It has been 30 years since Israeli rock was at its peak

Nick Floyd, drummer for Pink Floyd, once said in an interview that if you had long hair and walked the right streets of London in the ’70s, someone at a record company would have already signed you and your friends to a contract for an album. That statement can certainly be placed (with some adjustments) also in Tel Aviv of the early 1990s. In recent years, it has been difficult to find bands that sing in Hebrew on the radio, but then they were full. Record companies were desperately looking for those who would better translate into Hebrew the sounds and voices that Axl Rose, Kurt Cobain, Eddie Vedder and their friends provided in their clips that were aired on MTV.

1991, which began with the Gulf War that sent us all to shelters, could have been a terrible year for the Israeli music market. In retrospect, it became one of the most prolific and diverse the genre knew. When one compares the relative downtime of that time in light of what Israeli musicians have been going through under the corona’s restrictions for nearly a year, it is perceived almost as a joke. It was a year of shift changes: the midway music that dominated radio throughout the 80s began to move aside, and was replaced by quite a few rock bands that flooded the record stores with beautiful debut albums and starred in rock festivals in Arad, Eilat and Tzemach that attracted tens of thousands of young people with hair Down to the shoulders, a backpack on the back and a sleeping bag in the hand.

In contrast to the “last summer” of temporary insanity – the hit that the editors of the C network parade crowned as “Song of the Year” of 1991, the musical upheaval of that decade lasted more than one sweet summer. But not much more. In late 1995, following the tragedy of Mashina’s performance at the Arad Festival and the assassination of Rabin, Israeli rock stocks plunged sharply, and radio sought a more relaxed atmosphere and guitars disappeared. For the young people who heard the next ten albums, on the way to school or university, they remain alive to this day.

Yossi Elephant, the guitar hero and producer of this mighty album, did not get to hold a copy of “Changes in Screaming Habits”. He died of a heart attack shortly after Arkady Duchin, Micha Sheetrit and their friends finished recording one of the best rock albums released here, then and in general. After the debut album (the beautiful one in itself) and the gloom, Elephant was able to direct Natasha’s friends here to the center, even though he came from the hard wings of alternative rock. Almost every song here had a nice airtime on the radio and the sales were very nice. Even 30 years later, “Another Touch”, “On the Line”, “A Man Without an Eternity”, “In One Sane Minute”, “A New World Order” and the rest are some of the most beautiful songs written and played here. Immediately afterwards, Duchin and Sheetrit mixed up their artistic talents and aspirations – and also their sales – in the megalomaniacal “Radio Bella Bella” project, after which the band disbanded.

Here is an example of the interaction that flourished then in the Hebrew rock clique. Berry Sakharof, who received a siege of two lyrics to his album, returned it when he, along with Corinne Elal, produced the debut album of Carmela Gross Wagner, the band that Tzur formed after Tatoo disbanded. While Alona Daniel, still out of that band, conquered radio in the Gulf War with “On the Roofs of Tel Aviv,” Tzur sang about much darker and scarier things. Although the band’s name was composed of the family names of the neighbors in the house where Tzur grew up in the Krayot, they came to the whole country. Except for “Impressionist Picture” and “Illusion Butterflies,” most of the songs here were pretty hard to digest, even to the ears of the music editors on pre-playlist radio. “Black Flower” may not have sold in quantities, but it remains one of the bravest and most impressive albums released that year.

In 1991, Mishina members took a year off from the band, and Shlomi Bracha used it to produce this album. If “Black Flower” was the darkest of the Hebrew albums released in 1991, “Who Murdered Agneta Falskog” was probably the least understood of them. With songs like “Against the direction of the bristles”, “Am I a political text?”, Mixing Abba’s name – while disrupting – with the name of the album (today it could have been the basis for an intriguing podcast) and lines like “Buy yourself a holiday gift / gift, gift, gift For the holiday / I will also receive within the limits explained / Therefore who am I to throw stones at the sea “(” Holiday gift “), you did not always understand what exactly the singer Ehad Fischoff means when he sings. But when you listened to the subject of the hat, and especially to “Next in line is a horse,” it was impossible to erase the smile. It was a super original noise and nonsense celebration that did not last long. Shortly after the release of this great album the quintet disbanded.

Unlike Roquefort which is still here, the Ascot blend did not really last long. Assaf Amdursky, Yirmi Kaplan and Amir (Django) Rossiano formed this endearing ensemble after graduating from the Rimon School of Music. They managed to release only one album, but despite good performances, especially for “The Intimate Room” “And Maybe Some Comfort Will Come” and “My Girl”, they chose to unpack the package and embark on solo careers. Amdursky abandoned the alternative and lean rock that was presented here and broke into a long affair with electronics. Kaplan – at least at the beginning of his career as a lead singer – still maintained the wild wind that blew here, and only Django remained truly true to the monastic guitar-bass-drum format that characterized this album. Although good friends have remained, the Ascot mix has since reunited only once. Maybe the second one will be on the occasion of a re-release of the album on vinyl record – really it’s time.

Ethniks were the backlash to all the guitar bands here (and also to those who did not make the list). Or in the division of those days: While the IDF waves sanctified the rock ensembles of Tel Aviv, in the C network we ground the songs that appeared in “Masala”. And you can guess for yourself who you listened to more. The station also awarded Ethniks the title of “Band of the Year”. And two of the album’s hits entered the top ten in the annual parade: “The Fruit Spot” and the excellent “Katorna Masala”. The latter also revealed Zehava Ben to the general public. Ethnics not only sounded different from the rest of the bands then (many keyboards and quite a few ripples), they also looked different: Opposite the smoky rockers of Sheinkin, Zeev Nehama and Tamir Kaliski were more reminiscent of a pair of nerdy accountants who happened to be involved in the music business. At the time critics were quite arrogant about Ethnics, 30 years later they can admit that at least in this case they were wrong

In the mid-eighties, it seems that there was no living room in Israel where a copy of David Broza’s “The Woman With Me” was not played on the turntable. After the Spanish Schlager, Broza hoped to replicate the success abroad as well and left for the United States. In 1991 he returned with “Stolen Kiss”, which may not have sold as “The Woman With Me”, but was no less beautiful than him. Along with his longtime partner, Jonathan Geffen , Signed here for half of the songs, The Spanish Guitar Phenomenon received two lyrics from Meir Ariel. The first, “Under the Sky”, was for years the most sought after entrance song on the way to the canopy, and won a (very) long performance at Broza’s Sunrise performances in Masada. “, In which the Curly Troubadour also participated was the Canaanite version of the West that understands that despite dreams of America, we are still in the Middle East (” Look, look at these ‘Gary Cooper’ / ‘Clint Eastwoods’ his voice,’ They ‘will answer’ falcons to the bush Your long tongue / Western culture “).

Legend has it that it took Shalom Hanoch about three minutes to write “So and so”, one of the biggest hits of 1991. “In this incarnation” is indeed considered Hanoch’s less “important” album – certainly when placed next to “A Man Within Himself” and “White Wedding” . But he arranged for the Israeli rock king one of the most beautiful years of his career, probably after the failure in which the bombastic “Only Man” was accepted. There were great songs here (“So and so” and the gospel theme song), an important and uncommon discussion of Israeli-Palestinian relations (“just like you”) and lyrics that came from the good friend, Meir Ariel (“Say No” and the great “Victoria”). The dream list of musicians included Moshe Levy, the late Roni Peterson, as well as the bouncy bass of Yossi Payne and the saxophones of Jaroslav Jakubowicz. “In This Incarnation” is not only one of Enoch’s most beautiful and good albums, but also his latest that has really become a sales hit. 30 years have passed since then.