TRIBECASTAN - THE TWISTED CHRISTMAS

When you hitch a ride with Tribecastan, you never know where you're going to land. Drawing liberally from jazz, world music, and Americana, their new holiday EP, The Twisted Christmas, is a collection of your favorite Christmas songs, merrily reinterpreted with exotic cheer, unexpected instrumentations, and mischievous smirks. On their first single, “God Rest Ye Three Kings,” Tribecastan takes us on a midnight joyride across the desert sands with a figgy pudding of hand drums, sitar, sarod, mandocello, brass and bulbul tarang. This tongue in cheek amalgam of yule tide spirit and holiday chutzpah is a change of pace from the standard seasonal-tunes of old.

Even though there’s no easy way to describe the distinctive sound of Tribecastan, it hasn’t prevented people from trying! The Washington Post, for example, describes Tribecastan as sounding like “an international jazz and folk festival unto itself, fusing Balkan, Middle Eastern, Indian, Latin American, and African musical elements to bold and dazzling effect.” However you describe it, the final package is the result of an exuberant, and sometimes irreverent, collaborative effort of some of New York’s finest world music and jazz veterans. With Tribecastan's members having played with everyone from James Brown and Ornette Coleman, to Patti Smith and The Violent Femmes, the tribe combines an almost unprecedented diversity of styles into a singularly adventurous music that is legitimately global, virtuosic, and infectious. Tracks include: Do You Hear the Silent Night; Joy to the Angles; Noel Ye Faithful; and God Rest Ye 3 Kings

Stream link:
http://soundcloud.com/evergreene/sets/the-twisted-christmas
Purchase link:
http://evergreene.bandcamp.com/album/the-twisted-christmas