Oi Va Voi Lyrics, Photos, Pictures, Paroles, Letras, Text for every songs

B i o g r a p h y
(by Nigel Williamson)

Having fought their way through a series of trials and tribulations that would have finished off a lesser band, the long-awaited second album (Oi Va Voi) takes their unique mix of global rhythms and club-friendly beats to new heights - bigger, bolder and with more attitude(ital) than anything even their most ardent fans could have imagined.

The band's acclaimed 2003 debut album "Laughter Through Tears", vibrant live shows and festival appearances made them everybody's tip for the top. Then, due to circumstances beyond their control, it all started to go wrong. A terminal dispute with their record company was followed by the loss of a band member and a serious illness within the band, initial attempts to record a follow-up album had to be put on hold. Twelve months on and Oi Va Voi have regrouped and regenerated on a new label with a new producer and the addition of exciting new recruits. Out of potential disaster they have fashioned a second album that expands Oi Va Voi's core sound with a whole new range of subtle yet vivid new hues and striking primary colours. Recorded in Israel and London, the songwriting is more crafted, the playing more fluid, and the diverse elements of their sound more fully integrated. If the last record left people wondering if Oi Va Voi were an electronic dance act, world music worthies or a rock'n'roll band, the new album renders such questions irrelevant by trampling the fences of genre and simplistic categorisation out of sight.

Oi Va Voi came together in the late 1990s when trumpeter Lemez Lovas, drummer Josh Breslaw, bassist Leo Bryant, clarinettist Steve Levi, guitarist Nik Ammar and violinist Sophie Solomon pooled their diverse musical backgrounds in left-field jazz, hip-hop, rock bands, drum n bass and Jewish klezmer. With the addition of K.T.Tunstall on guest vocals, their debut album fused modern dance music, singer-songwriter sensitivity and their Jewish cultural heritage with global rhythms drawn from Eastern Europe, the Mediterranean and beyond. Laughter Through Tears received rave reviews and won two nominations in the BBC Radio 2 awards for world music. Yet anybody who saw Oi Va Voi's spectacular live shows was left in little doubt that they were far more than a world music act with an enviable ability to rock a crowd and get a dance floor heaving.

Then in late 2004, KT Tunstall left the live set-up to become a million-selling, multi-platinum solo artist. The rest of the band congratulated her on her success, the search for a replacement was on. Their claim to have "auditioned every female vocalist in London" is only a slight exaggeration. Several were tried live, but none was quite right. Next Sophie Solomon signed a solo deal that ultimately proved incompatible with continued membership of the band. Meanwhile, the band and its record company were at odds over their future direction and to cap it all, illness within the group further hampered their progress. When they attempted to begin recording their second album in 2005, sessions were soon abandoned. There was far too much uncertainty in the air for them to focus fully on the task at hand.

Then slowly the realisation dawned that out of the ashes of their trials and tribulations, new possibilities could arise: not a chance to make a fresh start exactly, but certainly the opportunity to explore new spaces and expand their horizons. First they found the right singer in Alice McLaughlin, whose stunning voice combines the English purity of early Marianne Faithfull with something of the otherworldliness of Bjork. Next, producer Mike Spencer came on board. Best known for producing top ten hits for the likes of Jamiroquai and Kylie Minogue, his less celebrated recordings of traditional music in Sudan and Cambodia made him the perfect fit for Oi Va Voi's own unique eclecticism. More recently, Australian violinist Haylie Ecker from pop-classical string quartet Bond has been added to the extended Oi Va Voi live family.

With a new record deal in place, band and producer decamped to Tel Aviv. The change of scene proved to be a tonic and the second album began to fall into place. Work continued back in London and the result is an album that thrillingly realises all of the possibilities opened up by their debut album. Black Sheep, the first track recorded in Israel, represents a manifesto of all that is best about the band, the skittering beats perfectly counter-posed by thrilling Arabic strings played by members of the Nazareth Orchestra and a vocal by Alice that announces her as a memorable successor to KT Tunstall. Described by the band as "a kitsch space song”, Yuri, sounds like the French electronic duo Air kidnapped for the night by a bunch of crazed Russian gypsies in a Moscow vodka bar. Worry Lines and Dry Your Eyes illustrate how far Oi Va Voi have come as songwriters. The former features an aching vocal by lyricist Steve Levi, while the latter is as beautiful and dysfunctional a love song as you're likely to hear. Dissident is another tour de force with a stunning vocal by Hungarian folk singer Agi Szaloki offset by Levi's haunting cantor, while the instrumental Balkanic reminds us that Oi Va Voi were championing East European beats long before Gogol Bordello or Basement Jaxx.

Oi Va Voi have not only survived in the face of adversity. They've returned with an album of startling ambition and breathtaking audacity that triumphantly defies everything fate has conspired to throw at them

Laughter Through Tears

Refugee

You ask me
Why it is I come to you
When someone else is just as good
I asked them but they said the same
Didn't even ask my name

Explain to me
Just what it is you have to lose
Take a minute in my shoes
Don't you feel like you've paid your dues
Already

I'll show you
That all our fates are so entwined
Don't lose your faith in humankind
Just don't forget my state of mind
Is fragile

Together
We can enjoy the taste of dignity
As long as you believe in me
I'll show you my reality
I've seen a few

You ask me
Why it is I come to you
When someone else is just as good
I asked them but they said the same
Didn't even ask my name

There's another refugee
There's another refugee
Oh oh there's another refugee
Oh oh there's another refugee

Yesterday's Mistakes

Don't need another resolution to feel
As though I'm going somewhere, somewhere

You said you needed me
Or at least that's what I thought
At times the memories
Seem to be knocking at my door
I've seen the film a million times
Feels like I wrote the storyline
I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday

I like to think I'm stronger now
Victim of common sense
The truth is that I know I still
Confuse the past with the present tense
Condensing what we had
To a single frame
That sticks in my mind
As I try to move on
The same image comes back every time

They were yesterdays mistakes
And they were yesterdays mistakes
Yesterday's mistakes
Somewhere

Forgive my selfishness
I'd be grateful if you can
Forget my ingratitude
You think I'm twice the girl I am
They say we should forgive
But not forget
What has gone before
I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday

And they were yesterdays mistakes
Yesterday's mistakes
They were yesterdays mistakes

I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday
I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday

I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday
I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday

I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday
I refuse to replay
The mistakes that we made yesterday

Od'yishoma be'harei yehuda, uvechutzot Yerushalayim
Od'yishoma be'harei yehuda, uvechutzot Yerushalayim

Kol sasson v'kol simcha
Kol chatan v'kol kallah

Od'yishoma be'harei yehuda, uvechutzot Yerushalayim
Od'yishoma be'harei yehuda, uvechutzot Yerushalayim

Kol sasson v'kol simcha
Kol chatan v'kol kallah...

Also wanted to add a free-translation:

Still will be heard

Still will be heard in the Mountains of Judas, And in the streets of Jerusalem
Still will be heard in the Mountains of Judas, And in the streets of Jerusalem

A voice of laughter and a voice of Joy
A voice of a groom and a voice of a bride.

Still will be heard in the Mountains of Judas, And in the streets of Jerusalem
Still will be heard in the Mountains of Judas, And in the streets of Jerusalem

A voice of laughter and a voice of Joy
A voice of a groom and a voice of a bride.

Ladino song

Yo me enamoré de un aire
De un aire de una mujer
Una mujer muy hermosa
Linda de mi corazón
Yo me enamoré de un aire
Linda de mi corazón

Yo me enamoré de noche
En luna ella me engaño
Si esto era de día
Yo no daba amor
Yo me enamoré de noche
Yo no daba amor

If I fall in love
Sun above me love
It won't be by moonlight
Won't be by moonlight
Moonlight, moonlight

Si otra vez me enamoro
De un aire de una mujer
De una mujer muy hermosa
Linda de mi corazón
Si otra vez me enamoro
Sea de día con sol

If I fall in love
Sun above me love
It won't be by moonlight
Won't be by moonlight
Moonlight, moonlight

Oh If I get to you
All I'm wanted to
It won't be by moonlight
Won't be by moonlight
Moonlight, moonlight

Won't be by moonlight
Moonlight, moonlight
Won't be by moonlight
Moonlight, moonlight

D'ror Yikra

D'ror yikra I'ven im bat
V'yin-tzar-chem k'mo vavat
N'im shim-chem v'lo yushbat

( Feat. Earl Zinger )

Now there's many tales
In many cites to tell
And there's so many ways
That the story is told

There's a room with no bed in the heart of the ghetto
Where the rags and words lie still
There's a room with a chair in the heart of the city
But only memories sit there
Princelet street in the heart od the ghetto
Still Katz sells bags and strings
Calling you back are the streets of the ghetto
Climb the stairs where you're from
There's a room at the top of the heart of the gheto
Where the gypsy's been and gone

Oh see them watching
Oh streets always watching
They're a watching now
Oh see them watching
Oh ghosts always watching
They're a watching now

Saying them prayers by edge of the city
And now it's time to move on
New voices talk in the heart of the ghetto
Make a little money move on
Memory thieves in the heart of the ghetto
Don't want ghosts movin' on
But the gypsy's on the loose in the heart of the city
And now ya see he move on

Oh see them watching
Oh streets always watching
They're a watching now
Oh see them watching
Oh ghosts always watching
They're a watching now

Listen to the street move on
Letters and numbers move on
Gypsy always move on
See him there then he gone
See him there then he gone
Always go to move on
See him there then he gone
See him there then he gone
Always go to move on
Always go to move on
Always go to move on

Hora

It's all about identity
Construction of a family
Of difference and simile
What I give you and you give me

It's all about identity
This tribal sense of dignity
Of tolerance and unity
Of prejudice and bigotry

It's all about identity
A web of who we'd like to be
Let's cut and paste our memory
A dark and timeless industry

It's all about identity
A strength and solidarity
A dazed, confused desire to find
A place and time in history

It's all about identity
Or how the sheer majority
Impose a predetermined badge
And wait to judge you silently

It's all about identity
A retrospective odyssey
But where I live and who I meet
Are stronger in defining me

There were jewish musicians who
Who's life music was

A jewish wedding or a jewish holiday
Can not go by without shedding a lot of tears
We must do a lot of crying

We cry always
When a baby is born we cry
Why, tears of joy
When the baby becomes Bar or Bat Mitswa we cry
When we leave them to the weddings, to the choepa, we cry

All nations the world over, all people
Whenever they celebrate the new year
They dance into the new year
We swim into ours, we used to say
Because if you went into the rosj hasjana
If you walked into the synagoge
You could swim into the ocean of tears

Oi va voi, this is your name, Oi va voi

Yuri

( Words by Lemez Lovas )

Russian radio translation:
"This is Moscow speaking, all radio transmitters in the soviet union are broadcasting.
We have received news from the state news agency Tass about the world's first flight of man in space."

I am a rocket
The power of the system
It's bullet-proof technology
Oh we're going to a new world
Going to a better place

This is just the first step
And everyone will follow me
Hold me up as an example
There's no need to watch my back
'Cause my friends have got it for me

I'm gonna go down in history
As the man who made a difference
Call me egotistical
Well how dare you care you call me selfish
I'm doing this for mankind

'Cause I am a rocket
A child of the motherland
Pioneer for humanity,
I'm a wholesome superhero
For the worldwide society

We're heading out to outer space
We're going forth for the human race

'Cause I am a prodigy
A part of the master plan
A symbol of equality
Blasting out into the future
I'm a man defying gravity

They'll build me a monument
Name everything after me
Schools and hospitals
Armies of boys and girls
I'm gonna live forever
Immortality is mine!

We're heading out to outer space
We're going forth for the human race

We're heading out to outer space
We're going forth for the human race

Russian radio:
"The cosmonaut pilot of the space ship Sputnik Vostok
is the citizen of the Soviet Union of Socialist Respublics,
pilot Major Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin."

Further Deeper

( Words by Lemez Lovas )

I feel deflated
Let down by heroes
Walls of silence
Soak up the echos
Of my ideals
Sold down the river
I blame my own
Naive behaviour
Time again
I'm a complete beginner

I have a theory
Too complicated
To explain now
Don't make me waste it
But you should realise that
For your freedom
I might just hurt you
But I didn't mean to

Our flesh and blood
In mute agreement
We stand like idols
We should be kneeling
A single signal
I'll flick the lever
And we'll all go falling
Further deeper

When the day comes calling
That's when we'll go falling down
Won't we all go falling down

Look down

(words by lemez lovas)

When I need you beside me, i can do things to myself I regret
My thoughts become distant, my mind turns everything right on its head
I search in vain for the positive, to stop all the demons from talking aloud
It's not that I’m lost, it's just there are times i don't want to be found

I'm feeling my way
One step at a time
I know that you're there
But I can't always find you
The next thing I know
The circus begins
And I’m walking along
Doing anything not to look down

Don't let go of my hand, I’m doing anything not to look down

When I need you beside me, at times I’m afraid ‘cause I don't know the cost
I focus my thoughts, or at least those that I hope I can trust
I start to feel all the maybes slowly spiral inside of my chest
Guess I’m no good at perspective so I should admit this is what i do best

I'm feeling my way
One step at the time
I know that you're there
But i can't always find you
The next thing I know
The circus begins
And I’m walking along
Doing anything not to look down

Don't let go of my hand, I’m doing
Anything not to look down

Black sheep

I’ve had enough of all the clichés
Out of sight is out of my mind
I’ve had enough of all the life-changing advice
They invent to pull the wool over my eyes.
I’ve had enough of all the clichés
The thought that nothing is even enough
I’m fine until the fears – they catch me unawares
Creep up and start to whisper sweet nothings in my ears.

I’m sending out thins tune
To places i once knew
To all the people i have lost
I’m sending out this tune
To another space and time
To another day in my life.

I’ve had enough of all the clichés
Sticks and stones they never break me in
But every single word, no matter how absurd,
Leaves the faintest trace under my skin.
I’ve had enough of all the clichés
I don’t assume the things i cannot see.
I try not to be rash – to ponder all the facts –
But false conclusions always seem to jump to me.

I’m sending out thins tune
To places i once knew
To all the people i have lost
I’m sending out this tune
To another space and time
To another day in my life.

Makes no difference
When I try
The numbers all
Multiply

Dry your eyes

What kind of path was it
That brought us to this place
So far from that first kiss
To this emptiness
How did all our trust
Fall down between the cracks
Can we ever comprehend
How it came to that…

Baby baby dry your eyes
Guess it wasn’t meant to be
I can only rationalize
See you in another life
When all has turned to grey
We’ll be born again as birds
Learn how to fly away
And life won’t be so absurd

Last you held me near
The memories made me freeze
Throwing motions absently
In a parody
As we lie side by side
The water rushes in
Seems like a bridge too far
Beyond the place we’re in

So i guess we found the line
Where you and I begin

Stepped over the other side
Wish we could start again

*** Thanx a lot to Yvonne for this one ***

Worry lines

I’ll make a sign that stirs a million eyes
Hold up my hand to be analysed
Echoes the pound of a crowd for miles around
Turn off the sound and those worry lines

I fear the world in black and white
My instincts fraught with compromise
My words are smeared in others rhymes
I lost my voice but kept my sight

I lift up my eyes my head is clear
I turn to the skies my head is clear
I look in your eyes my head is clear

I hope you enjoyed learning and singing these songs
Also, that you’ve discovered something about your voice
About its power, and its potential

But most of all
I hope that you could feel
Some of the spirit of Bulgaria in your hearts
And that’s every time you sing these songs
They get closer to you