Pop Matters,
Best World Music of 2009
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12
Balkan party music, ripping along at a noisy pace, and with all the showmanship you could ask for. The singer carols and plunges, the trumpets patter like hail on a plastic roof. Everything is briskly aggressive, bright as polished teeth: the taut, tight work of specialists. Forensic in its giddiness. One part of the band comes from north-east Romania, the same place as Fanfare Ciocârlia, and the other from the south, the same place as Taraf de Haïdouks. Brass there, fiddles here. The two groups have cross-pollinated. Traditional music, yes, village music, yes, “folk” music yes, but with a clear commercial goal: it wants to grab your bits in its fist, press your ears back against your skull, and make you pay attention. Reportedly good live too. 12/10/09
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