Balkan Beat Box June 5, 2007

8 - 1
£10 adv, £12
LIVE: BALKAN BEAT BOX + MISS PLATNUM
djs: GYPSY SOUNDSYSTEM + RUSS JONES

Brooklyn-based BALKAN BEAT BOX finally return to London in a rare UK performance to promote their new album ‘Nu Med’. With a background firmly based around the so-called ‘Gypsy-Rock’ movement, their scope is aiming well beyond that: BALKAN BEAT BOX transcend categories by breeding their Mediterranean roots with modern electronic beats and ragga/hip-hop elements. Balkan Beat Box are the misleadingly titled duo of Tamir Muskat (ex-Gogol Bordello) and Ori Kaplan (Firewater, Shot’Nez), two Israeli born musicians currently based in Brooklyn. Both Ori and Tamir grew up appreciating an eclectic blend of musics in Israel – Kaplan learnt classical and klezmer clarinet at an early age and listened to Egyptian pop, Russian and Moroccan music on the radio. As an adolescent he became fascinated with jazz, rock and industrial music. Muskat also grew up in a musical family and became a drummer in punk rock bands. Both would shift to the US as their musical ambitions lay beyond Israel’s relatively provincial pop-trance-rap scene.

Official Website: http://www.cargo-london.com/event.php?id=864