#balkan beat box

[mudwerks]

(via Meboli (feat. Vlada Tomova) - Balkan Beat Box (2005)

[daveydoodle]

Watch "Adir Adirim (feat. Victoria Hanna)" on YouTube

❤️ 🎶 🐓 turn it up 👆 😊 🎶 💗

[razorsadness]

Balkan Beat Box - “Move It”

[muchpreferredcustomers]

Balkan Beat Box - Avalanche

[music-crush]

Ori Kaplan

Happy birthday, Ori Kaplan, co-founder of Balkan Beat Box!

[subuwu-dyke]

Didn't realize until I just brought this CD home from value village but talk dirty to me is ENTIRELY sampled from Hermetico by Balkan Beat Box

[enchantingdonutfestival]

Spark!!!! ⚡️⚡️⚡️

[hit-song-showdown]

Year-End Poll #65: 2014

[Image description: a collage of photos of the 10 musicians and musical groups featured in this poll. In order from left to right, top to bottom: Pharrell Williams, Katy Perry, John Legend, Iggy Azalea, OneRepublic, Jason Derulo, Magic!, Meghan Trainor, Ariana Grande, Sam Smith. End description]

More information about this blog here

As mentioned in the previous poll, we're now seeing streaming services like Spotify taking over music consumption. Much like how Billboard had to adapt to individual retail sales in the 1950's, MTV rotation in the 1980's, Nielsen SoundScan in the 1990's, and YouTube views in the early 2010's, Spotify streams are now going to be incorporated more into Billboard's charts, with their album charts adapting to this shift in late 2014.

But before we welcome in another chart, 2014 is the year we'll also have to say goodbye to one. It feels like just yesterday we were talking about the rise of the ringtone. But as musical ringtones were starting to fall out of favor in the general public (with streaming people were growing accustomed to no longer having to pay 99 cents for a song -- they weren't going to pay 2 dollars for a snippet of one), Billboard's ringtone charts were retired in 2014, with Taylor Swift's Shake It Off as the final number 1 ringtone in America.

In 2014, we're seeing the continuing rise of retro-inspired production, with the neo soul of Pharrell Williams' Happy, the doo-wop pastiche of Meghan Trainor's All About That Bass, and the funk elements of Ariana Grande's Problem. And with Jason Derulo's Talk Dirty sampling its hook from Balkan Beat Box's Hermetico, it seems like this was a pretty good year for brass samples. Also fun fact about Happy, apparently that song was Pharrell Williams' tenth attempt at writing a song for the Despicable Me 2 soundtrack. Sadly, we will never hear those other 9 versions. Or else I would have put all of them on this poll.

Speaking of musical influence, we're also starting to see trap starting to rise in mainstream popularity. Trap music is a style of rap originating out of the southern hip-hop scene, notable for its 808 drums, snares, and triple-timed hi-hats. The origins of the style can be traced back to the 1990's during the rise of southern rap, with many trap acts coming out of Atlanta and Memphis. In fact one of the guest rappers on today's poll, Juicy J on Katy Perry's Dark Horse, is one of the pioneers of this style with his group, Three 6 Mafia. While Three 6 Mafia is associated with a variety of subgenres (gangster rap, horrorcore, crunk, etc), the trajectory of trap music can often be traced back to them. I don't usually give out homework on these polls, so instead I will just strongly suggest that you check out Mystic Stylez if you haven't already. We'll have to wait a few years until we see the explosive growth of the modern trap movement in the mainstream.

[occasional-owl]

Give us Spotify 69 ayyyyy

[thesinglesjukebox]

KYLE GORDON FT. DJ CRAZY TIMES AND MS. BILJANA ELECTRONICA - "PLANET OF THE BASS"

Time to find out once and for all who hates fun!

[3.50]

Crystal Leww: A fun weird thing that happened this year is that Kyle Gordon premiered "Planet of the Bass" at the party that I book called hulaHOOP, which is a trance, Eurodance, and euphoric dance music party that I started this year with two of my best friends. He was a last-minute add to our lineup, which was filled with friends and artists that we admire from around the world who are not white, not straight, and not dudes. I have nothing bad to say about Kyle Gordon, a guy who genuinely seems to love Aqua and Vengaboys, treated our team and the club staff with nothing but respect, and willingly took a ten minute slot that we gave him. But it was very weird to see "Planet of the Bass" become the center of conversation for a Eurodance and trance revival well underway that had been for a while spearheaded by mostly not white dudes. None of this stuff should be taken that seriously -- I'm on Team Dance Music Should Be Fun -- but it's kinda sad that something as goofy as the Eurodance revival still gets dominated by bros who are not even that good at the music part of it. The day before our party, Boiler Room dropped sets from La Darude, the collective from Paris that is really spearheading a lot of this stuff. Suggest you listen to those instead to embrace the goofy, euphoric whimsy from people who are really, really in it. [4]

Kat Stevens: I don't mind people taking the piss if it's banging, but this is just spiteful. [1]

Oliver Maier: If you are here reading this website you probably don't need me to explain all the ways that this isn't particularly spot-on as Eurodance pastiche. Maybe someone else will do it for me. Fortunately, "Planet of the Bass" gets the most important thing right, which is to have fun. It's pretty funny (throwaway 30 Rock joke/10) and pretty catchy (memorable, but not an earworm/10). Try though I might, I simply have no strong feelings about "Planet of the Bass"! Takes, I'm wanting more. [5]

Jonathan Bradley: Taken beyond meme length, "Planet of the Bass" seems increasingly dubious: are silly accents and ESL phrases actually hilarious, or is this tired American condescension? Forgive me for imposing some level of scrutiny on that lowest from of entertainer -- the internet comedian -- but the DJ Crazy Times project fails for its sloppiness about the details. Purportedly a parody of '90s Eurodance, it sounds more like it belongs to the 2000s than alongside "Rhythm is a Dancer," "Another Night," or "The Rhythm of the Night." It also posits its performers as central European or Balkan, while the big hits from the time it seeks to parody came from nations that hadn't just emerged from behind the Iron Curtain: Germany, Italy, the Netherlands. Maybe Slavs are supposed to be inherently more ridiculous than western Europeans? But the weakest quality of "Planet of the Bass" -- what makes it fail as a song rather than a gag -- is that it isn't interested in what the Eurodance acts of the '90s were doing with their big boshing beats and unusual syntax: adopting simple English phrases that could be understood in a club across the continent, regardless of which of the dozens of Europeans languages might be spoken there, yet still communicating a sense of dancefloor yearning that plays anywhere from Copenhagen to Cordoba. [2]

Will Adams: Like most viral memes today, "Planet of the Bass" was pummeled into oblivion in a matter of weeks. The life cycle of a joke landing to the jokester re-telling the joke (keep 'em laughing!) to the resentment of the joke to discourse about the joke to, finally, the chatter fizzling out... this isn't new. That's not the issue. The song is fine. The chorus is quite good; I trust that Kyle Gordon knows his Eurodance references -- I'm getting equal parts the goofy dude rap of Aqua and Toy-Box and the emotive female vocal of Matrix's "Can You Feel It" and Vengaboys' "Superfly Slick Dick." The issue is that the core joke belongs to the genre of "ESL? LOL!" comedy (hi Brian Jordan Alvarez!) that generally has a short shelf life. [5]

David Moore: I only recognize one TikTok meme as a legitimate 2023 banger, and it is "Sitting" by T.J. Mack, the alter ego of comedian Brian Jordan Alvarez. (The Paul F. Tompkins big band version is great, too.) [1]

Rachel Saywitz: Sometimes what goes viral on TikTok should stay viral on TikTok. [0]

Katherine St Asaph: Kyle Gordon appears to be a bit of an asshole, but an asshole with some genuine appreciation for the genre and for Y2K visual aesthetics. But regardless of how much Eurodance he's heard, he does not seem to realize that their English lyrics were almost never this bad -- and that deliberately bad English is both rarely funny and never emotionally charged like the real songs were. Should have stayed a meme reel on Croatia Roosevelt Island. [4]

Hannah Jocelyn: This doesn't understand what makes those songs great beyond the most obvious signifiers of broken English -- even shit like "The Fox" had a euphoric EDM outro that made at least one person in my life say "wait, is this actually good?" (No.) "Planet of the Bass" aims for that transcendence, but the production does the bare minimum, and nothing in the song is as beautifully unhinged as "I'm as serious as cancer when I say rhythm is a dancer." But "Planet of the Bass" brought me as much joy as anything else this year: a loved one and I constantly quote the spoken-word bridge, itself lifted from a deep cut that shows Kyle Gordon knows his shit. If that knowledge was translated to a stronger arrangement, we would have an all-timer parody song on our hands. But we'll always have the immortal affirmation "women are my favorite guy." [6]

Tara Hillegeist: As Gordons getting their five minutes of fame out of the way off a techno-type beat and meme-ready lyrics go, I'd genuinely much rather be listening to "Gordon Kill the Thomas". Peanuts-kun at least extends their socmed-ready pisstake with some wild, one might even say creative, decisions; "Planet of the Bass", by contrast, can't even get its feet motivated enough to reach the dancefloor. I would be lying if I said the bonehead genius of pastiche lyrics like "women are my favorite guy" inspired utterly no joy in me, of course, but as a full song, this misses the Vengabus. [3]

John S. Quinn-Puerta: Disney Channel Original Trance Song [5]

Nortey Dowuona: Half of this is BASS. The other part is a barely-there repeat of circa-'05 pop dance I'd hear in Torino. [3]

Tim de Reuse: Reviewing musical comedy is hard because you have to ask whether it's funny. And then when the answer is "the first time, I guess," you have to ask whether the music is good. And then when the answer is "it's unremarkable," you've run out of things to talk about. [3]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: No one who is actually funny will take a joke and try to milk it for all he can. That's just disrespectful to the craft. Even if this were initially amusing, the moment that Kyle Gordon dropped the full song is when he went from comedian to content creator. [0]

Will Rivitz: TSJ in 2014: collectively unable to parse that a Eurotrash genre sendup could be sublime. TSJ in 2016: collectively unable to parse that a Eurotrash genre sendup (except for at least one of us!) could be sublime. TSJ in 2023: admittedly, this song is no QT or Charli, but it rips regardless. I hope we've learned our lesson. [8]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: All jokes aside, that's genuinely an all-time great dance-pop hook. It's a shame about the other 2 minutes of the song, though! [5]

Aaron Bergstrom: This could have been a clever tweet (I'll admit that I chuckled at "women are my favorite guy" the first time), but instead it's a three and a half minute song that overstays its welcome by at least two. By the end he's basically just doing Borat. [3]

Taylor Alatorre: Those European people to the east of the Rhine -- they don't speak the English too good, do they? And they sure do love their bass-thumping, fist-pumping club music, right? Well, at least in the '90s they did. Now it's a different decade, and they like some different kinds of electronic music than that. But still, we could make pretend like we're back in the '90s and excavate a harmless, beloved, frozen-in-amber genre for the purpose of mocking I mean "celebrating" it, and have our YouTube TikTok comedian guy say some sex-obsessed and politically naïve phrases that probably sounded funnier as a recurring bit on Twitter than they do when spoken aloud. That's something, right? Ylvis still appears in Uber One ads, right? [3]

Brad Shoup: It rocks that he made a Eurodance track for locals and when the locals finally heard it, they had no idea what to do with it. The structure and timbre are dead on--I particularly enjoyed the electro freestyle ostinato--but the deep-fried Continental English stopped being funny real fast. There's just something really beautiful about European dance-pop: the way that shamelessness and fun can carry idiosyncratics like Hit'n'Hide or Rednex over the border. "Planet of the Bass" gets at a little of both, but it mostly feels like a joke about Slavic hustle. I guess I'll wait for the third-wave ska parody. [4]

Ian Mathers: Brevity is the soul of wit. Chorus is still pretty good, though! [5]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

[daveydoodle]

Watch "Balkan Beat Box feat. A-WA - Kum Kum" on YouTube

❤️ 🎶 and now for something completely different 🎶 ❤️ 🤍💙

[jules-has-notes]

Talk Dirty — VoicePlay music video

Next up on the Sing-Off roll call are two of the boys from The Filharmonic, the group that (indirectly) led to VoicePlay's elimination in episode 5. They couldn't stay mad at those talented, charming lads, though, and decided to combine their powers for a fun tune and a good cause.

Details:

title: Talk Dirty w/ drum battle (feat. VJ Rosales & Niko Del Rey)

original performer: Jason Derulo, featuring 2 Chainz

written by: Jason Derulo, Tauheed "2 Chainz" Epps, Ricky Reed, Jason Evigan, Sean Douglas, & Balkan Beat Box

arranged by: Layne Stein, Geoff Castellucci, & Hannah Juliano

release date: 18 December 2013

My favorite bits:

the groovy harmonies from Earl, Eli, and Tony

VJ's smooth boy band lead vocals and crisp riffing

the return of the megaphone to justify using fun filters in post

Niko and Layne's "beat off" (Don't look at me. Ben Folds coined it on the show, and the guys ran with it.)

⇘ ♫ "Talk dirty to me." ♫ ⇘ They know what they're doing when they deploy Geoff like that. Shameless behavior. (Please never stop.)

cutting out the more explicit parts of 2 Chainz's rap section to keep things classy

wardrobe honorable mentions — Eli's thematically appropriate Bettie Page shirt, Earl repping his DC comics fandom twice over, and Niko sporting a VP logo tee from afar

Trivia:

They donated the ad revenue from this video to the Red Cross to support recovery efforts for Typhoon Haiyan / Yolanda that devastated the Philippines in late 2013.

The guys decorated the walls of the set with hundreds of multi-colored sticky notes. (Shenanigans ensued.)

No singers were harmed (much) in the making of this video.

[thisisagta]

🎶✨when u get this, list 5 songs u like to listen to, publish. then, send this ask to 10 of your favorite followers (positivity is cool)🎶✨

Thanks for the ask 😘 The easiest would be to just list 5 Omar's songs but I will chellange myself and omit his songs for this.

[lifeattomsdiner]

🎶✨ When you get this u have to put 5 songs u actually listen to, publish. Then, send this ask/tag 10 of your favourite followers ✨🎶

Tagged by @st-just

Oh boy an excuse to inflict share the various niche bullshit I've been obsessed with lately? Don't mind if I do!

Hermetico - Balkan Beat Box - Randomly remembered that this band existed after somebody mentioned them offhand in high school like fifteen years ago, turns out they're really infectiously listenable? (And if parts of this track sound familiar--yeah, it's not just you. This is the original.)

Waltzing off the Face of the Earth (I. Crescendo) - Enter Shikari - Possibly the most blunt track of a whole album that wears its politics on its sleeve, but hey, it's good catharsis for those days when The Discourse is making you feel like you're losing your mind.

Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On) - Talking Heads - Take a look at these haaaaaaaaands! The hand of a government man! No notes.

Thank God I'm Not You - Himalayas - Possibly one of the cattiest songs I've ever listened to, and I'm into it.

tous les mêmes - Stromae - This might be the most enraptured I've ever been with lyrics in a language I don't speak, which is saying something given that I had an obligatory J-pop phase. Anyway, Stromae good.

so with the obligatory "only do it if you want to", tagging @jakey-beefed-it, @dragonsaffron, @enonem, @axiolotl, @daxleopard, @storywonker, @searchforthescars, @johnconstantius, @gostaks, and @mugasofer

[odedmusic]

BALKAN BEAT BOX - Same 4 Me 2

#OdedFriedGaon #OdedMusic