Groyse Metsie - Hey

Hear The Track Here

Now that's the sort of band name you are not likely to forget, is it?. I didn't, because I remember that their last track Mein Shtetala (September 2008) got a Must Have rating from me and a mention in my Tracks Of The Year 2008. Mind you, considering that Groyse Metsie (or is it A Groyse Metsie?) is a Jewish band who play truly world music, then it's a given that I am going to like it. Even though the lyrics were in Hebrew it still managed to capture my attention more than a few times then and since. I don't play it often any more but I do still play it and in my books that makes a good track. Groyse Metsie specialise in a Jewish musical tradition known as Klezmer.

Like most national musical traditions it isn't something that you just pick up in say the same manner as rock or pop. Like Asian music, true Jewish music has a long and proud history, stretching back into Biblical times and takes a great degree of skill to do properly. The kind of training that classical musicians go through is no less true for this particular music. I have been to a few Jewish weddings in my life and this is one invitation I would never turn down. For me one of the highlights of these events is the heady, almost spiritual rush of the music, and of course the sheer joy of life from the people performing it.

It was one of the main reasons I gave their previous track such a high rating and that quality is here in shedloads. Hey is exactly what you would expect if someone said to you 'oh this is Jewish music'; torrents of massive riffage, lots of 'oi' and 'heys' and enough raw energy to light up a medium sized town. Give it more time though, and you get a second underlying impression. You notice, for example, that the bulk of the instrumentation is modern (except for a very tasty violin and maybe mandolins or zithers). What surprised me most was the almost ska/bluebeat rhythm that scoots your butt along so fast you will finally come to know the true meaning of skid marks. Hey is an enormous slice of fun, above all and that is the quality that will endear it to most people who actually hear it. A track you absolutely can't resist.

MUST HAVE world music.