A Musical Melting Pot

Gypsy music has really surfaced on the indie scene over the past few years. Musicians from our own backyard like New Mexico folk singer Beirut and New York punk band Gogol Bordello have been reaching out to exotic and romantic Eastern Europe for their influence. The same story goes for misfit Denver quartet DeVotchKa, whose mix of Eastern and Western world music has made for a musical melting pot. On their fourth album A Mad and Faithful Telling, their first since their Grammy-nominated work on the “Little Miss Sunshine” soundtrack, DeVotchKa provides a few standout moments amidst music too similar to what has already been made on their previous albums.

A Mad and Faithful Telling opens with the melodrama of “Basso Profundo,” an up-tempo bask in Spanish guitar, accordion, tuba and singer Nick Urata’s frantic vocals, ultimately leading into a bizarre opera slowdown before the song picks up the pace again. The song, while thrilling, sounds fit for a festival setting and out of place on this otherwise romantic album. The album has two instrumental pieces (“Comrade Z” and “Strizzalo”) that indulge in gypsy music and polka, respectively. However, they run too long, becoming monotonous. Pieces like this keep the album feeling bogged down, making it too antique to excite the listener’s ears.

Nonetheless, the overindulgences of this album only prove to make the ballads more vibrant. “Along the Way” has Urata singing a soaring mariachi serenade over mariachi horns and beautifully descending violin. “Undone” has an achingly beautiful chorus over gently plucked guitar. “Transliterator” has a striking pizzicato violin line fused with flourishing violin and even some sustaining distorted guitar to make a wonderful and refreshing mix of musical styles.

But when it comes down to it, there are not enough moments like these to take DeVotchKa to the next level, where artists like Yeasayer and Beirut have been more successful at blending world music with contemporary styles to make something fresh. So although A Mad and Faithful Telling is surely eloquent and undeniably beautiful at times, the album is more of the same, more appropriate for fans of traditional world music than your average indie rocker.