Beirut - The Gulag Orkestar - general
Original Release date: 9 May, 2006
Label: Ba Da Bing Records (Northern America), 4AD
Original Release's track list:
1. The Gulag Orkestar
2. Prenzlauerberg
3. Brandenburg
4. Postcards from Italy
5. Mount Wroclai
6. Rhineland
7. Scenic World
8. Bratislava
9. The Bunker
10. The Canals of our City
11. After the Curtain
Other releases: Personally, I found another version of this CD in town which included the Gon Island EP, released seperately in January 2007 (songs include "Elephant Gun", "My Family's Role is in the World Revolution", "Scenic World", "The Long Island Sound" and "Carousels"). Definitely worth getting your hands on if you can
Beirut - The Gulag Orkestar - review
Despite what some of the reviews published out there since the release of Beirut's first effort, led by 19 year old singer and multi-instrumentalist Zach Condon, may want to have you think, "The Gulag Orkestar" is not Balkan folk music (nor is it roma/gypsy music for that matter, but it is as diverse as the land these people have traveled is vast). What can be said of it is that obviously, the people behind this recording have been inspired by it, which is particularly obvious in the use of brass and in the rhythms. But it's also continuously played in slow or mid-tempo, and Condon's voice can only be described as melancholic. Never does it explore the baroque and exhilirating sonor debauchery that's a trademark of this corner of the world. Like someone else put it once, balkanic music alternates in an often quite mad swirl wedding and funeral, and on this album, "there's just too much funeral, and not enough wedding". If you truly want to listen to a good introduction to southeastern music, but still accessible enough, try Goran Bregovic's work, in particular the "Time of the Gypsy/Kuduz" soundtrack
However, having said that, I certainly don't concur either with those who have "accused" Condon, Jeremy Barnes (Neutral Milk Hotel) and Heather Trost (A Hawk and a Hacksaw) of proposing a transvestite of Balkan folk music. If anything, Condon has, from the start, very candidly revealed that he had discovered this music in Western Europe, in Paris, even, if I am not mistaken. I think the GO should be considered more of an homage paid by a young man who's fallen in love with it, rather than as an attempt at mimicking it. And it is probably just as well
There. Now that it's out of the way, I can spend more time on what really matter: the fact that it's a darn good record. As I've already mentioned above, Zach Condon has a crooning voice tainted with melancholy, but also with nostalgia, which is quite surprising in someone so young, but very fitting for songs that, ultimately, all convey this sense of being in front of someone who is narrating his wonderful travels in distant countries, absentmindedly looking in the distance, remembering the shadows of the forests and the clear laugh of the rivers and the warm welcomes of the people, regretting that he had to leave them behind, probably forever, with his memories as only consolation
This feeling is reinforced by the music. It may be mostly the brainchild of a young man, but it sounds like it's played by an orchestar that's been touring together for years, giving off a sense of spontaneity, as if they were comfortable with each other to the point that they can improvise through most of their gigs, yet muster the same enthusiasm they had when they begun all these years ago. Probably a band that our storyteller has met during his journey, their music having become the soundtrack to his memories. A soundtrack that sometimes drowns his own voice, but that's so he can better focus on all the sensations he remembers
Everyting begins with "The Gulag Orkestar", a great opener with the trumpet and the piano dominating the first instants, before the brass and percussions take over for a slow march, immediately setting the landscape. The tempo accelerates throughout the next songs, reaching a climax with Postcards From Italy, with the ukelele temporary taking the lead before the accordion takes its place in Mount Wroclai. Perhaps surprising will be the electronic touch of Scenic World, which should sound completely out of place yet doesn't, but which however plays as an out-of-this-world interlude, a brief reverie, before we are taking back to the ground with the more earthy rhythms of Bratislava, where the orchestar is sending us on our merry way for the remanent of the journey
Certainly, with "The Gulag Orkestar", Beirut is looking back rather than trying to invent a future. Unless it is precisely in those sounds heirs of traditions dating back hundreds of years that lies a part of it. At any rate, what I am most thankful to them for sharing that journey with me, even if it was through a somewhat fantasized world - it was no less beautiful and touching
Final mark: 8.5/10
Review by Sandrine, published April 14, 2007
Beirut - The Gulag Orkestar - Links
Beirut Official Site
Beirut's MySpace
Beirut news @ Ba Da Bing Records
Beirut @ wikipedia
Review @ Prefix mag
Beirut - The Gulag Orkestar - regular edition