Maximum Yield Cannabis USA April/May 2018 | Page 61

came to the States, to Vermont first. Right outside of the
refugee house where we were stationed (in Vermont),
there was a reggae house, and as soon as I walked out
on the porch, I think maybe I looked so lost, and they
took me under their wing. Soon I was getting stoned
with them.
So, you believe in cannabis legalization,
even if you rarely imbibe?
Of course, I believe in legalization, who doesn’t? In our
circles, who doesn’t?
How do you think the rock and roll life and gypsy
life complement each other?
So, I love the myth that I tour all the time, and maybe I’m
a fool for breaking the myth, but truth be told, I take very
long times to myself. Sure, I’m out there, I’ve been out
there on the road and made a lot of places in the world
my home because of that. I love to travel and bring our
emotional music and spectacle elsewhere; however, that
is all heavily balanced by, say, my time in the botanical
gardens in Brazil, where nobody knows where I am for six
months, sometimes not even my band. So, going back to
the gypsy roots thing, perhaps some of the genetics from
that help, because, as you know, 99 per cent of musicians
hate touring, but I seem to thrive on it. And that’s how I
like it, I mean, what’s there not to like? It’s not easy. If you
don’t know how to do it, it will kill you.
this world of music? I guess I felt like there was a certain
amount of stories that I was destined to tell. So, I was
looking into storytelling and members. I was very drawn
to tell the story in the more dynamic way possible, so my
tools and my craft were Nick Cave, Iggy Pop, The Doors,
Leonard Cohen. I kind of want to put together a story and a
performance and give them an experience.
You claimed from the stage that there’s a rumor
about gypsy jazz and gypsy punk. How do they
intermingle in your eyes?
At the same time I got to know punk rock, I knew some-
body with a collection of early jazz. When jazz was really
jolly and groundbreaking, that spirit always stayed with
me, but you can see it in my performance more than my
playing. I use my body as an instrument and my other
skills, piano, guitar, drums, they’re quite basic, but the
spirit of improvisation drives Gogol Bordello. So behav-
iorally, my improvisation really lays there. And plus,
just think about the enthusiasm of early jazz musicians,
it was just outstanding. You hear stories about amazing
jazz players from the early years that got into jazz via
hearing this tremendous trumpet sound coming down the
Mississippi River on a boat. And there are so many sto-
ries like that, where these kids would hear it and follow
after the boats as far as they could. That was the shit,
man, running after the boat and listening to music.
Who were some of your earliest musical influences?
Back in Ukraine the ratio of people who knew rock and
roll music is maybe one to 20,000, so I was lucky and
very grateful to my father who basically downloaded
all my music knowledge. I’m a lucky bastard. I was born
and raised to the sounds of Jimi Hendrix, the Doors,
Velvet Underground, the Stooges, and everything that
was happening at the time, so much more farther out.
So, coming out of that bubble, I was just kind of boiling
in that juice until I discovered my own music, which is
more punk rock. That was like a second wave of massive
influence. And then out here I got of course learning
the language, learning English, what do I want to do in
“
I’M A LUCKY
BASTARD. I WAS BORN
AND RAISED TO THE SOUNDS
OF JIMI HENDRIX, THE DOORS,
VELVET UNDERGROUND, THE
STOOGES, AND EVERYTHING
THAT WAS HAPPENING AT
THE TIME, SO MUCH MORE
FARTHER OUT.
"
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