ARTICLE: “Folk-punk lets loose” (Bella’s Bartok)
My review of Bella’s Bartok’s Saturday night show in Pittsfield is in today’s Berkshire Eagle.
“The sprawling, eleven-member ensemble sounds surprisingly precise on its very good recorded debut, At the Kingmaker’s Ball. But in concert, this Berkshire-born Gypsy-punk juggernaut is delightfully imprecise. Its sound is informed by Eastern European folk music, suffused with the energy of punk rock, and tinted with a Dixieland inflection. The music is often delivered at full volume, and even the waltzes come at breakneck speed. It is getaway music for horse-drawn, peddler caravan. Call it borschtcore.”
