What do you get if you mix Gogol Bordello with Bob Dylan, but without Dylan’s lyrical genius? The New Gondoliers. It is not a combination that works.
Hailing from Croatia and Slovenia, the New Gondoliers are at least capable of playing their instruments, but apart from this there isn’t much else going in their favour musically. Lyrically this was a disaster, with clumsy, wince-inducing rhymes; too often they tried to make couplets out of words like ‘Stonehenge’ and ‘reservations’. Further adding to this problem was the delivery style of lead singer and rhythm-guitarist Alan Celić. It was akin to Dylan in that it was slow and deliberate, but being so it placed extra emphasis on what he was warbling.
The singing itself was not without its problems. It is not necessary to have a good voice to sing good music - take Dylan or indeed Morrissey for example - but whilst not the best singers, at least they hit the right notes from time to time. Celić was flat from start to finish, even when he delved into a pseudo-Tom Waits growl during a spotlit solo set (something which defies belief). Some might say that the set was ironic but the only time it seemed to be was during one song about Zinedine Zidane and Paul Cezanne. This was only because it was difficult to believe that it could be anything else.
Allowances could have been made if they were perfect instrumentally, but whilst they were capable musicians, there was nothing revolutionary in their repertoire and too often it was gratingly generic.
