Trans-Continental HustleGOGOL BORDELLO

Trans-Continental Hustle

[Columbia]

Hearing no style of music manic or multicultural enough to express his lusts for life and travel, Ukrainian native Eugene Hutz was forced to create one. The result is Gogol Bordello, a band whose brand of  “gypsy punk”—a propulsive ska-polka-thrash fusion—is as divisive as it is distinctive. Since 1999, Gogol Bordello has released a series of albums whose neon covers speak volumes about the music within. But Trans-Continental Hustle, the group’s latest, arrives with a muted cover shot of Hutz standing on a city street. The image suits the record, Hutz’s least harried (“calm” certainly isn’t the word) yet. The change in sound is likely the result of producer Rick Rubin, the stoic Zen master to Hutz’s restless searcher. The band still bum-rushes borders with songs of revolution and immigrant pride, but Hutz shows his romantic side, singing more about love than ever before. He’s still eating the world—he’s just taking smaller bites.

–Kenneth Partridge

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