17 HIPPIES
El Dorado
BUDA 860179
World Music
3341348601793
Buda
Germania
EL DORADO – the new 17 HIPPIES CD marks the band’s call back at home for 2009. What a tireless bunch of 13 musicians from Berlin! Their previous CD HEIMLICH caused an international sensation, leading to several tours both in America and England.
Taking a look at their tour schedules one might ask oneself rather enviously: where on earth will they not be touring to. The press raves them as “first rate globalists”, “the only true German ambassadors”, “the new Berlin Style” mainly relating to their very special 17 Hippies sound, which ever so lively and totally with ease manages to walk across the bridge to the unusual.
Taking no detours the 17 HIPPIES follow their path and there is absolutely no way they will be side-tracked from searching for that special something they might have found already. Their eyes light up with true passion when they do what they love doing so much: catching the metropolitan rhythm of Berlin to create new songs, over and over again. This is EL DORADO – the place, where everybody is drawn to by the promise of pure fortune. EL DORADO is their third studio album from altogether nine German 17 Hippies CDs in total. This new album demonstrates perfectly how a band matures over time. Having played together for 14 years with 1500 concerts
spread over 20 countries this fixed line-up of 13 musicians has found its very unique style. Whether influenced by Balkan music, American rock, British pop or even film music – nevertheless, their own compositions and sophisticated arrangements enter a new realm, where the sum of what they do is more than the explicable components. Always lead by energy and razor-sharp interplay, it still – as they say – "boils down to plain dance music!” Regardless of age or nationality, everybody around the world seems to get it, as proven by the international success of this “Rock-the-world-Orchestra”.
# 1 Uz – well, who would have guessed it: Take a bit of Hessian accent and Turkish rhythm and the hot result is a Cajun-Scat-Speed-Piece! «Hep hep mem Giggel ibbän Zou!»
# 2 Adieu – a most intimate farewell song in German coupled with airy beats. Pain finds its way into unspeakable depth when accompanied these lyrics.
# 3 Welcome to my world – a dense sound of guitar, violin, banjo and one maniacal Cajun-accordion ... a truly wonderful Hippification of a pop song with English lyrics. – “I’m gonna go and you bet I’ll be gone with a smile ... You can’t stop me ...“
# 4 La Zona Drom – Eastern Europe meets Bollywood. It swings and rocks to a 9/8 beat using a Turkish base to paint a picture of Royal Elephants treading carefully across at the Bosporus.
# 5 Atchafalaya – guitars, wind and string instruments add the Mexican spice to this song, consciously and a bit like a hit singing of sleepless nights at the river Atchafalaya.
# 6 Arcanul - Moldavian purgatory, using all instrumental fire lighters there are!
# 7 Solitaire – a forceful yet epic song in French, catching the loneliness of one woman, who impatiently awaits her Lover to come home from the war.
# 8 Stern am Ende der Welt (the star at the end of the world) – an ardent good mood in a grey courtyard of Berlin. “Looking at your room – you see vastness! Now you start lifting the anchor ...“
# 9 Six green bottles – mix a traditional Rumanian folk song with an English lullaby and your village celebration will have a kick start … and it won’t finish before the last glass has being emptied.
# 10 El Dorado – a rumba filled with swing and ease, promising pure fortune: «Mon El Dorado, symphonie d'un going better. Mon El Dorado, symphonie d'un going fine.»
# 11 Kaukapol – reaching the end of the world Rumania meets the acoustic sound of Kraut-Rock. Two tunes, two
worlds – never more apart, but unnoticed they flow into one, thus something new emerges, with its own special groove.
# 12 Bound for morning – a melancholic English ballad in its purest form. Delusional love at the bus stop is poignantly accompanied by the cello.
17 HIPPIES from Felmay Shop