DeVotchKa: A Mad And Faithful Telling : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

DeVotchKa are best known for a) their hot sousaphonist who wraps her ax in Christmas lights, b) their quirky contributions to Little Miss Sunshine and c) their kinship with other world-music-minded acts (see Beirut, Yeasayer, the Ruby Suns). But what leader Nick Urata does on his big indie debut is pretty straightforward: make dance music and ballads with drama and kitsch. DeVotchKa's idea of dance rock is rooted in Mexican and Balkan folk as opposed to funk, as the instrumentation complies: Besides the big horn, there's hot fiddling and accordion work (see the tango-spiked "Blessing in Disguise"), plus brass and string sections. There are David Byrne echoes in the vocals — maybe too many. But, heck, that's true of many otherwise good young bands. And Urata seems determined to carve his own path; his phrasing sounds drunker, for one, and his lyrics are more romantic than oblique. Here, his immigrant songs seek the border jumper in everyone. "The gringos block the roads/Inside your head," Urata croons on "Along the Way." You sense he knows of what he speaks.