Thursday, February 28, 2008

Dragons 1976 Warsaw 2-21-08

Last year, the third Dragons 1976 album was put out by a label in Poland, MultiKulti, it took a little while, but they asked us to come to Poland to play, and this week was the trip. Our first stop was Warsaw, the capitol of Poland and an iconic remainder of communisms influence in architecture. We got in on the 20th and had a day to reset our internal clocks - worked out for me, but I think Ajemian had a harder time.
Our first show was at Klub Aurora, a spot that is kind of a complex of clubs - though in a good way, not a bad one. We toured with a trio from Poland made up of Waclaw Zimpel, Wojtek Traczyk and Robert Rasz - Bass clarinet, bass and drums. Younger fellows than us, Multikulti released their first album this month. The concert started around 8:30, the crowd a bit light as the trio began their set. By the end of the set more folks had shown up, and we were able to hear the music - I was glad to hear their aesthetic was honest and in some ways similar to Dragons - strong melodic and harmonic aspects grounded the improvisations.
We played second - and this was our first time playing together in awhile - we did a long set - about an hour and fifteen - it felt good, the crowd was a listening one, we played an encore. A good start to the tour. After the show we stayed at Aurora and there was a dance party - a mix of the last 50 years of american music, but when the polish pop came on the crowd got real into it.