Enslaved - A good choice for ProgPower?

[Akumu]

Sorry Britt, but I have to disagree 100%.

Enslaved is the epitome of a progressive metal band. Period.
(IE - meaning both figuratively and literally).

Given some of the bands in recent years who have played, I certainly think Enslaved would be a perfect fit.

I mean, come on. Tyr and Turisas could be considered but not Enslaved?

Ehh, Týr and Turisas made sense to me because Týr has exclusively clean vox and interesting guitar work, and Turisas have a huge, bombastic power metal feel going on for them. I would think Enslaved just tour the states too often to draw in new faces via the black metal scene -- but I could be wrong!

Perhaps. Amorphis turned out fine though. The reception during their set was pretty damn good. Better than a few other headliners, as a matter of fact.

They did? I wasn't there, but I recall reading a few reactions here from Amorphis fans disappointed with the audience, saying that the band "practically had to beg to give an encore," among other things. I had thought that this -- along with their poor draw during the rest of that tour -- might've accounted for why they haven't been back to the States since. Whatever the reason, it rather sucks because I want to see them! :/

 

[Jasonic]

Sorry,
I know I haven't attended this festival, so I may be out of place in even speaking on this, since I have never seen any crowd response AT the festival.

I am just going off of previous lineups.

I have seen people fight tooth and nail in trying to justify the appearance of bands at this fest which are nowhere near the spectrum of prog or power.

Just my 2 cents that Enslaved would be a fit. Period.

Britt - Sorry, I didn't read your post fully. Yes, I do agree with you that the "wow" factor wouldn't be there, since they tour alot.

 

[Jasonic]

Ehh, Týr and Turisas made sense to me because Týr has exclusively clean vox and interesting guitar work

You are REALLY stretching here my friend.

Come on, I believe Glen himself admitted multiple times already that TYR's appearance was a business move to get new butts in the seats.

Look, I do like TYR, so I am not at all slamming them.

Booking ENSLAVED would be both a good business move in bringing in some fence sitters, though still interesting and appealing enough to the core crowd. I mean ENSLAVED are listed on the Prog Archives, which means they are certainly recognized as a "progressive" metal band.

 

[Harvester]

Mr Bath can take a month long vacation from the forum. I understand and agree to a certain extent. However, I will not tolerate draggging the festival name down like that...especially when you rarely contribute.

 

[Jasonic]

Yeah, that was just bizarre, and that's coming from me.

I think we all agree to disagree and are having a discussion.

 

[Akumu]

Booking ENSLAVED would be both a good business move in bringing in some fence sitters, though still interesting and appealing enough to the core crowd. I mean ENSLAVED are listed on the Prog Archives, which means they are certainly recognized as a "progressive" metal band.

This was pretty much what I meant with my Týr comment - that they'd bring in an outside audience (which ties in with Glenn mentioning it was partly a business decision because of the growing folk metal scene) while not being too "out there" for the core base due to clean vox/etc. It DID look pretty packed for them during their set, and people I talked to the next day seemed to really like them - though then I read some comments after the fest saying that they weren't very well-received, so who knows.

Mr Bath can take a month long vacation from the forum. I understand and agree to a certain extent. However, I will not tolerate draggging the festival name down like that...especially when you rarely contribute.

Glad I refreshed before replying. I haven't seen anything close to "bickering" in this thread -- and those who were talking about harsh vox were obviously discussing it in terms of how the "core" audience would react vs. personal preference...

 

[AeonicSlumber]

To the people who think Enslaved is not a good candidate because the festival should largely appease those who listen to bands like Seventh Wonder, etc.

Glenn should not care about you. Now, before I too get banned too for saying that, I'm not saying that you guys don't matter -- you guys buy tickets after all. However, the vast majority of these bands do not sell many records (some may not even have official releases in the States) or could not bring in enough people. Enslaved however does sell records, and does bring in fans. Thus, a hard medium between appeasing you guys (as well as himself of course) and trying to make the festival a financial success is a hard one to reach, but it must be met.

The facts are these: when people got mad over the announcement of this year's line up not having enough Seventh Wonder-ish bands and too many screaming bands/bands that they don't like, Glenn made it abundantly clear that a nice chunk of the longtime fans of the festival had stopped attending over the last few years -- and even had the ticket audits to show for it.

It isn't to say that none of these sorts of bands bands should play ProgPower, because alot of these bands helped define the festival (and not only that, but some of them went on to establish careers because of the festivals that helped bolster the festival alongside it), but something's got to give now. None of these bands that you guys pine for are relevant in the scene. They don't sell records or draw crowds (some of these bands probably don't even play more than 10 shows a year), and nobody beyond this forum really talks about them, etc. Music evolves and changes, and you have to deal with that. Wanting the same sort of bands to fill up a festival over and over again over a 12 year spectrum is not going to yield a successful festival. Enslaved may not appeal to everyone on this board, but they draw enough people that they could headline the festival and bring in a new crowd which would create new returnees. Diversity is the spice of life, as they say, and the most successful fesitvals these days are the ones that are diverse enough to bring in multiple people. Maryland Death Fest went from being much smaller than ProgPower to selling over 3,000 tickets within one year, because the promoters decided to seriously diversity their festival and bring in more relevant bands instead of the same old foreign grind bands that don't have much of a following here to begin with.

 

[AeonicSlumber]

However, I've been saying for years that Enslaved needs to associate with and tour with other bands in the prog-but-not-Prog circle (like post-metal, sludge, etc.) and they've never listened to me. They continue to tour with dumb black metal bands. So it's almost like they don't recognize themselves that they're a "prog" band, or at least figure it isn't in their interest for their fanbase to identify them as such.

Neil

They did a tour with Opeth 2 years ago which was pretty successful. This last tour with Dimmu was also massively successful for them. Although I disliked EVERY band (sans Enslaved of course) on that Dimmu tour to the point where I decided not to go to the show, that tour had some of the largest crowds Enslaved ever played to.

 

[AngraRULES]

I would say it's not the amount of death vocals that would be the problem with Enslaved, it's the lack of clean vocals. All the past (and future) PP bands with death vocals also have true "lead vocals" for the clean vocals. Most to the point where the clean vocals are the main vocal, with the growls adding a texture.

It's the opposite for Enslaved. Though they've mixed vocal styles for their entire career, the clean vocals have always been of a chanting, buried-in-the-mix, atmospheric kind of thing, not the hook of the song. You can't sing along with Enslaved songs. However, this changed significantly with AEO (one of the things I don't like about it!) so who knows, maybe it's time?

However, I've been saying for years that Enslaved needs to associate with and tour with other bands in the prog-but-not-Prog circle (like post-metal, sludge, etc.) and they've never listened to me. They continue to tour with dumb black metal bands. So it's almost like they don't recognize themselves that they're a "prog" band, or at least figure it isn't in their interest for their fanbase to identify them as such.

It's a good point about the vocals. I, however, *still* think they are a fit and some people would walk out fans. It is time. As AeonicSlumber said, they are a very relevant band and they'd bring in people without a heck of a doubt. And just as some of the PP crowd might walk away fans, their fans also could potentially walk away liking a few bands of the festival.

 

[AngraRULES]

Ehh, Týr and Turisas made sense to me because Týr has exclusively clean vox and interesting guitar work, and Turisas have a huge, bombastic power metal feel going on for them. I would think Enslaved just tour the states too often to draw in new faces via the black metal scene -- but I could be wrong!

Enslaved has very interesting aspects about it that make them just as fitting into the festival. My response to your Turisas assessment is simple: What Turisas offers to the Power Metal crowd, Enslaved offers to the Prog metal crowd.

They did? I wasn't there, but I recall reading a few reactions here from Amorphis fans disappointed with the audience, saying that the band "practically had to beg to give an encore," among other things. I had thought that this -- along with their poor draw during the rest of that tour -- might've accounted for why they haven't been back to the States since. Whatever the reason, it rather sucks because I want to see them! :/

They drew pretty decently in some shows, and the ProgPower response was not that bad. It was better than some other headliners in the past, like I said. Riverside put on a HELL of a set before them though, it was hard to follow.

 

[Pelata]

As has been mentioned, Enslaved is on Prog Archives AND has been featured in Classic Rock Presents: Prog magazine very recently...they are definitely a fixture in the Prog scene now, brought about by their last couple of albums...they're as Prog as Opeth...would anyone deny Opeth a Progpower slot?

 

[AngraRULES]

Sorry,
I know I haven't attended this festival, so I may be out of place in even speaking on this, since I have never seen any crowd response AT the festival.

I am just going off of previous lineups.

I have seen people fight tooth and nail in trying to justify the appearance of bands at this fest which are nowhere near the spectrum of prog or power.

Just my 2 cents that Enslaved would be a fit. Period.

One of the best assessments on the subject so far. You're right on the spot.

 

[AeonicSlumber]

As has been mentioned, Enslaved is on Prog Archives AND has been featured in Classic Rock Presents: Prog magazine very recently...they are definitely a fixture in the Prog scene now, brought about by their last couple of albums...they're as Prog as Opeth...would anyone deny Opeth a Progpower slot?

I think I remember someone on here saying they were considered for ProgPower around the time Blackwater Park came out.

 

[skyrefuge]

They did a tour with Opeth 2 years ago which was pretty successful. This last tour with Dimmu was also massively successful for them. Although I disliked EVERY band (sans Enslaved of course) on that Dimmu tour to the point where I decided not to go to the show, that tour had some of the largest crowds Enslaved ever played to.

Oh, yeah, I wasn't saying that they need to change their touring methodology for *their* benefit, I meant it for *my* benefit! I want to see the fruits of a cross-pollination between "metal bands" (Enslaved) and "bands that play metal-like music" (Isis). Bands that have arrived at similar points by navigating rather different paths with different influences and different fanbases. I want to see what happens to a band like Russian Circles when they integrate black metal tremolo riffing and true grimness into their sound.

Sticking with bands like Dimmu and Opeth still plants Enslaved fully within the "metal" scene, and that's boring.

Neil

 

[Pelata]

Oh, yeah, I wasn't saying that they need to change their touring methodology for *their* benefit, I meant it for *my* benefit! I want to see the fruits of a cross-pollination between "metal bands" (Enslaved) and "bands that play metal-like music" (Isis). Bands that have arrived at similar points by navigating rather different paths with different influences and different fanbases. I want to see what happens to a band like Russian Circles when they integrate black metal tremolo riffing and true grimness into their sound.

Sticking with bands like Dimmu and Opeth still plants Enslaved fully within the "metal" scene, and that's boring.

Neil

Dimmu, yeah. But Opeth have been ever more steady Prog fixtures since Blackwater Park...they've been on Prog Nation Tour, they've been on the cover of and within the pages of CRp: Prog several times already, showing in Prog polls quite heavily....they're widely accepted by people who (based on Progressive Ears and Prog Archives forum) never liked Death vocals before ever...they ARE Prog Metal...

 

[The Invisible Guest]

I think Opeth would be a much better fit than Enslaved. I'm guessing they are a band on Glenn's wish list, but are out of his price range. I think they also are a much easier sell to the prog power base because they have the big time frontman who has both a fantastic clean and growled voice.

I also think they are way more accessible than enslaved both vocally and musically. Opeth is kind of rooted more in prog metal ... while Enslaved is rooted more in black metal. Opeth is also at a point where they are more clean vocaled than Enslaved by a wide margin.


Britt

 

[The Invisible Guest]

Guys, I like Enslaved a lot ... I just don't think they are an easy listen for many because of their blackened extreme vocals. Believe it or not some people like the growls of say Amorphis, Mercenary, After Forever, and Opeth, but find black metal vocals unlistenable.

I will say that if Glenn added Enslaved to the roster some year I'd be happy about it. I however don't think it would be a popular choice.


Britt

 

[Pelata]

Enslaved has Black Metal roots and Opeth has Death Metal roots...the band that has strayed the most from their original sound and into Prog is Enslaved, quite honestly. IMO anyway...

 

[The Invisible Guest]

Pelata, that's fair .. I don't fully disagree with that at all, but I don't find Enslaved to be that much of a prog metal band. I find them to be mostly black metal with some pink floyd'ish interludes mixed in. The definition of prog is kind of fuzzy ... to me Opeth is prog band .. while Enslaved is a black/extreme band. One seems to fit the prog power type concept to me while the other one does not. Just my opinion.


Britt

 

[skyrefuge]

Dimmu, yeah. But Opeth have been ever more steady Prog fixtures since Blackwater Park...

Oh, yeah, I fully agree that prog dorks like Opeth, but they're still a metal band that grew out of the metal scene. They have the same influences as Enslaved (metal), come from the same part of the world, came up on European metal labels, have had a similar evolution, etc. They don't have anything to learn from each other. I would like to see Enslaved cross paths with bands that came from a whole different headspace and aesthetic. Heck, mix 'em with God is an Astronaut or Sigur Ros. Show the world what a post-rock buildup can REALLY crescendo into.

Ok, I guess that's probably just Solstafir, but the world needs more Solstafir anyhow!

Neil