PragueBuzz!

On the way to work on the metro, I saw a short article about Gipsy.cz. Not able to understand almost anything but I was able to catch the words “dnes” meaning “today” and “Lucerna Musicu Baru.” By the time I was at work, I’d already received an email and an SMS invitation to the concert.

For a long time, I’ve had this inexplicable obsession with Romani culture, especially their music. Perhaps, their existence and their history are still something to be discovered and understood for me. Whenever I visited an European country which had any link to the Romany, I always asked the locals to take me to a gypsy neighborhood or to introduce me to some gypsy they knew. Most of them did not take my interest seriously. They usually pointed out to some dirty dressed, dark skinned people selling stuffs or doing weird things on the streets. It was only in Croatia that a friend pointed out an error of my search: “C., the gypsy you are looking for are the artists, the entertainers. They are not here. These gypsy you see here only steal and do nothing.” So then where are these gypsy artists? They have to be Europe somewhere, mixed together with other stealing and begging gypsies. It’s not like they have a community of just entertaining gypsies of their own.

But anyway, my enthusiasm for looking for gypsy waned. I stopped looking for gypsy all at once. Want proof? I’ve lived in Czech for almost a year, and I had no photos of any gypsy. I heard many time about Karlin’s gypsy ghettos, but did I bother to go there? No!

Concert
So, I was really excited looking forward to this concert, the first concert since living here. The ticket was only 120 CZK compared to tickets to concerts of other Czech popular singers and bands and other who come from the US. Lucerna Music Bar’s small size with less than 200-people capacity was excellent for taking photos and seeing the artists’ up close.

I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of their music: vocal, instrumental and melodic elements. Their overall music style could be summed up as rap, hip-hop, pop and gipsy tunes cleverly blended to produce addicting and seducing melodies. The main singer’ Eminem-like rap, jokes (which I did not understand), sound-mimicking with only his voice, charisma and pure talents brought down the house.

Eurovision
And, of course it’s all about Eurovision. Gipsy.cz was the 2nd runner-up, after the more popular rock band Kabat in the Czech Eurovision’s qualification. Kabat’s pure Western rock style didn’t fare well in a heavily pop-themed Eurovision. Gipsy.cz had many Eurovision’s elements: pop/hip-hop, funny, unique and could have gone far.

But on the other hand, they might find themselves in last place like their countrymen Kabat due to European’s general disdain toward gypsies, thus not giving them any vote.

Songs