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Beirut - March of the Zapotec & Realpeople: Holland
| Rollingstones |
| The globetrotting adventures of Beirut — a.k.a. Zach Condon, indie-gypsy wunderkind — are becoming harder to keep straight. Condon's new EP is a two-part affair: March of the Zapotec features mostly Balkan brass-band-style tunes recorded in Oaxaca, Mexico, with a 19-piece local band; the second part, Holland, is five synthy songlets that were laid down in Condon's Brooklyn bedroom (not the Netherlands). Together they highlight his strengths (ace horn arrangements) and, especially, shortcomings: a fatal love of swooning vocal chorales and a disinterest in writing actual songs. The effect is all mood, no meaning — a blurry view from a tourist's bus as it zips past a landscape, on the way to the next "exotic" stop....full text |
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| Thephoenix |
| Willed into existence when the commercial needs of the mid-20th-century record industry required something in the intermediate price point between a single and a then-pricy album, the lowly EP has developed into the musical equivalent of the novella. The precocious Zach Condon here takes advantage of the medium's invitation to stretch and experiment with a pair of EPs, one credited to his main project, Beirut, the other to his nom-de-bedroom knob twiddler, realpeople. A canny British reviewer likened Condon to a Wes Anderson character leading an endless exploration of other cultures and times (previous Beirut projects concerned Gypsies and 1920s bohemians) in a vain attempt to escape the barren white suburb of the mind. Zapotecs is another such foray into exotica; this time the destination is an imaginary Mexico populated by funeral-marching bands and indigenous individuals who seem to be into Nino Rota. Holland's synth-pop, on the other hand, is Condon's thinly veiled homage to another overachieving man of many concepts, Stephin Merritt. Like the most artistically successful EPs (Magical Mystery Tour, the Who's surf-rockers, the Beta Band's glory-days output), these do the job without overstaying their welcomes....full text |
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| Dustedmagazine |
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Zach Condon is one of those people who draw a lot of inspiration from the places they visit. His much-adored debut Gulag Orkestar was ostensibly an homage to Balkan folk music (although it also reflected other European orchestral and big band influences). His second full-length, The Flying Club Cup, was his western Europe album, a gloss on the catalogs of Jacques Brel or Charles Aznavour. After he released The Flying Club Cup, Condon announced that he was taking a break from Beirut, citing difficulties from his constant touring schedule. Now, just a year later, Beirut is back and apparently refreshed. Condon’s released a new EP of Beirut material and an EP of songs from Realpeople, the synthpop band that, before Beirut, was Condon’s primary outlet. March of the Zapotec bills itself as “new recordings from the state of Oaxaca,” and the album was inspired by a trip that Condon and some friends took to the town of Teotitlan del Valle, just outside of Oaxaca. The EP contains one field recording of a band playing in El Zocolo Plaza, and a local ground called Band Jimenez makes a contribution on several tracks. Condon wrote the songs, inspired by what he heard in Oaxaca, and recorded them either in Teotitlan del Valle or back home in Brooklyn...full text |
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