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THERE ARE
GYPSIES IN OUR TOWN! Punks, accents and debauchery with Gogol Bordello
Photo by Andrew Hoxey
International entertainers: The members of Gogol Bordello, who played Liberty Hall on Oct. 24, come from all over the world, and this reflects their mixing of cultures.
// JAKE LERMAN
Punks, accents and debauchery with Gogol Bordello
For more photos from the show, check out this story at Kansan.com/jayplay.
MEMBERS OF GOGOL BORDELLO:
Liberty Hall is pulsing, and you can hear it from the street. The storefronts across Massachusetts St. echo a two-step thump that feels as foreign to our mid-American town as saltwater. Heat radiates from the doors and windows of the venue. The air inside is thick and tough to swallow, heavy with bass-ridden sound waves that shiver down the ribcage. Gogol Bordello are in town and it's way too hot to be October.
The New-York-bred nine-piece "gypsy-punk" outfit boasts a stage show that is as eclectic as it is overpowering. Assembled from a motley crew of immigrants from all over the world, Gogol Bordello are a force to be reckoned with and the crowd knows it.
The band's charismatic front man, Eugene Hürtz, emerges from backstage with a bottle of wine in his hand. Shouting wildly at the crowd from behind his legendary mustache, the masses roar back as the music erupts. The whole venue is transformed into what feels like something between a Technicolor revolution and a punk show in a Russian sauna. Within minutes the front ranks of the crowd are shrouded in a cloud of pot smoke and slick with a layer of liquor. The show goes on and Hürtz's bottle loses wine while his back loses its clothes.
Though there's likely not one full Eastern-European person in the audience, on this night, everyone sings with a Ukrainian tongue. When Pedro Erazo, the group's lone Ecuadorian member, leaps out from behind his conga drums to let loose a blazing rap, it brings the show a whole new dimension. This band isn't simply old-world music come to the heartland; it's an international experience that pulls its influence from all corners of the globe.
Despite the unbridled energy of the band, the night is best summed up in the group's most intimate song, "Alcohol," a stumbling love letter to the band's beloved beverage that seems as though it just hiccupped it's way out of Hütz's wine bottle. His wine-soaked vocal chords waver through the song and are nearly overtaken by the enthusiasm of the certainly inebriated crowd, who echo the downtempo chorus, "And you know that I'll pick up; every time you call; just to thank you one more time ... alcohol."
The rare lull in the set lends perspective and the crowd solidifies, reflecting the tone of one of Hütz's many drunken sermonettes as he bellows,
"You must educate your neighbor if we're ever going to get anywhere!" A feeling of patchwork unity floods over the crowd, as if tonight — regardless of our homeland — we're all misfits and that's what binds us. The moment of tranquility only stokes the flames, and with Yuri Lemeshev's accordian taking a long inhale, the band launches back into song and the audience responds with renewed zeal.
After a three-song encore, with the audience in a state of jelly-legged bliss. Hütz, in typical punk fashion, empties the dregs of his bottle into a bucket, adds the microphone for good measure, and spikes the whole concoction to the ground before shouting, "Now let's go get drunk at The Bottleneck!"
As the crowd thunders a fanatical send off, the band rambles off stage. House lights rise and everyone shuffles out the door with mixed grins of exhaustion and satisfaction gracing their lips. For those enduring souls who still have life left in their bones, the shouts of one eager fan say it all ... "After party!"
Photo by Andrew Hoxev
Thunderding crowd. The huddled masses at Gocal Bordello's Oct. 24 show at Liberty Hall banded together in song — singing along with frontman Eugene Hitz.
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