Consumer Guide Album

Balkan Beat Box: Nu Med [JDub, 2007]
More Balkan, less beat box, very Brooklyn, ex-Israeli masterminds Tamir Muskat and Ori Kaplan dispense with the yé-yé girls and give their touring band some on a truly pomo Gypsy brass record--asses freed in a corkscrew kind of way, minds likewise. Couldn't tell you where or whether they stole Kaplan's fetching tenor line on"BBBeat" or Uri Kinrot's fetching guitar line on "Habibi MinZaman." But they sound like looted treasure that will soon help the guys wire much-needed cash to the old country from a newer, happier home. In this fifth year of our imperial horror show, anybody who can lay such a benign aura on a province of America, even rebel Brooklyn, should get a Congressional Order of Merit. Unable to suss what MC Tomer Yosef believes "intelligence be tellin' gents," I hope we get to find out. A