Recorded since 1988

Three albums, one fusion

Klezmer, Polka, Czardas, classic rock and Latin music, recorded across four albums. A fourth album is on the way, following each record down a different musical thread.

Beatriz and Bass

The discography

Three albums, three threads

Album Cover on a Bench

2001

Umpires of Straw

Subtitled 'Slavic Music Collected in the Midwest performed by California Surfer Gypsy Punk Rockers', the debut gathers the band's early East European material and pushes it through a surf-punk attack.

2005

Fighting for Harmony

A search for Byzantine roots in dance music from Southern California and Tijuana, tracing shared melodic threads across the border.

Fighting for Harmony Album & Jeff with Bouzouki Instrument
The Electrocarpathians - Cafe Bego

2010

Cafe Bego

Cafe Bego celebrates Flamenco influences, bringing guitar-driven rhythm and handclap phrasing into the band's Eastern European and Latin mix.

A fourth album is on the way, continuing the series.

Jeff Pekarek, 2010

Panamerican Shanty

Traditional sea shanties and film-noire-inspired originals tell the story of the Nakai Nakai, a fabled whale-tooth scrimshaw piece.

Poetry and narration, partly in Spanish, give the perspectives of a tango dancer, a late-night disc jockey, a private eye, and various mariners. A chorus of rum-lit sailors provides abstract commentary between the stories.

Before there was worldbeat. Before the word multicultural was coined to describe 87.4% of the music you now hear, before eclectic mix became the byline of any band that might have a bouzouki in tow, there were the Electrocarpathians.— The Troubadour magazine