B EAST Magazine website

How long have we been telling you all to get along to the Space:Garage bar/club in the Riga district of Andrejsala? Too long. And how many of you have listened? Not nearly enough. You’ve been lazing around in your trendy Berlin kiez, tripping out at dayclubs until the afternoon, sleeping in parks in the sunshine, waiting for the world to come to you - haven’t you? Well, your tactic worked.

Riga’s Space:Garage crew visited Berlin’s ZMF bar on Friday April 25 for a special “Riga Party”, organized by our friends at Pixelfestival. Unfortunately the venue wasn’t nearly as authentically cramped, steamy, sexy and trashy as Andrejsala, the dockside squat where the DJs normally play. But then again, nothing could match the atmosphere of Space:Garage on a Friday night.

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Balkanbeats are hot these days, what with Gogol Bordello, Balkan Beatbox, Goran Bregovic and others cashing in on the West’s desire to let loose, turn into wild gypsy brides and go beastly to pumped-up brass, Klezmer grooves, ethnic tunes, trash-pop, bagpipes and other synthesis of guitar-rock, dance and folksy instruments and attitude.

Few have captured the zeitgeist as well as Berlin’s Eastblok Record Label (www.eastblokmusic.com) who recently released BALKANBEATS3 has some great tracks including Goran Bregovic’s dancy Gas Gas and The No Smoking Orchestra’s soulful Dobrila, in addition to Slovansky Bal’s Moscow Fever. The selection is compiled by DJ Robert Soko.

B EAST brings you a selection right to your desktop. So jangle your beads and rock to The No Smoking Orchestra’s Dobrila.

Representatives of Bjork have insisted that the singer was forced out of Serbian festival EXIT due to her views on Kosovo.

The singer claimed she was dropped from the July event because of what she said onstage recently in Tokyo in support of the region gaining its impendence.

EXIT’s organiser Bojan Boscovic then issued a statement denying that the singer had been not dropped for her views, or that Bjork had ever been cancelled.

However Bjork’s management have issued to following statement to NME.COM claiming that they were told politics was the reason she would not be allowed to play, and said that the festival had cancelled her performance.

The statement reads as follows:

“Bojan Boscovic, General Manager of the Exit Festival in Serbia, said in an email to Bjork’s representatives, that, quote: ‘We hope Bjork does not relate to Kosovo on other concerts here in Europe, nor in her interviews, because if she does we need to cancel the concert; if this happens, we may as well look for some other artist, or see what is available’.”

Her management added: “The coverage of dedicating her song ’Declare Independence’ to Kosovo at two recent shows in Japan was so widely covered in print and online media that the festival had no option but to cancel her performance. We will replace this event with another show in due course.”

Other acts at EXIT, one of Eastern Europe’s most rocking music festivals, include the Sex Pistols, Primal Scream, Deep Dish, Sven Vath, Ministry & Gogol Bordello. www.exitfest.org

Watch Bjork’s ‘Declare Independence’ video here…