Period : April 30 - May 8, 2001
In this issue : La Esterella, The Strangers, ABN, El Tattoo del Tigre, Yum,
Mintzkov Luna.
May 8, 2001
LA ESTERELLA 82 Yesterday, Esther Lambrechts celebrated her 82nd birthday. Whoohoo,
big deal. Esther Lambrechts however is better known as La
Esterella, the girl from Antwerp that had an international singing career
that started in 1940 and still continues (on a more subdued scale) today.
A video was shot to the tell the tale of the entire career of this "living
legend" through archive footage, interviews and witnesses: from winning a
"crochet"-contest in 1940 whan she was still a dreamy teenage seamstress,
to meeting her husband/impressario/stateless immigrant Charly Schleimovitch,
to starting a recording career with Philips in 1953, the end of her showbizz-career
when Charly died, and her return to the same showbizz 20 years later. Still, the
video was received by La Esterella as "schoon, maar bijlange nie compleet"
(nice, but far from complete). The video is entitled "Immer Schijnen"
(shine forever)
It can be ordered at vzw Het Gematigd Zeeklimaat on tel 03/582.24.27) and can
be rented for public projections.
THE STRANGERS QUIT AT 50 More good news from Antwerp : The Strangers have announced that they will
be ending their 50-year long career in May of next year. In a public
letter that was sent out on this weekend, the Strangers announce their retreat
on May 8th 2002.
The Strangers have been a very popular band in Flanders for years and years, with
a recipe that consisted of translating international success songs in the the
dialect of Antwerp, in a popular (populistic) & funny manner (ranging from
"Schele Vanderlinden" to the tune of "Gigi L'Amoroso"
by Dalida, to "Bij de Rijkswacht" to the tune of Village People's
In the Navy, from "O mijnen blauwen geschelpten" on the tune
"Paloma Blanca" by the George Baker Selection to "Bleke Algerijn"
on the notes of "Le Métèque by Georges Moustaki). In more recent
years, the band deserved a bad press by singing at meetings of Vlaams Blok, and
slowly faded from the center-spotlight, only clinging on by doing performing stupid
commercials ("tam-da-da-dam t'a-mééé-ri-kaan-tjeee).
In the farewell letter, they state that "We zijn de laatste jaren weliswaar
ontsnapt aan de aandacht van de media (… goddank) , maar in de reële
wereld zijn we nog enorm populair. Wanneer we optreden, lokken we nog altijd volle
zalen en hetgeen we brengen is nog altijd van dezelfde kwaliteit. Eens we op het
podium staan, hebben we er nog altijd plezier in. Aan de andere kant,… fysiek
worden de optredens de laatste jaren steeds zwaarder. ... Dat begint te wegen,
de laatste jaren hoe langer hoe meer en we hebben echt het gevoel dat "de
meet in zicht is". Dan moet je het juiste moment van stoppen goed kunnen
bepalen vooraleer de kwaliteit van ons optreden begint af te nemen waardoor automatisch
ook het plezier dat we eraan beleven zou verdwijnen."
The how when and where of the last concerts next year remain "open for suggestions".
In the meantime, you can find all the Strangers-info you could ever want at www.destrangers.com.
May 7, 2001
ABN
CAUSES NACHTSCHADE Dutch-rapping hiphopcrew ABN wasted
no time whatsoever to come up with the successor to last year's "Seriewoordenaar
: the third album goes by the name "Nachtschade"
(translated that would be "nightshade", but in Dutch this also means
"damage in the night"). With Quinte himself as producer, with beats
provided by P. Van Buyten and Money P, the crew have tried to put as little samples
on the CD as possible.
Guest vocalists on this album were Mental MC's (Phillibustas & Sint-Andries
MC's), Leverancier (Filip Kowlier of 't
Hof van Commerce), Pieter Embrechts (Kakkewieten, El
Tattoo del Tigre) and Rudeboy (Urban Dance Squad). This last provided
his part for the first single that was taken from this album "xxtralarge"
,
which has received an xxx-rated xx-tra videoclip as well.
EL TATTOO DEL TIGRE It
was announced in "these columns" before, but now it has become reality
: El Tattoo Del Tigre has a
CD.
El Tattoo del tigre was founded last year and consists of over 30 musicians (Theo
Mertens, and members of such band as Metal
Molly, Wawadadakwa, Brussels Jazz
Orchestra, De Kakkewieten and the Wizards
of Ooze). All these step outside of their "genre" and dedicate themselves
to merengue and mambo in a big-band setting, interpreting songs from Perez
Prado (eg. Mambo n°8 ),
Marcos Valle (eg. The Crickets sing for Ana Maria ),
Yma Sumac and Tito Puente. And even play a saucy "flight of the bumblebee"
on the way there too.
The band made one of it's first appearances at Werchter and also performed at
Boterhammen in de Stad last year. This year, the "ambiance" of El Tattoo
will even be exported, as they will appear at le Printemps De Bourges Festival
and Les Beaux Jours De Faubourg in Lille.
On Fun2Go.net, you can see a realvideo reportage
& interview that was shot during the recording sessions in the AB. The
CD will be presented at the same location on the 9th of May.
>>> Buy "El Tattoo del Tigre" for 681
fr. at Proxis
<<<
May 1, 2001
NEW MONOKID ON THE BLOCK : YUM Sony
is leaving no stone unturned to promote them : Yum,
the band that was put together by Reinert D'haene (the drummer of Ashbury
Faith) with dutch singer Lennert Busé. And apparently it's catching
on, because "Fake" ,
the current single, is already doing much better than the earlier single "Caught
it Alive" .
And since last weekend, the band already got a ful-cd in the shops : Monokid.
The album was produced by Gary Langan (ABC, Yes, Franki Goes To Hollywood, Scritti
Politti ....) and sound exactly like that. For the live-performances, Reinert's
brother Geert joins them on synth, and Matthias Van der hallen (also an ex-Ashbury
Faith) on guitar. My guess: they'll play at Beach Rock.
More should be available shortly at the website that's being put together for
the group at yum-music.be, but there's already
a bit of promo-html at MSN.
BELPOPTOP APRIL : MINTZKOV LUNA
Surprise (at least for me): Mintzkov Luna went all the way and snatched
victory in this month's Belpoptop, beating
"established" bands such as Das Pop, Mauro, DAAU & Zita Swoon.
Plenty of new suggestions again for the next edition (you can vote,
and win a copy of the album "Bongo Festeris" by the surf-bigband
The Whodads, or a copy of the debut
album "Supermarket" by the band Vanilla
Coke):
- Yum "Fake" Fake is the new single to come out of the debut album of Yum (Reinert D'Haene
(Ashbury Faith) & dutch singer Lennard
Busé) "Monokid", out on Sony.
- Starflam "La Sonora"
Finally, the long-awaited album "Survivant" by this powerful hiphop-band
has hit the shops. The first single is the poppy "La Sonora".
- Laïs "Dorothea" , the title-track of the 2nd album was released a single - available in a
few versions as well on the limited release of Dorothea. Laïs fans: check
out the line-up for Werchter, or Marktrock, or Dranouter, or Boterhammen... Help!
They are everywhere...
- Coem "How I Remember", Coem
is short for Coin-Operated Entertainment Machine, and is Belgian guitar-band on
a german label. 2nd album is called "Bandwi(d)thconsidertions"
- Darling Nikkie "Sugar Cane" Darling Nikkie is the current pseudo for Nikkie Van Lierop (Lords
of Acid, Praga Khan, Jade 4U ...) and
"Sugar Cane" is the thing she's sucking on these days.
- Lords of Acid "Scrood Bi U" Said Nikkie is no longer the singer of LOA, replaced by Deborah Ostrega. Penthouse
got quite lyrical over her "nicely manicured Belgian Beaver" (see article),
and the lyrics to their songs ("I wanna be screwed by you, but anyone
else will do, I wanna be screwed by you and you and you").
- Vive La Fête "Tokyo"
Vive La Fête is getting close to releasing a 2nd album (in June) and has
now released a vinyl-only single. Don't let this audio-excerpt fool you into thinking
there's nothing more to it than saying "Tokyo" over a synth-beat.
They switch to saying "Milano" a bit later on!
- The Dill Brothers "Right Time"
The Dill Brothers are trying to maintain their reputation as one of the most exciting
ska-bands from these parts with the album "Remedy" and have released
this single to promote that idea.
- Moiano "Keep My heart with it"
Peter Lesage & Friends get hyperfunky again with a 2nd EP of the project Moiano.
- Paranoiacs "In My Eye"
Although the album "7 day weekend"
is already almost 2 years old, the Paranoiacs are now releasing the opening track
of it as a single, with video.
So go ahead and vote now ...
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