That Goddamn Rat

rjzimmerman:

Strange post for me, but I’m sharing because this story and the embedded videos pulled me in. I wouldn’t characterize the music played by this band from Mongolia as “heavy metal,” but it’s definitely rock, with a strange, harsh tone to it based upon the instruments the band uses and the guttural tones used in the singing. The story tells us that instruments are based upon Mongolian tradition, such as guitar/fiddle which can be played to sound like a horse, and the guttural tone of singing. Very interesting.

The band is called The HU, from the Mongolian root word for human.

Anyway, two videos from the story.

Description of this video from the story:

In the band’s first song, “Yuve Yuve Yu” (What’s going on?), they mention Genghis Khan and how he was fated to bring nations together. The video begins with images of people inside playing video games, watching television and looking at their phones. A door is opened and the band’s four members step into different natural settings: cliffs, desert, forest and lake. The message they hope to convey through their lyrics and imagery is that people need to pay attention to nature and their history and culture, explains lead singer TS. Galbadrakh, known as “Gala,” 29.

The second video, which is kind of creepy:

Description of this video:

Leather jackets, skull rings and bandannas alongside intricately carved Mongolian horsehead fiddles are just some of the images in the first two music videos the Mongolian band The Hu released on YouTube this fall. Excited listeners from around the globe have posted comments like: “This makes me want to ride a horse and shoot people with a bow” and “This sounds like ancient mongol rock of 1000 b.c. Really badass!” (sic)