On the frigid Tuesday night of February 20th, I had the utmost pleasure of seeing one of my utmost favorite bands, Gogol Bordello. It has been nearly five years since I last saw these self-proclaimed gypsy punks.
They hit the stage right on time. This time front man Eugene Hutz sported longer hair that hung just below his shoulders, but his signature mustache was right in place. He barely stood in one place for more than a few seconds, exerting an amazing amount of energy. If that wasn’t enough, percussionist Pedro Erazo-Segovia, often left his bongos from the back of the stage to rile the crowd from the stage lip with accompanying vocals and several hey heys including fist punches to the air.
Gogol Bordello also had a female vocal accompanist who provided a rich, sensual backing to Eugene’s more rough and growling voice. Sergey Ryabtsev (Violin), Thomas Gobena (Bass), Alfredo Ortiz (Drums) and – Boris Pelekh (Guitar) rounded out the sound. At times members of the opener Lucky Chops joined the fray and things got even more livelier.
During the course of their set there was much crowd surfing and one daring soul got up on stage and took a flying leap back into the crowd before security could reach him. I was jostled about so much I felt like I’d never walk straight again. When they played their classics like Not A Crime, Alcohol and Start Wearing Purple I felt like a human ping pong ball.
A couple of times Eugene swaggered about taking sips from a bottle of wine and at one point took a swig and sprayed it out of his mouth onto unsuspecting audience members in the front.
The encore began with just Eugene singing with an acoustic guitar and the audience was so rapt you could hear that proverbial pin drop. Then the rest of the band came out along with members of Lucky Chops and I again became a human ping pong ball.
All in all this was a fun night. Eugene’s vocals could have come across stronger in the sound mix, but that’s my only complaint.
The aforementioned Lucky Chops opened the night and did a fine warm up job. In fact, if they had played their set outside, our 34-degree temps would have risen to at least 50 degrees. That’s the amount of energy they put forth. Like Gogol Bordello, Lucky Chops also hails from NYC. This all instrumental group was like a lively marching band with stage antics. This is the only band I have ever seen (in my more than 40 years seeing live music) that had a sousaphone player (Raphael Buyo AKA Yung Raffy AKA Patchy Brian-Sousaphone). And he played shirtless. He also stomped about the stage never missing a note. The other three-fourths of the band’s horn section (Josh Holcomb-Trombone, Daro Behroozi-Tenor Sax, Joshua Gawel-Trumpet) were no slouches in the energy department either as they constantly bounced from one side of the stage to the other. Add Charles Sams IV on drums and a heavy dose of pure charm and you have Lucky Chops. As I looked around the sold-out crowd, I could see I wasn’t the only one enjoying their performance. In fact it was difficult to tell who had more fun, the band or the crowd. One thing’s for sure, no one can claim Seattle doesn’t love Gogol Bordello nor did it appear anyone didn’t like the Lucky Chops.
– All photos property of Holly Homan, all rights reserved.
