Bordello a-go-go

I while back I received a copy of Gogol Bordello's latest CD, Gypsy Punks, thanks to my job as a music reviewer at the Ottawa Sun. I thought it was good, but not year-end list material. Nonetheless, I dropped all plans for Friday, March 17, when I heard the band was playing Barrymore's, because they have a hard-earned reputation as one of the best live acts on the planet. It's well deserved: They had the house moving from the word go with their Gypsy-Slavic folk-rock hybrid. Barring a brief pre-encore intermission they had the crowd in the palms of their hands for a good hour and three-quarters.

The crowd started moshing almost as soon as frontman Eugene Hutz hit the stage and yelled "Let's party!"



Violinist Sergey Ryabtsev.



Yury Lemeshev squeezes it out.



There wasn't a whole lot of lateral movement allowed - this is the closest I got to a good shot of drummer Eliot Ferguson.



Bass player Rea Mochiach in his Clash chic.



I may have a better picture of Oren Kaplan - at right with the groovy pants - somewhere, but this is the one I like most. Like Rea, he's originally from Israel.



Accordion action from Yury.



After a couple of songs Pamela Jintana Racine and Elizabeth Sun zipped onto stage in their ragamuffin chic to scream the screams in I Would Never Wanna Be Young Again. Incidentally, that's a Slayer T-shirt Eugene is wearing.



You can tell which is which thanks to their monogrammed washboards.



Washboard action!



More washboard action!



Sergei eyes Pamela! And who can blame him?



Eugene tried to crowd surf ... he must have been a bit slippery by that point because I don't think the crowd managed to keep him aloft. Barrymore's security was quick to stop any audience shenanigans, anyway. Anyway, here he is getting back on stage, ready to kick things up a notch!







Pamela sings!



Elizabeth breaks out the cymbals while Eugene strums.



Pamela gets a big drum (which proved handy later).



What the heck, everyone deserves some percussion action. I should mention that in addition to his industrial strength stand, Hutz had one of the most battered microphones I've ever seen. Care to wonder why?



My favourite Hutz shot ...



Some singing along with Pamela and Yury.



Rea grabs some front stage action.



Sure, they could just toss a few shirts into the crowd, but a slingshot is so much niftier.



And one last shot of Eugene working the kinks out ...



As you can see, I shot a bunch of pictures - in fact, I shot so many pictures that I ran out of film: Double drat, since I missed the chance to get a picture of the audience holding up Pamela's marching drum so that first she, and then Hutz could perch on top of it (to the displeasure of Barrymore's security). An amazing show ... there was just one strange thing. I was right up at the stage, and was dancing around between shots. There were two guys right beside me just leaning on the stage, drinking. I don't think they so much as wiggled a foot. I almost wanted to check them for a pulse. As for Hutz, as the gig came to an end he asked "Okay, where's the aftershow party?"

• Show reminder: Magneta Lane and Golden Bulldozer play Zaphod's.