NEW YORK (By George Pardalis/ Top40 Charts Staff Writter) Zagar is a headliner group of the Hungarian electronic music scene. Their music has been used in the US television series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and its spin-off CSI: NY. With almost ten years of music making under his belt, Balazs Zsager is a survivor and a music legend. Still touring and recording, he takes time out of his schedule to talk exclusively to
George Pardalis and Top40 Charts about his artistic legacy!
Top40 Charts: Hungary has always shown great bands in various genres.Unfortunately,almost every band didn't go beyond the limits of Underground. What's your opinion about the Hungarian Electro music scene? Has it passes the limits of this underground feeling?
In Hungary the real independent and honest music as you mentioned comes from the underground scene. Usually this kind of bands and musicians are not supported by the radios and the TVs maybe that's one of the reason that they are not so well known. In spite of that I think the Hungarian electronic music scene is very strong. I know many talented musicians and producers who don't want to be more just playing in clubs and they don't want to sign to any label. For us our hit single 'Wings of Love' helped to get through the border between underground and mainstream, but we want to keep the balance and our independency.
Top40 Charts: The sound of Zagar compiles lots of different styles. Indie,Bossa,Jazz,Soul,Electronica. Is this the result of your music education or you just wanted to compile the intersection points of these genres?
I think nowadays the electronic music is influenced by many genres. We try to use every kind of influence which gets through to us from Jimi Hendrix to Trentemoller. For us the point is to communicate and convey our imagination through the music with a characteristic style. For this reason I don't really like to describe our music with an exact category. Zagar is a 5-piece band now with vocal, drums, bass, guitar, turntable, keys and different kind of electronic instruments. Each band mate comes form different music scenes like jazz, abstract hip-hop, rock or electronic dance music. We don't want to skip these facts, so you can feel all of these influences on our tracks. In spite of that I think there is a typical Zagar sound which is based on a coherent mood.
Top40 Charts: How things are about electronic music in Eastern Europe?
For us is important to express in our music that we live here in this region. The band name, Zagar comes from my family name Zs�ger. With this name we wanted to represent our Eastern European roots also. The Eastern European attitude makes our style a bit different sometimes more dreamy and melancholic. When I was a child I usually watched typical Eastern European cartoons which were more sensitive and emotional then the Western Europeans like Walt Disney movies for example.
Top40 Charts: What are the main themes of your music? What kind of things inspire you?
We do not really want to convey any exact message, we are simply writing songs about things that interests us. On our latest album there are some simple topics from our every day life such as solitude, desire to love, snobism or vanity. But sometimes we write songs influenced by a book or a film. My favorites movies are the surreal ones like Terry Giliam's Brazil, David Lynch's features or the Hungarian Szindbad. But sometimes, when I listen to a new tunes or a good song I tell to myself I want to write music like that, of course if I try it becomes totally different when I finish. Usually I am always looking for something new which makes me excited. I think one of the most important thing in art is that the artist has to be totally involved in his work.
Top40 Charts: As far as I know you are the only electroning musician that commisioned Hungarian National Theatre! How does this feel?
I'm not sure I'm the only one, but I was one of the first who got invited by the National Theatre in Budapest to compose music for couple of great pieces. It was a great honour and experience at the same time to work with such famous actors. When I was a child I watched them many many famous Hungarian movie- and TV film.
Top40 Charts: I adore the music of CSI and I was really surprised when I saw that the OST of the series was your work! I also think that the music of Eastern Sugar movie is yours, right? Is it easy to make music for a movie or a TV program?
Yes, beside of the albums and live performances we are involved in other projects like theater, advertisements and films as well. We made music for TV- and feature films and documentaries also. As a movie fan I really like this kind of works. I like to work with such directors who has the same associations about a topic like I have. But sometimes the screenplay requires a strange genre or style considering the soundtrack. In this case is a real challenge to compose music, but it can lead to new influences wich can be usefull for my own works for example.
Top40 Charts: Do you have any future plans?
Recently we are working on a new album, but in the meantime we are releasing two new single on the German label from our latest album with the tracks called 'Prophet is a Fool' and 'Never the Same'. Remixers include the well-known german electro producer duo Moonbootica, the UK soundcloud phenomenon Cottonmouth, the pioneer of German minimal houseTerry Lee Brown Jr. and my bandmate, Dj Bootsie as well. We plan to shot new videos for these two songs also. Besides we try to spread our music all around the world, so we would like to get to play abroad more and more in the future.
Top40 Charts: Share anything you want with your fans!
Keep listening our tracks and come to see us on stage live!
