Thursday, August 11, 2011
interview with Beirut
Beirut
by Jessica Suarez, posted August 21, 2006
Zach Condon, the 20-year-old singer/songwriter behind Balkan pop orchestra Beirut, played his first two sold-out New York shows this summer. In the two months between those two performaces, Condon hasn't really grown into his powerful, plaintive voice-- all back vowels and Morrissey-like histrionics. Rather, he's gathered a 10-piece band that can support him, because it takes a full string and brass section to tether down his sighing, somersaulting vocals.
Condon wrote his debut album, Gulag Orkestar, mostly alone in his bedroom in Santa Fe, somehow capturing the sounds and textures of Eastern Europe after spending just few months overseas. Here he talks about that trip to Europe, the process he used to recreate a Balkan orchestra, and his improving live shows.
Pitchfork: Was growing up in Santa Fe boring?
Zach Condon: I'm sure that's every adolescent's complaint about their home town. When a city is unstimulating, you get pretty isolated. That's probably why I did what I did.
Beirut
Biography
The EPs and the albums by Beirut are largely the work of Zach Condon, a young Santa Fe, New Mexico native.
Condon has recorded before: when he was fifteen and under the name of Realpeople, he made an electronic record, fashioned after his love for The Magnetic Fields. Condon was a straight-A student until he dropped out at the age of 16 to travel Europe in a drunken haze, cavorting and partying with the locals wherever he ended up. It was during one of these evenings that he was first exposed to Balkan music (notably including the Boban Marković Orkestar and Goran Bregović), blasting from the upstairs apartment. Condon ended up with the Serbian artists all night, going through albums country by country, note for note.
The first album under the Beirut moniker, Gulag Orkestar (2006), was the direct result of what he learned that night. While it may sound like an entire Balkan orchestra playing modern songs as mournful ballads and upbeat marches, the album was performed and recorded almost entirely by Condon alone. He did so on Pro Tools while skipping school in Albuquerque and at Sea Side Studios in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Jeremy Barnes added percussion and some violin overlays.
After recording, Condon formed a full band which at times varies in the number of members, from six to ten. Live he is accompanied by Perrin Cloutier (cello/accordion), Jason Poranski (guitar/mandolin/ukulele), Nick Petree (drums), Kristin Ferebee (violin), Paul Collins (organ/keys/tambourine/ukulele), Jon Natchez (baritone sax/mandolin/glockenspiel), and Kelly Pratt (trumpet/euphonium).
Condon has recorded before: when he was fifteen and under the name of Realpeople, he made an electronic record, fashioned after his love for The Magnetic Fields. Condon was a straight-A student until he dropped out at the age of 16 to travel Europe in a drunken haze, cavorting and partying with the locals wherever he ended up. It was during one of these evenings that he was first exposed to Balkan music (notably including the Boban Marković Orkestar and Goran Bregović), blasting from the upstairs apartment. Condon ended up with the Serbian artists all night, going through albums country by country, note for note.
The first album under the Beirut moniker, Gulag Orkestar (2006), was the direct result of what he learned that night. While it may sound like an entire Balkan orchestra playing modern songs as mournful ballads and upbeat marches, the album was performed and recorded almost entirely by Condon alone. He did so on Pro Tools while skipping school in Albuquerque and at Sea Side Studios in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Jeremy Barnes added percussion and some violin overlays.
After recording, Condon formed a full band which at times varies in the number of members, from six to ten. Live he is accompanied by Perrin Cloutier (cello/accordion), Jason Poranski (guitar/mandolin/ukulele), Nick Petree (drums), Kristin Ferebee (violin), Paul Collins (organ/keys/tambourine/ukulele), Jon Natchez (baritone sax/mandolin/glockenspiel), and Kelly Pratt (trumpet/euphonium).
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