International music

[Egiam]

I live in the U.S. and want to learn about more great music. I have heard plenty of Canadian songs and a few Mexican, but lacking in what's across the Atlantic. I tend to like rock and pop. Think Nickelback, Three Days Grace, and Alejandro Sanz. What do you playgrounders know of in Germany, France, Italy and so on?

P.S. Every time I go to Mexico I hear this one pop song about 10 times that I like. It's driving me crazy because I don't speak enough spanish to guess what it's called, and for some reason it never occured to me to ask. It sounds like a Rob Thomas Mexican equivalent. Any ideas (This might sound like a crazy question, but really I'd be able to make a list of every song I've heard in the region I was in.)?

[Athaniar]

European music? I feel obligated to mention german 80s pop band Dschinghis Khan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dschinghis_Khan). Listen to this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQAKRw6mToA). Best song ever.

[Don Julio Anejo]

European music? I feel obligated to mention german 80s pop band Dschinghis Khan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dschinghis_Khan). Listen to this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQAKRw6mToA). Best song ever.
:biggrin:

Music in Germany is about 3 things. Big scary metalhead dudes with chains, black leather and flamethrowers (Rammstein and others I don't know about). Trance (Paul Van Dyk, ATB, although most more popular DJ's are Dutch or British). Or girly pop.

[Arlion]

Argentine music is cool

listen to La Renga,Sumo,Los Redondos

Especially Sumo

[ufo]

Should it be in native languages? There are some kick-butt Danish bands singing in English.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Zach Condon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zach_Condon) of Beirut has made some excellent albums, drawing (alternately) on turn-of-the-century French chanson, Romany orchestras (the particular group he collaborated a lot with, Kocani Orkestar, is also very good), and Mexican funereal music.

Maybe a little more folk/world-y than what you're looking for, but very good nonetheless.

[InaVegt]

Rapalje is a good Dutch celtic folk band. (Mostly tradditional british songs, at least one traditional song that is in Dutch but has a very celtic melody. I suspect it's written by one of the Batavii, a native Dutch Celtic tribe who traded in thier language a long time ago, the primary ancestors of those who live in the Dutch provinces North and South Holland.)

[The Vorpal Tribble]

Within Temptation (www.myspace.com/withintemptation) - Dutch Symphonic Metal/Goth Rock
Alizee (www.myspace.com/alizee2006) - French Pop
Diablo Swing Orchestra (www.myspace.com/diabloswingorchestra) - Norwegian Jazz
Vitas (www.myspace.com/vitasvitas) - Russian Techno Opera (never heard anything like this, Opera #2 in particular)
Sylvain St. Amour (www.myspace.com/sylvainstamour) - Canadian Blues
Shakira... nuff said.

Edit: There is also this Qatar pop star who's incredible but can't remember her name...

[SilentNight]

Reggae is good from just about anywhere south of the equator. Putamayo records actually puts together really good compliations of world music. Also, I just discovered Rodrigo Y Gabriella (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8dPso79Z9I) out of Mexico, freaking amazing.

[RTGoodman]

I listen to quite a bit of European music of several genres. As far as more folk-type music, I listen to a lot of Irish stuff. Luke Kelly and the Dubliners, the Wolfe Tones, Athenrye, and a lot of other bands like that are some of my favorites.

Besides that, I listen to a lot of German music. From the '80s there's Nena (of "99 Luftballons" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQYQTFudrqc) fame) and the great (Austrian) artist Falco, famous for "Der Kommissar" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w4Xulsjo5I) (later covered in English by After the Fire) and "Rock Me Amadeus." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trOij8SPIAo) As for more modern stuff, I LOVE German Neue Deutsche Haerte stuff like Eisbrecher and Megaherz. It's closer to industrial or metal than rock, but it's still worth a listen. I don't know as much about Megaherz (just what I've heard from friends' copies of their albums), but both of Eisbrecher's albums that I have ("Eisbrecher" and "Antikoerper") are great. Take a listen to "Herz Steht Still" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgqSIDrO06c) and "Frage" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dg31ysEqjDQ) for the kind of stuff on the first, and "Ohne Dich" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd4VlHqPVSU) and "Vergissmeinnicht" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fa2TIXrwWbo) from the second.

[Toastkart]

In addition to Within Temptation, I recommend a few other bands from the Gothic rock/ Symphonic rock genre.

Xandria (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCPjgZpuQzE)
Leaves Eyes (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XbctRM2mvg&feature=related)
Lacuna Coil (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixxtnrWb17Y)
Epica (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfLtA8SkmVw)
Visions of Atlantis (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jd9fba4v2U&feature=related)
Theatre of Tragedy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJ95J-k16bw)
Sirenia (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njPWBTIv9qw&feature=PlayList&p=C73E0C8F785BADCB&playnext=1&index=10)

All of these are pretty good.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

Epica's cover of Memory from CATS (which is an alteration of Preludes, Eliot's best poem) is one of the moments in metal that was most made of win. Also one of the silliest. I mean, it is a song from CATS.
Almost as amazing a cover, but not nearly as silly, is Sirenia's Leonard Cohen cover.

That said, none of that really falls in the Nickleback sort of range. Closest thing in America is the comparatively trite Evanescence.

The main pop/rock kind of band from Germany at the moment is Tokio Hotel, but I strongly reccomend against them. They are famous for their singer looking like an ugly girl, which stupid teenagers find more attractive than a boy looking like an attractive boy or an attractive girl. Finland's Lovex might be to your liking, at least vocally, and its singer would make a far better looking girl.

That's all the help I can offer, as I listen to wholly different sorts of music.

[Innis Cabal]

I find bands like Finntrol, Heidevolk and Lumsk to be enjoyable, all being european in some shape or form. You also can never go wrong with Rammstien. Ever.

Outside of that, Ravi Shankar, Daler Mehndi is fun if not a little strange if you really understand the languages he's speaking.