Tel Aviv battle of the bands

November 6, 2009 - 9:41 AM by David · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Israeliness, Life, Music, Pop Culture

spitfire It was an opening line that did not forebode well.

“You picked an interesting night. Almost all the entries are metal,” said Bryan Steiner, greeting me at the bar of the Barby club in Tel Aviv Sunday night.

Steiner was referring to the 16 musical acts which were set to perform two songs a piece in the hopes of going on to the Israel finals of the Global Battle of the Bands Challenge. Steiner, the head of Blue Sun Records, along with promoter Carmi Wurtman and Barby owner Shaul Mizrahi, organized Israel’s participation in the event for the first time.

Over a dozen qualifying heats have taken place in October and November throughout the country with scores of Israeli bands vying to head to the finals taking place on Wednesday. The Israeli champion then goes on to the world finals in London on December 13, competing against the finalists from 36 other countries, with the winner receiving an artist development package worth $100,000.

Along with Sderot-based musician and producer Avi Vaknin, and Ziv Goland, a musical arranger for Dana International, I was asked to be one of the three judges for the event. However, unlike the high-profile American Idol model of in-your-face judging, we were allotted comfortable back-of-the-room tables and a scorecard to rate the entries from 1-20 and to provide written constructive criticism.

Battle of the bands have taken place for as long as there have been rock groups. Even in the mid-1960s, local high school bands would perform against each other at sock hops and on TV talent shows. One of the highlights of my college education in the late 1970s in Boston was attending the annual Rock & Roll Rumble held at the venerable punk club The Rat, where young hopefuls would wield “guitars like switchblades” in order to lay claim to the title of Beantown’s best band.

Turns out that not much has changed in 30 years. Despite the digital age of downloads and the gradual disappearance of CDs, the fading on the radio of guitar-based rock & roll in favor of studio wizardry hip hop, pop and dance music, and music in general receding as a number one priority among the social network-crazed youth culture, there’s still a lot of guitar slingers out there – of all ages.

The Barby was swarming with a mostly rambunctious teen audience – many of them bused in from Modi’in, where a good number of the competing acts hailed. The high school-aged entries, which made more than half of the 16 contestants stood in contrast to the half-dozen or so ‘older’ bands of adults, including one bass player who was even older than me, and a singer-songwriter, Yasmine Ariel who was in an advanced stage of pregnancy.

According to Steiner, amateur and professional musicians were eligible to sign up for the Challenge, with the only requirements being the ‘bands’ consist of two to eight members, all the music is live with no playbacks, and the songs are original compositions and not cover versions.

Regretting the fact I neglected to bring ear plugs, I took my seat, ready to face Steiner’s prognosis of a head banging evening. And indeed, there were a good number of acts – like Rockweiler (guess their genre) and Behind the Sun that looked and sounded like they learned everything about music in the back seat of Wayne and Garth’s car in Wayne’s World. Long hair flying in circular motions to the thunderous beats, they were parodies of a genre invented to be a parody.

Yet, there was something fresh and innocent about it nonetheless, as if despite the years of watching music videos and playing RockBand to get their moves just right, these kids were feeling music’s primal power and creating their own magic, no matter how derivative.

A big revelation for me was how musically tight and well-rehearsed every band was – this was no ‘hey, let’s enter the competition and write a song’ operation. While the lineup was male-dominant, women were represented by two high school bands featuring female singers of the Pat Benatar variety, a third with an incredible 16-year-old female lead guitarist, and the aforementioned Yasmine.

Particularly eye-opening were the school-age musicians, who must have been playing since they were kids and waiting for this day. It was a little sad that they’ve had to latch on to the music that their parents grew up with and many of their moves and riffs are mechanical regurgitations, but it was uplifting to see that another generation has caught the rock and roll bug.

When each band played, some singing in English some in Hebrew, its fans stormed to the front of the stage holding signs, pogo dancing and moshing in a show of solidarity. The audience also received scorecards, and like on American Idol, it was their vote, not the judges which ultimately determined the winner.

My top pick was a young four-piece band called Hageveret Harishona who performed sparkling guitar power pop with precision three-part harmonies . But chosen by the majority and headed to the finals on Wednesday is Spitfire 07, one of the female-led Modi’in high school bands. They were a ‘great for a high school band’ entry, and I gave them high marks for their spunky, arena rock performance and stage presence, while citing their lack of originality.

But they were unsurprisingly the audience favorites, with singer Meit Botton, dressed in Joan Jett black and reaching all the vocal shredding high notes, darting around the stage in various ‘rock chick’ poses.

While it’s unlikely they’ll be headed to London for the international finals, you can be sure the members of Spitfire 07 will keep their victory on Sunday night close to them for the rest of their lives. Even though there’s nothing new under the sun, rock & roll is still alive in Tel Aviv.

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