Gogol Bordello

All Music Guide:

Combining elements of punk, Gypsy music, and Brecht-ian cabaret, Gogol Bordello tell 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 Birthday Party and Einstürzande Neubauten in his native Ukraine. After being evacuated to western Ukraine in 1986 following the Chernobyl 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. After arriving in New York, he teamed up with guitarist Vlad Solofar and squeezebox player Sasha Kazatchkoff. American Eliot Fergusen added a strong rock sound on the drums and the band was also augmented by Sergey Rjabtzev on fiddle, a former theater director from Moscow whose past experience would prove helpful in the future in crafting Gogol Bordello's bizarre stage shows (like one that tells the story of super-powered immigrant Ukrainian vampires).

The group's early gigs involved playing straight Gypsy music at Russian weddings, but their music soon evolved into the hyper-kinetic explosions that earned them a solid following among New York's downtown hipsters. The band issued a single in 1999 entitled When the Trickster Comes A-Pokin', quickly followed by their debut full-length, Voi-La Intruder, which was produced by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds drummer Jim Sclavunos. Solofar and Kazatchkoff were replaced by accordionist Yuri Lemeshev, who hails from the Russian island of Sakhalin, and two Israelis, guitarist Oren Kaplan and saxophonist Ori Kaplan, who despite their similar names aren't related. Hütz helped bolster the band's popularity by becoming somewhat of a celebrity in the downtown scene, in part fueled by his Thursday night DJ gigs at Bulgarian club/restaurant/bar Mehanata, where he played Ukrainian, Gypsy, rai, and flamenco music for a crowd of artists, models, Ukrainians, Russians, Gypsies, and Bulgarians with tendencies toward exuberant dancing and smashing plates.

In the spring of 2002, Gogol Bordello embarked on a European tour and performed as part of the Whitney Biennial, bringing their music to a whole new audience. Voi-La Intruder came out around that same time, followed that fall by another album, Multi Kontra Culti vs. Irony. The East Infection EP came out in March 2005 before Gogol Bordello made their Side One Dummy debut that August with the aptly titled Gypsy Punks. By this point, though the band's cast no longer included Ori Kaplan, it did boast bassist Rea Mochiach and dancers/percussionists Pam Racine and Elizabeth Sun. Aside from leading the band, Hütz also lent his hand to acting when he was cast as Alex in 2005's Everything Is Illuminated (based on the critically acclaimed book) after Gogol Bordello attracted the attention of the film's producer. The bandmembers soon got to work on their next album, however, switching to bass player Tommy Gobena and utilizing the talents of producer Victor Van Vugt to help them craft their fourth full-length, Super Taranta! Wildly praised by critics, who pasted the album all over their year-end lists, Super Taranta! (as well as the band's increasingly physical live shows) made them indie rock heroes. Live from Axis Mundi was released in 2009, followed by the group's Rick Rubin-produced fifth studio offering, Transcontinental Hustle in 2010.

Wikipedia:

Gogol Bordello is a Gypsy punk band from the Lower East Side of Manhattan, formed in 1999 and known for theatrical stage shows and persistent touring.

Much of the band's sound is inspired by Gypsy music. The band incorporates minor-key accordion and violin (and on some albums, saxophone) mixed with punk and dub.

The band has appeared in a number of independent films, most notably in 2005's Everything Is Illuminated in which the lead singer, Eugene Hütz, co-starred with Elijah Wood in a dramedy and adventure story about the Nazi purges in Ukraine. The entire group was present for one shot in which they played a brass band in a set that included the Star Spangled Banner. They also played the traditional Yiddish tune Bublitschki (little bagels). Gogol Bordello contributed the song "Start Wearing Purple" to the film's score.

The band also has their own documentary called "Gogol Bordello Non-Stop". This documentary was filmed in 2008 and follows the band's progress. It is currently available for streaming on Netflix.

History and influences

"Gogol" comes from the name Nikolai Gogol. As one of the most influential writers in Ukrainian and Russian literature, Gogol paved the way for the likes of Kafka and Dostoyevsky. He also serves as an ideological influence for the band because he "smuggled" Ukrainian culture into Russian society, which Gogol Bordello intends to do with Gypsy/ East-European music in the English-speaking world. "Bordello", in Italian, refers to a brothel or a "gentleman's club". The band was originally titled Hütz and the Béla Bartóks, but Eugene Hütz says that they decided to change the name because "nobody knows who the hell Béla Bartók is in the United States". The band played their first show as the unofficial band at an after-hours club called Pizdetz where they became the house band and DJ Hütz became the house DJ.

Gogol Bordello's first single was released in 1999, and since then they have released five full-length albums, and one EP. In 2005 the band signed to punk label SideOneDummy Records. On 27 April 2010 Gogol Bordello made its major record label debut with Transcontinental Hustle on Rick Rubin's American Recordings, a subsidiary of Columbia Records/Sony Music Entertainment. Many of the songs on Transcontinental Hustle were inspired by Hütz's move to Brazil. .

The band has toured tirelessly throughout Europe and America. They have made appearances at numerous international festivals and toured with such diverse bands as Primus, Flogging Molly, and Cake. In an interview with NPR, frontman Eugene Hütz cites Jimi Hendrix and Parliament-Funkadelic as among the band's main musical influences. They have mentioned Manu Chao, Fugazi, Zvuki Mu, Karamelo Santo, Sasha Kolpakov and The Clash as influences as well.

In August 2010 the band was rumored to participate in the Ukrainian national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2011, but the band soon denied this. Gogol Bordello performed seven shows with System of a Down throughout May 2011

They performed live at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts festival 2011 for Bonnaroo's 10 year anniversary, playing a 1.5 hour set in the middle of the night and performed with Devotchka.

Appearances

Television

The song "60 Revolutions" was featured on season 2 episode 12, "Trapdoor" of the US TV drama Life.

Music festivals

Gogol Bordello has appeared in a multitude of American and international music festivals. A significant step towards greater publicity was made when Eugene Hütz and violinist Sergey Ryabtsev joined Madonna on stage. Hütz and Ryabtsev performed "La Isla Bonita / Lela Pala Tute" with Madonna at the London Live Earth concert on July 7, 2007.

Gogol Bordello's appearances have included:

Filmography

Line-up

Current members

Former members