Palo Alto Pop Overthrow

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin: I'm Gabe McClelland: lover of maraschino cherries, haberdasher-about-town and life enthusiast. You may have heard another (substantially deeper) voice alongside your regular host last week; those succulently sanguine vocal chords belong to me. I'll spare you from the nascent details of my rise to radio fortune and fame; suffice it to say that Howard Stern was Howard Aloof before he met me.

Let's step back in time to last Thursday: The dollar was advancing against the yen, and DJ Phil Andrews had just handed me a CD that was surprisingly thicker than your everyday jewel case. I tried not to make eye contact with the young man on the cover, and opened the case to reveal not one, but two compact discs of equal shape and proportion. One, chosen at random, was pronounced our featured album of the week. "Which disc did we choose?" you inquire; hands clasped under your chin in eager anticipation.

We chose the one on the left, which happened to be "March of the Zapotec" by Beirut. Featuring the 19-piece "Jimenez Band," who hail from beautiful Teotitlan del Valle in Oaxaca, Mexico, this album takes us on a sonic journey of epic scale and largely departs from what you normally hear on Palo Alto Pop Overthrow.

Our first taste of the 'Zapotec' came to us in the form of The Akara, which introduces itself as what sounds to be a funeral dirge and ends up as a nostalgic tune from the old country. When we came back to our featured album with The Shrew, I was immediately reminded of the Little Miss Sunshine soundtrack and the music of Devotchka (who, if you get a chance, is EXCELLENT live.) We said farewell to this album with My Wife, where I learned that Russian folk dancing is best performed in a space with a minimum of 6 feet in all directions.

Favorite track: My Wife

Label: Ba Da Bing
4 stars (but only because I went home and listened to the other EP in this album.)

official site, wikipedia
Last.fm: album