I had an alarming experience at their May show in Toronto (at the — sigh — Kool Haus). I went in thinking the space would be filled with balding 30-something adult-indie beardos like me, and was stunned to find out that the band has a giant frat boy contingent who had made associations with the band and their lyrics (!!?!)... I know that "Fake Empire" has been associated with Barack Obama, as it was played in Grant Park shortly before Obama's election victory party kicked off, but was it included in some Abercrombie and Fitch sampler or something? I reckon they were thisclose to making the NEW MOON soundtrack...
Back to the show: I witnessed beer cans held aloft, 19-year-old boys screaming "WHOOOO!!!!" during some of the more hushed moments, and girls in Uggs swaying as if to Taylor Swift or something... Picture this scene at a Leonard Cohen show. Maybe my gut response was that it was a boorish, improper response to music which I feel should put one into a more introspective frame of mind (like a good short story), but then I was like, who am I to judge how this music clearly makes a good number of people feel? Maybe not an original thought, but one that that perhaps doesn't hit these boards often enough...
Halter tops for men never did catch on, did they? Tom Jones' cover of this was icky — sounded like he was passing a gallstone. Fine, Prince sounds pained here too, but it takes balls to rock a falsetto for an entire song like this (ironically). Just fun — it's the 'Hey Ya' of the 80s — if you gave it a '1', I can't help you...
By the way, the sample here is, in fact from Lalo Schifrin's score for the American TV series "Mission: Impossible" (1966-73). The track called "Danube Incident" — excellent, moody track — when the sampled bit comes in at the end, it's like WHA?!
(More Wiki goodness: The jangly sample in "Sour Times" is a cimbalom, a form of hammered dulcimer from Central and Eastern Europe.)
Not that that JC's late albums with hip-hop impresario-turned-New Agey-head-of-Columbia-Records Rick Rubin didn't contain some goodies, I can't help but feel that the novelty factor runs high, perhaps here more than anywhere (kinda cheesy 'dung-dugga-dung-dung' riff, "..and RUN."). Cash in his Sun Records prime buries anything here, including 'Hurt', which I think many associate with their sadness over Johnny's death, and the powerful Mark Romanek video that accompanied it...
"Combining elements of punk, gypsy music, and Brechtian cabaret, Gogol Bordello tells the story of New York's immigrant diaspora through debauchery, humor, and surreal costumes. Leader and singer Eugene Hütz's taste in music was spun out of black-market tapes of the The Birthday Party and Einstürzende Neubauten in his native Ukraine.
After being evacuated to Western Ukraine in 1986 following the Chornobyl disaster, Hütz became enamored of the mystical, outsider qualities of gypsy music. Living as a refugee in Poland, Hungary, Austria, and Italy before moving to the United States in 1993, he experienced life as an outsider himself."
Now he stars in films directed by Madonna, seen by no-one (FILTH AND WISDOM)... Better chance you'd have seen him in Liev Schreiber's adaptation of literary wunderkind Jonathan Safran Foer's debut "Everything is Illuminated" - he was Elijah Wood's amusing Ukrainian chauffeur Alex...
I've got no problem admitting to liking the manic Muppetism of this tune, but is it cynical to see GB's gypsy-punk as schtick? Maybe I've seen a few too many 'gypset' art-school types looking like dispossessed Roma in Birks at shows lately...
I would have called myself a Decemberists fan once upon a time (was floored by their live show in 2004, shortly after the release of their still-excellent The Tain EP, an 18-minute song cycle based on a Celtic epic — with Sabbath-y touches!), but after another five years of hyperliterate rock-opera bombast and Colin Meloy whinging about scrimshaw, organza and, I dunno, vestibules, I'm kind of done. I don't begrudge them their reasonably successful move to a major, it's just that this stuff has a shelf life...
At his best, Michael Timmins is one of the great unsung songwriters going (see also "Sun Comes Up, It's Tuesday Morning"). Love the cinematics here... love it all, actually.
Welcome back freaky, unsettling Flaming Lips!! Not that I haven't liked your output of recent years, but it was starting to feel like you'd worked all of the LSD out of your system, and twee indie Muzak was all that remained... Viva la relapse!
I don't really get the hate-on for Peter Garrett's voice — just the right mix of menace and indignation for their choons. I'd call him a 'manshee'... And I've always taken a shine to the coda in this song ("In the end the rain comes down...")...
Back to the show: I witnessed beer cans held aloft, 19-year-old boys screaming "WHOOOO!!!!" during some of the more hushed moments, and girls in Uggs swaying as if to Taylor Swift or something... Picture this scene at a Leonard Cohen show. Maybe my gut response was that it was a boorish, improper response to music which I feel should put one into a more introspective frame of mind (like a good short story), but then I was like, who am I to judge how this music clearly makes a good number of people feel? Maybe not an original thought, but one that that perhaps doesn't hit these boards often enough...
Uh... thanks for the insight?
That's a funny image.... yuppie's in their overpriced re-vamped apartments...at it to the sounds of this jibberish.
... a burned CD-R with Thievery Corporation, Afro-Celt Sound System, maybe some John Mayer to mix it up.
To each their own and all, but me and the missus'll stick with "Honky Tonk Women" on repeat...
Tom Jones' cover of this was icky — sounded like he was passing a gallstone. Fine, Prince sounds pained here too, but it takes balls to rock a falsetto for an entire song like this (ironically). Just fun — it's the 'Hey Ya' of the 80s — if you gave it a '1', I can't help you...
By the way, the sample here is, in fact from Lalo Schifrin's score for the American TV series "Mission: Impossible" (1966-73). The track called "Danube Incident" — excellent, moody track — when the sampled bit comes in at the end, it's like WHA?!
(More Wiki goodness: The jangly sample in "Sour Times" is a cimbalom, a form of hammered dulcimer from Central and Eastern Europe.)
You are a douche.
Could it be otherwise?
Say hey to Evan, by the way...
Maybe they read a book. Does every inspiration have to come from drugs?
If the back of the album cover offers any clues, my guess is that their mind-altering hairdos and trousers played a role.
Picked this vinyl up in the summer — it is the bomb.
What amazing world do you you live in where this song is "formulaic"? I think I'd like to go... unless it's Troll-land...
"Combining elements of punk, gypsy music, and Brechtian cabaret, Gogol Bordello tells the story of New York's immigrant diaspora through debauchery, humor, and surreal costumes. Leader and singer Eugene Hütz's taste in music was spun out of black-market tapes of the The Birthday Party and Einstürzende Neubauten in his native Ukraine.
After being evacuated to Western Ukraine in 1986 following the Chornobyl disaster, Hütz became enamored of the mystical, outsider qualities of gypsy music. Living as a refugee in Poland, Hungary, Austria, and Italy before moving to the United States in 1993, he experienced life as an outsider himself."
Now he stars in films directed by Madonna, seen by no-one (FILTH AND WISDOM)...
Better chance you'd have seen him in Liev Schreiber's adaptation of literary wunderkind Jonathan Safran Foer's debut "Everything is Illuminated" - he was Elijah Wood's amusing Ukrainian chauffeur Alex...
I've got no problem admitting to liking the manic Muppetism of this tune, but is it cynical to see GB's gypsy-punk as schtick? Maybe I've seen a few too many 'gypset' art-school types looking like dispossessed Roma in Birks at shows lately...
I don't begrudge them their reasonably successful move to a major, it's just that this stuff has a shelf life...
Viva la relapse!
And I've always taken a shine to the coda in this song ("In the end the rain comes down...")...