Gimme one word.

One word is all i need after listening to Brooklyn musician Zach Bondon, alias Beirut.

Dreamy. The stuff is just plain dreamy.

Checking out the song “Postcards From Italy”, a lone ukelele commences the number. The tone is sweet and already it’s taking me somewhere. And once Bondon starts in with the singing, you’re all wrapped up in a silky croon cocoon that brings to mind NY native Julian Casablancas, or perhaps Morrissey Whatever you prefer, his voice reverberates with a conviction the likes of which is rarely seen in contemporary music.

Cue the drums. Cue the bass. Hell, cue a few more instruments. Beirut’s instrumental range is a broad one, with mandolins, horns, keyboards and even a glockenspiel if you’re in the market for one. The real kicker is Bondon plays almost all of his instruments, with the help of fellow indie darlings from Neutral Milk Hotel and Hawk And a Hacksaw. Everything swells up without any individual instrument taking a dominant forefront, and the result is an enormous cloud of harmony and rythm that you take in deep and don’t let go of.

There’s another little number you can check out on Beirut’s myspace titled “Mount Wroclai”. This was the song that got me fully absorbed.

A beautifully somber accordion plays underneath Bondon’s moody dirge of a vocal, a seemingly solitary sound until a haze of vocal harmonies descends on the whole bit, and the time and place it evokes is spectacular. You’re standing on the street corner of a cobblestone road in Russia circa the 1930’s, a woman is out on her balcony beating a rug and singing loudly to herself. Stray dogs wander about the legs of men peddling their produce from fruit carts, and the weight of poverty hangs on your shoulders like a tattered coat. This song is the closest most I think I’m ever gonna get to the “Old Country” you hear the old guy in the park talk about.

What’s really great about all this, is that Zach Bondon is only nineteen. To not know that before you hear his voice, you’d never guess it. So deep and rich, so world-weary, it sounds like the beat-up suitcase that came over with him on the boat to Staten Island and spent a few decades in the attic gathering dust. And yet, there’s so many more facets to it. beyond the weathered soulful experience lies this sheen of perserverence. The kind that any human soul is capable of in the throes of a complete economic instability.

So all in all, it’s a sound so bittersweet you can taste it. And it tastes like vodka and potatoes. Bondon’s spectacular croon coupled with a symbiotic instrumental shmorgasbord of strings, horns and percussion makes for an enriching, envigorating experience. All that and the fact that this kid has reached musical levels that some musicians never experience in a lifetimes’ work, and you have got one seriously promising act on your hands.

Dreamy.

3 Responses to “Beirut: Get ya croon on”

1. Navid Says:
   June 27th, 2006 at 10:38 pm

   I loved it.

2. Chris Says:
   June 27th, 2006 at 10:41 pm

   Wow…that’s the first time in a while I actually blocked out all the distractions and was completely absorbed in your words. Beautifully written!

3. Chris O Says:
   June 28th, 2006 at 9:12 pm

   Hella good article. I couldn’t stop till the end and I have ADD.

Give the Author Some Feedback!