Brickwork Lizards: Haneen
Lazima Record – Out Now
Artists have always been at the vanguard of change. It’s why they’re often targeted first by authoritarian regimes and why the powers-that-be try to co-opt them into their camp. So it’s been really encouraging to discover more and more artists whose music can only be described as multi-cultural. Of course, most of the music we listen to is already by definition multi-cultural. Jazz and blues, the roots of what we call rock and pop, were themselves a hybrid of the musical traditions of African slaves and European settlers.
But recently I’ve been coming across artists who combine American, European and Arabic music into a whole new hybrid. One example is Brickwork Lizards, an Oxford-based 10-piece band that have been active for 13 years, successfully plying their unique brand of world music all over the UK at gigs and festivals. They aptly mix trad jazz, Arabic and Middle Eastern music, with many other musical flavours added to their musical gumbo. Brickwork Lizards certainly have a flair for cabaret and drama, crafting a patchwork of sounds and styles into something uniquely their own.
Hijaz Zeybek, the second track on their latest album ‘Haneen’ is a modern reworking of an old Ottoman tune. It starts off with a sample from an old Arabic record before the band tackle it in their own melancholic, laidback way.
There is also surprises, such as an unlikely combination of the Middle East, Peruvian folk and rap on Toro Mata. Meanwhile, The Hanging Tune is a macabre old English folk tune. In the Brickwork Lizards’ capable hands this version evokes both Danny Elfman and Urban Voodoo Machine, as singer Tarik Beshir croons melodramatically over oud, violin and cello laying down a baroque harmonic background.
Ya Rayah wears its Middle Eastern influences on its sleeve, sounding like a hip Arabic pop tune while Come on Home combines psychedelica, indie-pop and solemn spoken word lyrics in the verse, before leading into a delightful 60s pop chorus with lovely harmonized vocals. A sweet fuzzed out guitar solo rounds out this intriguing tour de force of cross-genre goodness.
True to its title, closer Old Fashioned Song sounds like an old torch song, as tremolo guitar, violin, cello and oud accompany a tongue-in-cheek delivery of some fairly cheesy lyrics. At times it’s hard to figure out if Brickwork Lizards are putting the listener on, but in the end, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that this band combine a slew of instruments and influences from all over the world into a musical hybrid that doesn’t take itself too seriously and manages to dazzle, intrigue and entertain. Brickwork Lizards play multi-cultural pop for the world of tomorrow.
http://www.brickworklizards.com/