21 January,2009 09:33 AM IST | | Bhairavi Jhaveri
Austria's five-piece vocal groove project, Bauchklang performed at Blue Frog on three consecutive nights last week. Pic/Pradeep Dhivar
Vocal groove project Bauchklang's performance is far from cacophony. Back in Mumbai by public demand after 2008's jaw-dropping performance, Bhairavi Jhaveri caught up to ask them an incredulous HOW?
Having missed the act last year, thanks to au00a0 filled-to-the-brim nightclub, this year's Bauchklang performance held high expectations if I were to go by reviews of fans who'd watched them consecutively for three days.
As five simple, European blokes swaggered on to stage, equipped with nothing more than microphones, it was hard to believe the "energy" they were to bring to the place, minutes from then. With no instruments in sight, one member began to create the bassline that emerged from the hollows of his loosely closed fist in contact with his mouth. Another threw in some scratching and beatboxing and slowly, a mix of sounds encompassed the club. Flute sounds fused with hip hop-style vocals and classical beats. From the in-a-state-of-inertia, bewildered audience suddenly foot-tapping, head-bobbing hysteria emerged. The rhythm picked up, tempo stepped up, and you found you could rave, dance, jump, hop, and create any kind of funky movements you would have to any electronic/dance act.
"Electronic music was big in the late 90s and early 2000 in Austria, which is why, all the gigs we bagged back then were at nightclubs where a DJ was asked to play on most nights. We had as much pressure to make people dance as any other DJ," says Andreas Fraenzl, lead vocalist. A musical project in school 12 years ago got the trio together Gerald Huber (beatbox/sounds), Alex Boec (bass) and Andreas (loud vocals/sounds), and each of them discovered they wanted to experiment with their vocal talent, for life.
Much later, Philipp Sageder (vocals/sounds) and Bina (mouth percussion / beatbox) joined in to add more vocals to the original Bauchklang sound. "We started as a quiet act; we became more dancey 5-odd years ago," says Andy, sharing that they experimented with Gospel music and even did cover versions of Peter Gabriel and Whigfield tracks initially.
Each member of this self-taught group brings in a unique skill set, due to their diverse repertoire in vocal performances prior to Bauchklang some beatboxed for psychedelic acts, while others sang for bands, which helps them create a perfectly timed and immaculately well-coordinated show, and above all, nothing like that has been done in the world today.
As you itch to club this contemporary a cappella group into one genre, or simplify them as beatboxers, they tell you, rather nonchalantly, how they haven't come across or heard of any other act that fuses so many music styles and sounds from so many diverse cultures hip hop, beatbox, drum 'n' bass, Ragga and avant garde world music. They are simply what their name suggests bauchklang or "sounds from the belly" in Austrian.
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Originally from St Poelten, a little outside Vienna, most members now live in various Austrian cities. "In fact, Philipp got married to an Indian classical dancer from Pune, two weeks ago!" Andy
tells us.u00a0u00a0
Ironically, each of them has professionally trained in a musical instrument guitar, piano, drums, and saxophone but the group is sure about wanting to sustain their "vocal groove" image. They pick up new sounds after watching gigs, and listening to all kinds of music; innovation is imperative, they say.
Check out www.bauchklang.at and their official MySpace website: www.myspace/bauchklang
