Cabaret - Homophobia

I have to admit that I strongly underestimated the band Cabaret when their debut album 'Homophobia' (wither or the album title is a standpoint from the group is unclear) got into my hands. The band says that they find their inspiration from Depeche Mode, like all synthpop artists, but also from more unusual sources like Porcupine Tree and Leonard Cohen. I'm a great fan of Leonard Cohen, one of the world's greatest poets and musicians; therefore I got a little more interested how this would sound.

When you listen to the music it's hard to find any comparisons between Cohen and Cabaret, even though some sounds and feelings point in that direction with allot of will. The music varies between more traditional synthpop to more techno inspirited sound and also to some more acoustic feeling with a piano. The singer Jaroslaw Pawlik will never get as lovely voice as Mr Cohen, even if he drinks whisky and smoke cigar all day long, but his voice is still all right even though you tend to get a little disturbed on the accent. Further more they have sampled Leonard Cohen himself in the tenth track "Check Point Charlie" where he finish the song by saying "Give me back the Berlin wall...". This is taken from one of his performances in Los Angeles.

The album contains allot of strong and beautiful tracks, most of all I'm thinking of "Song for Berlin" which I think is the greatest track on this release. You also don't want to miss out "Rain On My Skin", "Homophobia (nr 9)", "Check Point Charlie" and "Electric Chair Song" which is also the title of the first MCD from the band.

I will defiantly follow this band with great interest in the future, surprising.

This review was written 2005 and initially published on Neurozine.com Jan 01 2005