Poptarticus

Shannon’s Super Sexy Blog. Music. Travel. Randomness. And a Lot of Wine.

Insane from the Ukraine

OK, I admit it. Until last night I was hopelessly out of the loop. Who knew the craziest punk rockers come from the friggin’ Ukraine? And here, all along, I wanted to name my blog Ukrainian Poptart. Was that the reason, all along?

Whatever. I’m still trying to get my mind around Gogol Bordello’s short set of insanity last night. I didn’t think any show could match the inspired abandon of David Byrne with the Extra-Action Marching band, but I was wrong. In the forty-five minutes or whatever that they were on stage, I don’t think my jaw once retracted into it’s normal position. Frontman Eugene Hutz came out wearing some kind of belly dancing skirt over knee-length pants and proceeded to whip the audience into complete pogo stick frenzy. He was Iggy-Popping out. He was everything Vincent Gallo wishes he could be. There was also a sinister looking fifty something violin player and two screaming asian looking chicks who danced around, got tossed around, and at one point played WASHBOARDS. There were PUNK ROCK ACCORDIAN SOLOS. Are you getting it yet?

I really can’t explain – it was just total controlled chaos, with the singer climbing on some yuppifieds back and using him to ride around the floor, spewing sweat and who knows what else all over us. It was really, really fun.

I found a video. Check it out.

They were a pretty hard act to follow. Tegan and Sara? If Scarlett Johansson put on a brown, 70’s shag wig, got a boob reduction, and starting singing, that would be Tegan and Sara. Great for teenage chicks and horny middle-aged men, but not my cup of tea.

Cake were a lot of fun though. They came on late to a packed club full of people who were, well, totally into Cake. In fact I was pretty shocked at the very loyal following Cake has in San Diego, because I’ve been to a couple of shows elsewhere and I don’t remember the audience knowing the words to every single song. There was one very humorous moment where John McCrea had the women and men battling to see who could scream “No phone, no phone” the loudest (the women won. San Diego dudes are pussies.) And the noisemaker will never die.

Leave a Reply