Gulag Orkestar (LP)
VINYL FORMAT. While it may sound like an entire Balkan gypsy orchestra playing modern songs as mournful ballads and upbeat marches, Beirut's first album, Gulag Orkestar
, is actually the work of 19-year-old Albuquerque native Zach Condon, with an assist from Jeremy Barnes (Neutral Milk Hotel, A Hawk and a Hacksaw). There are no guitars on this album; instead, horns, violins, cellos, ukuleles, mandolins, glockenspiel, drums, tambourines, congas, organs, pianos, clarinets and accordions all build and break around Condon's deep-voiced crooner vocals, swaying to the Eastern European beats like a drunken twelve-member carnival band.![]()
| Tracklisting | |
| Disk | 1 | |
| 1 | The Gulag Orkestar |
| 2 | Prenzlauerberg |
| 3 | Bandenburg |
| 4 | Postcards From Italy |
| 5 | Mount Wroclai (Idle Days) |
| 6 | Rhineland (Heartland) |
| 7 | Scenic World |
| 8 | Bratislava |
| 9 | The Bunker |
| 10 | The Canals Of Our City |
| 11 | After The Curtain |