Big Gilly Style

A very entertaining gig in our local on Saturday. Germany's own Dad Horse Experience brought his unique brand of mutant blues and gospel to the people of "The Bow", and we all got on like a house on fire. Although I fear the mass purchase of patent Dad Horse Experience kazoos by many of the regulars is something we will all come to regret in the next few weeks.



On the subject of central Europeans who take classic American music forms and mangle them into something entirely new, I picked up a Gil Dobrica compilation while in Bucharest last week. Gil was a big star in Romania in the 1970s with his covers of rock, blues, soul, and country songs, his biggest hit being "Hai Acasa", a Romanian language version of "Take Me Home, Country Roads". That is on the compilation, of course, along with covers of the likes of Ray Charles, Barry White, Jimmy James & The Vagabonds, KC & The Sunshine Band and Sailor.

The only slight disappointment is that at least half the tracks are sung in English not Romanian. But it doesn't detract too much from your enjoyment. He does a pretty good job on most of them and, as the list above shows, his choice of artists to cover is nothing if not eclectic. Take, for example, today's first selection, which is an old Tower of Power album track. The second selection I have not been able to trace at all. The writing credit goes to "Solarion" (which could be a person or a band) and it has the feel of a song that started life somewhere in Europe. Any ideas?

"I Got The Chop" - Gil Dobrica

"Blue Bubbles" - Gil Dobrica

Gil also makes a valiant stab and this old Wizzard hit.