Skarbone 14 w/ Q-Check

20.04.11 Skarbone 14 (Belgium)w/ Q-Check (Bulgaria) @Soul In Da Hole

Last night club Soul In Da Hole (mostly known for it's jazz shows) held an ska concert with the belgian ska squad Skarbone 14 and the bulgarians Q-Check. The concert started with an hour and a half delay during which I had plenty of time to talk with the guys at the door about drugs, Amsterdam, the current state of the bulgarian and world music and in general about this particular ska concert. Well it was entertaining. So after all this waiting the belgians jumped first on the stage at around 22:30. It was strange that the foreign band was first when in fact should be the other way around. Go figure. Anyways, without wasting any more time they started right away. I have to admit that the belgians sounded refreshingly nice. They were advertised as a ska-rock (whatever that means) but what I heard was a good, melodic ska with very few punk references and to my amazement even some hip-hop elements. This whole blend sounded just about right. This resonated well with the crowd which was dancing all the time, noone was left idle although I'm sure that 99% of the people didn't understand the lyrics which were almost entirely in french. Nevertheless I'm sure that most people had a great time as myself.
Next it was time for the locals to show up which they did around 24:00-24:15. Q-Check seemed to take it easy when it comes to adjusting their instruments and preparing to play. For a relatively unknown bulgarian band they acted more like a well-established act which was kinda ridiculous. So finally they started. Their set was some bizarre combination of ska blended with bulgarian chalga music. And though someone might find this original as an idea most of the time I thought that I was listening to chalga with some guitars. Not that great and not that original. Add to that some technical difficulties and I was left with some mixed impressions from their music. Not that they sounded bad or anything but I somehow expected more from a band partially connected to La Muchedumbre, my fav bulgarian ska band. I was kinda disappointed. On the brightside there was some freestyle beatboxing as well as some ragga songs which improved the things a little bit. There was a couple of cover songs that I remember vaguely except for the White Stripes cover which sounded good. Apart from all that I had fun that night and don't regret going to this kind of a last minute show. Such shows have their own distinctive charm.

Skarbone 14 official website

Q-Check myspace