The Witzard

It's a rather unlikely story, which almost sounds too good to be true, but it all started with a single White Denim-centric piece I published back in October-November 2013; "I saw you recently featured White Denim [on The Witzard], and thought you might find UBK's (Israel) new music video interesting," read an email from a publicist named Emma. Uri Brauner Kinrot-fronted UBK would soon effortlessly morph from a mere solo project into a full-fledged band called Ouzo Bazooka. I've been in sporadic contact with UBK's people, fellow band mates, and most recently, Kinrot himself over the course of the past three years and have been honored to feature a number of their videos here on this very site. I would, if pressed, likely attempt to best describe Ouzo Bazooka's unique Israeli Rock sound as a stylistic love child between The Black Keys, Eric Clapton-helmed Cream, and a Mediterranean-influenced version of The Rolling Stones. Ouzo Bazooka's genre-blendin...

"Kinrot describes ["Children of The Revolution"] as an interpretation of the emerging social movement in the middle-eastern countries: "From the social justice protests that happened in Israel during 2011 (and to this day), and all the manifestations that are changing the Middle East surface, emerged a strong connection to this song and its relevancy for today's reality," reads a pull-quote lifted from Ouzo Bazooka frontman Uri Brauner Kinrot (formerly UBK ). Initially billed as "Mediterranean garage rock / Israel," I've been in touch with UBK and his social media team since about November 2013, after they saw an old featurette I did on White Denim ; at this point in time, I've written about roughly 3-5 UBK/Ouzo Bazooka videos and I would best liken their overall sound to a Mediterranean -influenced brand of Queens of The Stone Age 's Desert Acid-Rock infused with The Black Keys' radio-friendly Blues-Rock Americana . ...

"The music video is about people from different worlds connecting through music. And it's surprising how what eventually came out when everything was finished, was somehow so similar [to] the production process itself: Uri [Brauner Kinrot] and I connecting across the globe to get this project done and him flying from Israel to Peru to shoot it. It seems like a great parallel to the finished work, were Uri's almost arcane musical world gets connected to The Hermit 's darker underworld all for the sake of a good time!," director Mikael Stornfelt lamented about the making-of Mediterranean Psych-Rock band Ouzu Bazooka's latest single, "Southern Winds." While frontman Uri Brauner Kinrot (UBK) is largely based out of Tel Aviv, Israel , he's toured the world and recorded with his "drunken wedding, Balkan -surf, guitar-tuba-drums power trio Boom Pam ," as well as jet-setting acts such as Balkan Beat Box , Shantel, Firewater , and cou...