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Concert Preview
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Time Out Chicago, Concert Preview >>
While New York's Eastern European folk-punk scene has been percolating for a couple of years now, it seems unnatural to call it a trend. This is joyous party music of the oldest sort, with each generation putting its own individual stamp on it as it's passed down. Why is it popular again? It's so infectious, the real question is, Why hasn't it always been?
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Of the two groups tonight, Balkan Beat Box has a more Middle Eastern feel fitting, since New York transplants Ori Kaplan and Tamir Muskat are both Israeli-born. The pair employs a rotating cast of guests to flesh out its tapestry of klezmer clarinet, Moorish rhythms and barked hip-hop rhymes. But it's the Eastern-inflected women's vocals that are the best part of its self-titled disc, shuttling you straight to an Istanbul nightclub, all lush silk and gyrating midriffs. Still, it'll be hard to follow ragtag klezmer troupe Golem, whose new Fresh Off Boat goes an even more traditional route. Each track is a rare folk song that singer Annette Ezekiel scouted from Lower East Side immigrants but wry English comments tucked between Yiddish lines (My sister, she's a streetwalker, fellow vocalist Aaron Diskin woefully sings, And my little brother, well, he picks the pockets of hipsters on the L train) keep it distinctly modern. Last year Golem even staged a giant mock Jewish wedding complete with bride and groom in drag. While that's not on the agenda this evening, there's sure to be walletless hipsters at the Bottle whipped into a hora-induced frenzy.
Antonia Simigis 09/07/06 >> go there
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