Rock and roll didn't really gain solid ground in Romania in the early sixties since it was considered deformed music. There were some beatgroups trying, inspired by the movie ‘The young ones’, such as Uranus, Cometele and Sfinţii. In 1968 there was a small breakthrough but the music was not allowed to be called rock so instead they called it "electric guitar bands" (formaţii de chitare electrice in Romanian). Acts like Sfinx , Phoenix (with Nicolae Covaci) and Mondial were allowed to record. Songwriter Dorin Liviu Zaharia was able to record his controversial rocksuites ‘Decameronul focului alb’ (1969) and ‘Karma Kaliyuga’ (1971) with progrock group Olympia 64. The whole scene was forced underground when the regime hardened again at the start of the seventies. Mondial re-emerged in 1977 as Semnal M. In the Eighties Romania developed a still vibrant heavy - and doom metal scene starting with the band Celelalte Cuvinte (The Other Words) in 1981. After the turn in 1990 an independent rock scene slowly started evolving . Since 1991 Direcția 5 has been one of the more popular guitar driven pop acts. It was the Romanian folk that became popular internationally. Mostly coming forth from the Roma music tradition ( with Fanfare Ciocărlia as best example) and the Wallachian province. This province is home to the taraf bands, which are perhaps the best-known expression of Romanian folk culture. Dances associated with tarafs include brâu, geamparale, sârba and hora. The fiddle leads the music, with the cimbalom and double bass accompanying it. Lyrics are often about heroes like the Haidouks. Taraf de Haidouks is an especially famous taraf, and have achieved international attention since their 1988 debut with the label Ocora. The Haidouks first attained visibility as lăutari, traditional entertainers at weddings and other celebratory occasions. That folk pop plays such an important part doesn’t mean that more international styles like hiphop, dance and rock played no part in Romanian music. With the dubious reputation of being one of the centre point of international CD piracy Romanians had access to millions of international music albums since the invention of the cd burner in 1997. This wasn’t very positive for creating a local pop scene though because any album was immediately pirated and international record company’s were hesitant to enter the Romanian market. At the turn of the century electronic pop-duo Blondy became popular. Singer Andreea Banica went solo in 2004. The tide changed with the international success of boyband O-Zone and their European hit "Dragostea din tei". A year later Akcent has a big European hit with ‘Kylie’ and established themselves as a credible act in their home country. Locally popsinger Keo became one of the more recent popular pop-singers. More international (English language) pop-dance music is made by Inna who entered stage in 2008 and is pushed heavily by MTV. Dance-orientated acts like Radio Killer and DJ Sava (with singer Raluka) are recent radio-pleasers.
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