90s too. Even had a 2nd copy on cassette for my car at the time. I remember when getting the cassette version the record store owner, who was familiar with it, said "why are you getting such a great album on cassette"?

[Digital_Man]

Gee, I don't agree with this. Echolyn's "As the World" was not nearly as difficult to assimilate as the groups you mentioned. I believed that the record label thought that Echolyn might appeal to a more mainstream audience. They were essentially song based and didn't feature a lot of instrumental virtuosity like a lot of the old-line prog bands. There was certainly a lot of verbosity in the lyrics, much more so than the pop of the day, but no side long epics or too much dissonance to scare the general public away.

True but they probably weren't much more song oriented than your average neo-prog band at the time (such as Iluvatar for example). Their songs were a bit more condensed (ie no epics) but still quirky because I think they were very influenced by Gentle Giant at the time especially something like Octopus which is one of their more song oriented albums imo. I think the fact that the songs were relatively accessible (at least for a prog band) and were to some degree catchy is why they were signed to Sony in the first place. Maybe Sony figured if Dream Theater could do prog in more metal way and be successful at it then maybe those fans who were open to less metal oriented prog would also catch on to echolyn. I'm not sure it quite worked out that way though. In the end Sony wound up doing more harm than good and ultimately echolyn broke up (at least temporarily).

[Sputnik]

Gee, I don't agree with this. Echolyn's "As the World" was not nearly as difficult to assimilate as the groups you mentioned. I believed that the record label thought that Echolyn might appeal to a more mainstream audience. They were essentially song based and didn't feature a lot of instrumental virtuosity like a lot of the old-line prog bands. There was certainly a lot of verbosity in the lyrics, much more so than the pop of the day, but no side long epics or too much dissonance to scare the general public away.

Sony signed Echolyn on the strength of Suffocating the Bloom, an album that contained a 28+ minute long suite. Yes, admittedly, it sounded like a bunch of short songs woven into a larger piece, but still, Echolyn were very much aligned with the then resurgent Prog movement and had boatloads of virtuosity in their early days. Sony may have seen wider appeal in their sound, but the Prog elements were still very important on ATW. It wasn't until Cowboy Poems that you see those elements start to recede, so Sony obviously didn't try to discourage them from doing more Proggy material. I've always felt that if they had delivered CPF instead of ATW, they might have had more support from the label, but from a musical standpoint, I'm not sure that would have been for the best.

But that wasn't really the point I was trying to make. Someone said nobody else was making music like Echolyn in in the mid-90s, and I just don't think that's true. My list is a bit more obtuse because I don't like the fluffier side of Prog, but in addition to the bands I listed, there were tons of Neo/Symph bands that flirted with more accessible music that had some vague Prog elements that were out there in the mid-90s. I was just showing that there were a lot of bands doing what Echolyn were doing at that time.

Bill

[GuitarGeek]

Sony signed Echolyn on the strength of Suffocating the Bloom, an album that contained a 28+ minute long suite. Yes, admittedly, it sounded like a bunch of short songs woven into a larger piece, but still, Echolyn were very much aligned with the then resurgent Prog movement and had boatloads of virtuosity in their early days. Sony may have seen wider appeal in their sound, but the Prog elements were still very important on ATW. It wasn't until Cowboy Poems that you see those elements start to recede, so Sony obviously didn't try to discourage them from doing more Proggy material. I've always felt that if they had delivered CPF instead of ATW, they might have had more support from the label, but from a musical standpoint, I'm not sure that would have been for the best.

I suspect wht happened was, the A&R guy who actually signed them to the label, by the time the album came out, wasn't working for Sony anymore, or had been promoted, one or the other. And the henchman who took his place wasn't as enthusiastic about Echolyn as his predecessor. I understand this happens a lot in the music business, there could be a few months or a year before that first record comes out, and in that time, a regime change happens, and "the new sheriff in town" basically thinks you suck. Arthur Barrow talks about this happening several times with records that he produced, in his book.

Same thing happens in the film industry, sometimes, one studio henchman OK's a movie, but by the time said picture actually gets finished, which could a be year or more later, there's new studio execs who don't think so highly of the picture you just finished. There's definitely a lot of movies where that happened. Or you end up making something for one company (be it film or music), but that company ends up getting gobbled up a bigger corporation (e.g. Capricorn Records getting bought out by Arista at the start of the 80's).

[GuitarGeek]

Oh, and talking about Echolyn in general, I'll never forget having to get up in the middle of Mei, when they played the entire thing, front to back at NEARfest, to use the john. I guess I hadn't realized they were about to launch into a 50 minute piece of music, so I figured "I'll wait until after this one is over". Then there was a certain point, there was this big crescendo, like I what I assumed was going to be the end, so they get up this big dramatic crescendo, and I'm thinking "Great, NOW I can go", and the thing stops, and then this guy starts strumming away on an acoustic guitar, and I'm remember saying, under my breath, by I guess loud enough for the guy in front of me to hear, "Oh, for the love Of GAWD!", because the guy turns around and says "They've been going on like this for 25 minutes". That's when I finally said, "OK, enough is enough" and got up and went to take care of business.

[JAMOOL]

I suspect wht happened was, the A&R guy who actually signed them to the label, by the time the album came out, wasn't working for Sony anymore, or had been promoted, one or the other. And the henchman who took his place wasn't as enthusiastic about Echolyn as his predecessor. I understand this happens a lot in the music business, there could be a few months or a year before that first record comes out, and in that time, a regime change happens, and "the new sheriff in town" basically thinks you suck. Arthur Barrow talks about this happening several times with records that he produced, in his book.

echolyn's website has this journal on it which they wrote while recording As the World and yes, the story is exactly as you describe. apparently things really were going well for them in 1994 but the guy who signed them got fired and the band was just kind of left in no man's land after that. IIRC As the World had been completed about 9 months before it was actually released. I think they kind of knew the writing was on the wall during that period.

its really too bad - as much as I like (some) of the bands on Sputnik's list (many of them I haven't heard of), I think echolyn had a much broader appeal while still doing right by the progheads. I don't even really think of them as a progressive rock band even though they clearly have the chops. I really do think they would've found their audience had they been promoted and were able to do a proper tour.

[Steve F.]

Ken Golden knows this stuff better than me, but Echolyn was signed to SONY by Michael Caplan, who worked for Sony in A&R at the time and is a genuine Prog fan.

Obviously, financially, it didn’t work out so well, but his intentions were definitely good. I didn’t remember that he was fired shortly after signing and recording them, but it is hardly surprising to hear that….

I saw them at this great bar in Baltimore, Cafe Tattoo, twice before they were signed, and they were very refreshing, very original and shockingly progressive for that time period.

(Note - you could get a tattoo at Cafe Tattoo if you wanted it!!!!)

[Frumious B]

Suffocating The Bloom is really the album that made me a fan. I still adore that record. When As The World came out my experience was one of phoning multiple stores and driving to buy what was possibly the only copy available for release date retail sale in the entire city of Atlanta. I love that album too and I was excited to see them on a major label, but the reality of that turned out to be such a drag.

[Czyszy]

Just to clarify. Ray's bass playing, to me, just fills a sonic niche and really doesn't add anything to the proceedings. It's not a deal-breaker by any means. I just think Tom Hyatt's bass playing added an extra ingredient to the Echolyn broth that really put them over the top for me. I'm not a great fan of the records on which he is the bassist, even Cowboy Poems Free, which a lot of folks seem to love.

Just listened to CPF with extra focus on the bass parts. I like Ray's bass playing honestly. That guy can play some really intricate stuff.

[GuitarGeek]

echolyn's website has this journal on it which they wrote while recording As the World and yes, the story is exactly as you describe. apparently things really were going well for them in 1994 but the guy who signed them got fired and the band was just kind of left in no man's land after that. IIRC As the World had been completed about 9 months before it was actually released. I think they kind of knew the writing was on the wall during that period.
.

Under those circumstances, Echolyn were actually kind of lucky, as a lot of times, what happens is, the album gets recorded, and new the bosses refuse to release it. There's lots of stories of bands and performers who got signed, spent whatever duration of time recording, they get the album recorded, mixed, they deliver to the label, and the new A&R guy refuses to let it be released. When I mentioned Arthur Barrow in my previous post, he mentions I think three or four different records in his book that he produced where the exact scenario happened: the label refused to release the finished album.

Even if you've been on a label for awhile, it can still happen. I recall Lita Ford saying she actually cut a third album for Mercury in the mid 80's, after Dancing On The Edge, that was never released, and I know it's happened to other people.

[bigjohnwayne]

I got an original copy of the And Every Blossom ep last week. I am in love with those tracks as I know them from the A Little Nonsense set and was surprised that the original 1993 ep sounds so different.

First of all, at some point in the late 90s, Brett Kull became a top flight producer. The remix on the box set is a big step up. That I expected. But what surprises me is what sound like totally different vocal performances on 3 songs. The vocal melody on Ballet for a Marsh is entirely different! The only song that seems untouched (besides the remix) is Blue and Sand.

Did they re record the vocals in the early 2000s? I feel like both Ray and Brett's vocal approaches were very different by the Cowboy Poems-Mei era, but that might be George W Bush era Kull I hear on the box set renditions of Bright Sides and Lunch in the Sun.

[zeprogmeister]

Ken Golden knows this stuff better than me, but Echolyn was signed to SONY by Michael Caplan, who worked for Sony in A&R at the time and is a genuine Prog fan.

Obviously, financially, it didn’t work out so well, but his intentions were definitely good. I didn’t remember that he was fired shortly after signing and recording them, but it is hardly surprising to hear that….

I saw them at this great bar in Baltimore, Cafe Tattoo, twice before they were signed, and they were very refreshing, very original and shockingly progressive for that time period.

(Note - you could get a tattoo at Cafe Tattoo if you wanted it!!!!)

An interesting time. I seem to recall Echolyn mainly doing some east coast smaller gigs after signing. I don't remember them put as openers on any national tours or anything. I think Caplan also signed October Project as well.

[moecurlythanu]

^ echolyn definitely toured Ohio and Michigan in support of As The World, not just the East Coast.

[GuitarGeek]

^ echolyn definitely toured Ohio and Michigan in support of As The World, not just the East Coast.

I didn't know about it at the time, but someone told me several years later he saw Echolyn in Cleveland, I forget where at, maybe the Symposium? Anyway, he said there were like 10 people in the audience.

[moecurlythanu]

I didn't know about it at the time, but someone told me several years later he saw Echolyn in Cleveland, I forget where at, maybe the Symposium? Anyway, he said there were like 10 people in the audience.

I don't remember the location, but I saw them in Cleveland. The next night they played Toledo, and the night after, Detroit.

[LeFrog]

I'm starting to wonder if the new album will be released this year.
Judging by their FB posts, the new album seems to be nearly finished and on the verge of being released since at least mid-2022.

[progholio]

anyone know if this one's gonna be on vinyl? they're such a special band to me I'd probably pay whatever they're asking for it

I support this idea 1000%

[nosebone]

Ken Golden knows this stuff better than me, but Echolyn was signed to SONY by Michael Caplan, who worked for Sony in A&R at the time and is a genuine Prog fan.

Obviously, financially, it didn’t work out so well, but his intentions were definitely good. I didn’t remember that he was fired shortly after signing and recording them, but it is hardly surprising to hear that….

I saw them at this great bar in Baltimore, Cafe Tattoo, twice before they were signed, and they were very refreshing, very original and shockingly progressive for that time period.

(Note - you could get a tattoo at Cafe Tattoo if you wanted it!!!!)

I saw Finneus Gauge with Boud Deun at Cafe Tattoo around 1997

[moecurlythanu]

^ Nice to see you nosebone. Maybe I'm in the wrong threads, but I hadn't seen you post in a while.

[Steve F.]

I saw Finneus Gauge with Boud Deun at Cafe Tattoo around 1997

Me too!

[MudShark22]

I saw Finneus Gauge with Boud Deun at Cafe Tattoo around 1997

We also played three gigs with FG in 97, one at Orion and two others in Jersey

[Steve F.]

We also played three gigs with FG in 97, one at Orion and two others in Jersey

What band?