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Average: 4.0 (60 ratings)




- Date Released: May 15, 2007
- Genre: International
- Style: World Fusion
- Label: JDub Records / The Orchard
Balkan music: it ain’t just for horns anymore.
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We Say...
Drummer Tamir Muskat and hornman Ori Kaplan are charter members of the multi-ethnic New York-based Gypsy revival that's been brought to our attention by the reprobates in Gogol Bordello. But where their pal Eugene Hutz slavers over his role as Gogol frontman, playing the Mad Slav, the better to whip devotees into a drunken punk froth, the co-founders of Balkan Beat Box are one-world groovers, intent on mapping the musical crossroads between Eastern Europe, the Middle East and the United States. As on their 2005 debut, they recreate the distinctively pinched horn sound and microtonal brass blasts that define Gypsy music. The beats, whether generated by human or machine, add old world funk to new world tech, and MC Tomer Yosef brings the ruckus. On Nu-Med, Balkan Beat Box, they expand the range of musicians they work with even further — on the sinuous "Habibi Min Zaman," Syrian singer Dunia raps in Arabic; on "BBBeat" Israeli-born Macedonian clarinetist Ismail Lumanovski weaves nimbly through his hosts' horn charts, and on "Pachima," Moroccan fashion designer Gilber Gilmore sings a song from childhood. Having already honed a distinct sound themselves, Balkan Beat Box now offer that sound as a platform from which their pan-global slate of guests can make themselves heard.
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They Say...
Their name suggests a troupe of plugged-in Gypsies, and Balkan Beat Box is that, for starters. Lob on overdoses of klezmer and hip-hop, funk and dub, brass band and Arabic elements, and you'll be closer to getting it. Formed around two Israeli-born musicians,Tamir Muskat, who pounds the drums and takes care of the programming, and saxman Ori Kaplan, Balkan Beat Box is a veritable melting pot of disparate sounds and seemingly contrary influences, all scrunched together seamlessly and disguised as an exhausting riot. It's not that others haven't attempted the sort of mix that BBB does on this sophomore effort, it's that none have been so successful at pulling it off. On tracks like "Digital Monkey," with its dancehall-style toasting atop bottom-heavy techno and snaky brass, and "Joro Boro," with its surfy guitar, stark, industrial rhythm and mesmeric guest vocal from Dessislava Stefanova of the London Bulgarian Choir, it's one surprise after another here. Calling it world music wouldn't do it justice, it's more like out of this world music.
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You Say...
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Credits
- Ben Holmes - Trumpet // Ben Holmes - Flugelhorn // Wes Kidd - Management // Itamar Ziegler - Bass // Itamar Ziegler - Guitar // Itamar Ziegler - Percussion // Itamar Ziegler - Producer // Itamar Ziegler - Group Member // Ori Kaplan - Saxophone // Ori Kaplan - Producer // Ori Kaplan - Woodwind // Ori Kaplan - Group Member // Ron Caswell - Tuba // Tamir Muskat - Percussion // Tamir Muskat - Drums // Tamir Muskat - Programming // Tamir Muskat - Producer // Tamir Muskat - Engineer // Tamir Muskat - Mixing // Tamir Muskat - Group Member // Danny Shatzky - Mixing // Dana Leong - Trombone // Dana Leong - Trumpet // Dessislava Stefanova - Vocals // Dessislava Stefanova - Guest Appearance // Jeremiah Lockwood - Guitar // Peter Hess - Saxophone // Aaron Bisman - Photography // Uri Brauner Kinrot - Guitar // Uri Brauner Kinrot - Producer // Uri Brauner Kinrot - Group Member
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