Although the band has only been established since 2003, BOOM PAM already have a cult following in Israel. Their cover version of the Greek song Boom Pam, performed with rock star Berry Sakharof, was a massive hit that flew straight into the Israeli charts in 2004. It had already been a hit in 1969 for the Greek singer Aris San, who emigrated to Tel Aviv in the fifties and was one of the first to use E-guitar for Greek music.
Meteoric as their career may have been, BOOM PAM did not simply appear out of nowhere overnight. It all began when the band’s guitarists Uri and Uzi moved into a flat together in the south of Tel Aviv and started experimenting with oriental guitar sounds. After a few guitar-fuelled nights and some compositions of their own, they called up their old school friend Tuby, a superb tuba player, and asked him to listen to what they’d come up with. Tuby didn’t hesitate for a minute. A new band was born Once they had enough pieces, they played their first gig in February 2003. All they needed now was a name. Just one week before the gig, they hit on BOOM PAM in homage to musical rebel Aris San. Even now, their eyes shine at the very mention of his name.
For a year, BOOM PAM performed as a trio in clubs and at weddings. Tuby played bass drum as well as tuba. But with his pedal foot threatening to take on a life of its own, the band started looking around for a drummer. And what could have been more obvious than to ask another old friend? Just one phone call to Dudu Kohav was all it took to persuade him to leave his spiritual mountain retreat near Jerusalem and join them in their musical experiment: “I haven’t a clue what you’re up to, but why the hell not?” The new band member didn’t have much time to get to grips with BOOM PAM’s repertoire, because their first foreign gig was already booked: Shantel, who had discovered the trio on one of his visits to Tel Aviv, had invited them to perform with him in Berlin. And so, as though they had been this sort of thing all their lives, they stormed the German State Opera House on the boulevard of Unter den Linden, transforming it into a hot and sweaty dance-fest that had the entire 800-strong audience on its feet.
Press reactions on their live shows ”The reaction of the audience was expressed by howling, breaking plates, hand clapping and mental dancing on the dance floor.” Haaretz ”I can officially say that Boom Pam’s live show will drain the juice out of you and kick you topless out to the street with a smile all over your face… Boom Pam play exquisite Balkan-surf-rock fuelled with a nuclear energy reactor that even “Vaanoonoo’s” (Israeli nuclear ex-cone freedom fighter) balls would have blushed being close to them.” Walla
“Probably the hottest name in town.” Time Out Tel Aviv
“Boom Pam succeeded in dismantling the audience from an anthropologic point of view and kicked them out of their chairs on to the dance floor on to a voyage.” Zman
“This time, Bucovina Club has a visit from our partner city of Tel Aviv. And what a visit! Boom Pam was the sensation at this year’s Museumsufer Fest. Just imagine two guitarists playing Balkan brass band sounds sweetened with Jewish melodies and driven along by a drummer and a tuba player. The whole thing smacks of the typical surf guitar sound you might expect to find in a Taratino film. They put Alexis Sorbas through the mangle, and they don’t spare the Middle East either This incredible cocktail is played with precision and heightened to the point of ecstasy – which is no less than you’d expect of the Bucovina Club, really. This is how a Tarantino soundtrack would sound if the film were set in the Balkans. This band plays music that goes straight to the heart.”
Journal Frankfurt
Yuriy Gurzhy (DJ, Russendisko) saw Boom Pam perform in Tel Aviv: “When they started playing a few hours later, I was in the audience in front of the small stage. Most of them were young people talking in Russian, Hebrew and English. The Boom Pam sound was an exotic mix of Arab and Greek pop, Gypsy music and surf. Within twenty minutes, the audience was dancing. Although the music was entirely instrumental, three Russian punks with lurid hairstyles and a bottle of vodka were singing along enthusiastically. The atmosphere just got better and better: Vodka and Red Bull was the cocktail of choice. The dance-floor was heaving. Some dancers couldn’t even fit in, so they clambered onto the stage.”
(from his blog of 16.03.2004)
"...When they slide in and out of 'middle eastern' scales and in to waltzes that ride the tuba bellowing um-pa-pa um-pa-pa, the dance floor goes nuts galloping along the beat and jumping up and down like pogo sticks. After two encores BOOM PAM leaves the stage with a 'lehayim'." Fader Magazine U.S.A
(from an article about the Bucovina Club @ Schauspiel Frankfurt in Germany)
Boom Pam:
Uzi Feinerman: guitar, banjo & vocals
Uri Brauner Kinrot: guitar, saxophone & Vocals
Yuval “Tuby” Zolotov: tuba
Dudu Kohav: drums & percussion
Band contact & world wide booking:
www.boompam.org
email:booking[at]boompam.org
Booking Europe: Florian Joeckel for guilty76
www.guilty76.de
email: joeckel[at]guilty76.de