Cheers to our sponsors!

What's On Kyiv came through and printed a full page article about Ilya, the band, and the event, along with our event poster on another page.

Thanks to Neil and Tatiyana from What's On - the article and photo look great, and I hear we're already getting calls inquiring about the event! Success!

Man, wouldn't it be cooooool if we sold out? Tres cool...

Check out the online version here (even though it's prettier in print). ;)

Ironic experience with Jimmy Bosch

So, it's Bosch T-9 and I'm getting closer and closer to *****ing my pants. ;) In all seriousness, we're quite excited. In fact, before anything crazy happens, I tend to get very calm, and that's kind of where I'm at now.

In fact, I was so much the "calm before the storm" that when I called JB yesterday to finalize the last plans, I was trying to not be hyper and I think I put him to sleep... haha.

But there was one ridiculous part of the conversation. Jimmy, as the great man that he is, wanted to let me know that people already know about us. Now, the more times I tell the story, the more it could be like the fishing story, where you keep exaggerating the size of the fish you caught, but I'm pretty sure this is how it went:

JB: "By the way, did you know that you guys are well known?"

KP: "Really, what do you mean?"

JB: "When I was in Cali, Colombia, I said that I was going to Ukraine and people were asking me if I was going to play with Dislocados. So, they know you down there. They even have your music."

Now, when I was re-telling this to Ilya, the irony suddenly dawned on me. JIMMY BOSCH was telling ME, Karolina, that DISLOCADOS is well known.

Jimmy Bosch.

It reminded me of this Seinfeld scene (minus the anger and the dumping, but my enthusiasm for the irony was pretty much similar to Elaine's here):

Gotta love JB. I'll try to keep up with the blog a bit more if I can for the days leading up to the concert cuz I think it'll be interesting to keep track of this ridiculous experience. I already told my facebook friends, the next stop for me is dancing on Mars in my underwear.

Great review

Big thanks goes out to Azucar y Candela for doing this great review of our album! Check it out here.

In other news, we're just working really hard for this Jimmy Bosch concert... so much stuff to prepare... But it's going to be worth it. I can't believe we've got like 15 people working full or part time on this and we still have new stuff to do every day... but it's kind of fun. And it will definitely be worth it.

Official ads and announcements go out in December. Keep your ears and eyes open...

In yet more news, my wooden guiro stick - my favorite one, the white one doesn't have enough friction for me - is finally starting to split... :( Also, I didn't realize how hard it is to find a Puerto Rican guiro anywhere outside of Puerto Rico. I can't even find it online to order (or at least a place that will ship to Poland). Boo.

Can I blog about this?

So it's November 9, 2009, the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the beginning of democracy sweeping through Central and Eastern Europe.

As the first original salsa band to come out of the former Soviet Union, we're proud to remember this day, even though quite a few band members (myself not included) were under 5 years old at the time.

At the same time, we're dealing with some frustration. And, unfortunately, I'm even scared to blog about this, which is a shame that I'm scared to exercise some free speech while we say we've come so far. So, before I go on, let me just say that I, Karolina Patocki, am taking this on myself, and am not expressing the views of any other band member in particular.

Presidential elections are coming up in Ukraine, and right when the campaign opened, a mass hysteria started about swine flu in the country. It is true that there are many people sick, but first of all, it is from all flus and respiratory illnesses, and as far as I understand, the statistics this year are not dissimilar to any other year.

Dislocados is organizing the biggest event of our lifetime as a band, and one of the biggest multicultural concerts to this date in Ukraine, intending to open the country up to embrace other cultures and people of different backgrounds working together to enjoy their common passion, regardless of their background.

And yet now there's a talk about a state of emergency in the country, possibly cancelling the upcoming elections for the foreseeable future.

And we are frustrated. We're working for a better Ukraine, for a better unity of international culture in these 20 years of freedom...

Well, we refuse to give in. The show must go on. We're going on with the concert on the planned date of January 23rd. We believe that it will happen and it will be a success, and we ask all Ukrainians to join us.

And as we close with the words of our Plena Pa' Tontos, now you understand why we sing:

A mi me cansa la politica

La economia, la religion

Quiero cantar en armonia

Porque la plena (y nuestra salsa dura) celebra mi pasion.

I'm tired of politics

Of economics, of religion

I want to sing in harmony

Because the plena (and our salsa dura) celebrates my passion.