Awful subgenre of Hawaiian music -> European

Flicking through the second hand vinyl in the UK, I often happen upon albums of Hawaiian music, but made by Europeans. The quantity is astonishing but the quality is inevitably awful. While the musicians can certainly play their instruments, they were probably churning out big band tunes the previous week.

These albums seem to originate from Great Britain, Germany & Holland, in the main. Not too sure why that's the case! Often, you have to look really closely to see that it was recorded in London rather than Hawaii, but occasionally, the name gives the game away. (Such as the Big Ben Hawaiian Band!)

Anyway, most of the time I give these albums a miss, but I thought the 'Benny Hill' quality of this piss-poor offering does a good job of illustrating the (sub)genre.

Trader Woody

[ Edited by: Trader Woody on 2004-08-31 17:08 ]

I have some wierd old albums from Holland. One of them is hawaiian style music, but really badly done!

There are some "island" looking people on the cover, but I think they are indonesians, since there are a lot of them living in holland.

I agree with TW....it seems like this was just a "concept album" for most of these bands, and that they were probably playing polka music the week before!!

Oh yeah, and that one wahine at the bottom, looking at the camera....wow!!!

yeah, I have some german's bad organ hawaiian music...but your cover's really cool.

I actually LOVE some European Hawaiian music..especially some of their great steel players, like Wout Steenhuis, Rudi Wairata. One of my favorites is a German LP by a trumpet player: Frank Valdor: Hawaii Beat A Go-Go. It's AWESOME..like the Tijuana Brass go on a luau. My favorite pseudo-Hawaian group would be Belgium's The Waikikis..great, strange mostly original instrumentals.

Here are two examples that are not bad, in fact I like them and wouldn’t part with them, even though they’re not authentic, I just don’t care. The Krontjong Nusantara is from Holland and the Hula Hawaiians are german.

KK

i'm glad the second one is german ~ otherwise, the sentiment of the title in english is kind of harsh... DIE! :)

I picked up a cassette, "Jodle Birge pa Hawaii" a while ago. Apparently Jodle Birge was a big entertainer in Denmark. I really have to wonder how this item ended up in the Salvation Army store in Bullhead City, Arizona, by the way. Anyway, if it was in English the corniness of it would be insufferable, but the novelty of hearing "Hawaiian music" like Aloha Ohe (sic) and The Moon of Manakoora, not to mention such Hawaiian classics as Jamaica Farewell (!), in a northern European language I am totally unfamiliar with, makes it kind of a strange pleasure to listen to now and then. It was recorded, at least partially, in Hawaii, and features Jerry Byrd on guitar.

Strange Pleasure - I like that!

http://www.omodern.com/kult/index.html

OK, now that is NOT fair on a Monday morning. I have a lot to do, but ended up spending half an hour clicking through those photos!
:lol:
I want those huge shirt collars to make a comeback. Anyone care to volunteer to be in the vanguard of the resurgence? If you blaze the trail I promise to follow. Really.

It is a little-known fact that in 1970s Sweden, pop musicians could often be seen flying through the air to and from gigs, using their shirt collars as wings...

My personal favorite is the "gert Johnny's"!!!

How many of these bands wear all green and red outfits? Didn't they know that those two colors are the most hard for the human brain/eye to process?

http://www.svenskadansband.se/

Another link where you can spend hours looking at these dorks. Even the modern ones dress in matching outfits. Just like the Smoking Menehunes.

Nope, new favorite!!

http://www.svenskadansband.se/img2405.htm