Customer Reviews

Sex & Violins

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What do you get when you inject a lethal dose of techno into Hee-haw style country music? You'd probably get something like Rednex's Sex & Violins, the same way Bond injected a new sound into classical music.

The female vocalist sounds a bit like Cyndi Lauper on helium, while the male vocalist sounds at home on Hee Haw or the Red Green Show. Rednex don't stop at fiddles, techno beats, and country rhythms--the music is filled with barnyard noises like cows, chickens, and horses. Oh yes, and yeeehaws!

This is a treat for anyone's CD. Heck, put the CD on random, excluding tracks #4, #7, #11, #12, and party away! However, of those four, "Rolling Home" is actually a sweet ballad with a harmony chorus. "Nowhere In Idaho" is a lazy ballad with a forlorn steel guitar, which is interrupted in the middle by a cowboy's monologue saying that the "song is about a man and a woman, what else?" and the sound of a whinnying horse. Tweaked!

"Cotton-Eye Joe," the single, opens the album and sets the stage for the entire album. A different mix of it also closes the album. For those not in the know, the song is also on the Malcolm In The Middle soundtrack.

Song No. 8 has got to have a record for longest song title. (I think Fiona Apple's clinched the one for longest album title. It also happens to be the shortest song on here, clocking in at 2:20.

"Shooter" is yet another machismo-laced song about a man and his best friend, his gun, except this time he's singing the verses, while his girl's doing the chorus.

"The McKenzie Brothers," no, not Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas, but considering the rest of the album, it is still a strange brew. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.) Anyway, it's a wild west tale done in monologue over a lazy steel guitar.

"Wild And Free" has the swiftest tempo of the 14 songs. If you play this in your brand new Ferrari while hightailing it down the interstate, don't be surprised if A) you get a speeding ticket, B) your engine overheats and smashes through the hood of your car, or C) both.

"Fat Sally Lee" comes in second in terms of tempo, and in the bridge, the Cyndi-ish vocalist dementedly squeaks, "Step one, step two. Step too and shake your boots!"

A one-off effort by a bunch of crazy Swedes. Pity--we could have used a second album, called More Explicit Sex & Violins maybe?

I'm proud to have a copy of the Rednex' only album--SEX & VIOLINS--which I bought in May 1996. The first song I heard from that album was COTTON-EYE JOE, which I heard on the radio, in 1994.

The Rednex--from Stockholm, Sweden, by the way--were successful in combining country music and techno to form a unique sound that only the Rednex (as far as I know) could produce: high-tech country!

I'm not a country music fan; but, I still recommend SEX & VIOLINS to everyone.

I am PROUD to own my ONLY Techno-Country CD: Rednex's "Sex & Violins". This CD will have you dancing for hours on end (well, if you hit the repeat button on your CD player). It contains all their world wide hits, from the dance floor stompers "Cotton-Eye Joe", "Old Pop In An Oak" and "Wild'N'Free" to the sweet ballad "Wish You Were Here", produced by Max Martin and Denniz PoP, the masterminds behind Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC, and Ms. Spears. Also featured on this CD are some sterling album cuts, such as the hilarious "The Sad But True Story...", which features the chorus lyric "I'll be harder than your husband, I'll be harder than your man; I'll hit you with my twenty-gauge until you cannot stand". "Shooter" features perhaps the best use of female vocals on the CD, with the vocalist reaching into what could almost be called ethereal territory on the bridge. "Mckenzie Brothers" features spoken word narrative over an R&B light funk beat with cheesy "the bad guy's comin'!" guitar riffs. "Rolling Home" is another ballad winner, with more tempo than "Wish You Were Here", and the Slide to the Side Mix of "Cotton-Eye Joe" is almost as good as the original. Definitely an energetic CD to add to your collection.

If you have stumbled onto this album, you are LUCKY! This one has been in my CD player for 5 years, and I still love it. It's a wild mix of electric banjo's, snappy tunes, and crazy Swedes! You can't help but jump around the room looking for overalls and straw.

This group combines country with disco. How often do you hear that? If you like disco, but not country, or country but not disco, there's a good chance you'll like this. Good music to dance to, or just tap your foot in time with the beat. We're asked not to mention other reviews, but the one listed here slamming this music, take it with a BIG grain of salt. Listen to what this person likes.......Euro/Techno/Garage band trash by the likes of Arcade Fire and Interpol, but if you like Rednex, there's something wrong with you? Yeah, ok.....right. If you listen to Rednex, you're part of what's wrong with America? I think not. What's wrong with America is narrow-minded people like him. Amazon should not even have his review listed, since he did not list exactly what it was he didn't like about the music of Rednex, but instead, just insulted all of those who DO like their music. That's not a review.

This Swedish outfit sounds about as Appalachian as The Fraternity of Man (the group that performed "Don't Bogart Me" on the "Easy Rider" soundtrack), but Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass weren't Hispanic either. The whole point here is dopey fun, not cultural accuracy. The fiddle sounds real, but the banjo here sounds like a sampling keyboard in its phrasing. I have such an instrument and I could do it. The bottom line is that I didn't think of doing it in the techno dance format--these people did. There have been a lot of fusions of style in pop music history, but Rednex are the only Disco Hoedown outfit that I know of. With mainstream country of the past century almost totally locked into the two rather depressing song topics of romantic betrayal and jingoism, it takes a mite o' sittin' and thinkin' to remember that country's roots were based in...well...partyin'. Barn dances featuring the Virginia reel and squaredance calling. In spirit, not a whole lot different from disco, actually. The two forms are roughly the same in time signature and tempo--they only differ in how heavy the beat is. Both forms center on couples competing with one another on how skillfully they can dance. Which makes Rednex's fusion of the two not all that grotesque.

I loved Rednex ever since I heard Cotton Eye Joe for the first time. I love techno but hate all-styles of Country music. But when you mix in Techno It sounds awesome. There are a couple slow songs I don't care for. But most of the Album follows the Cotton Eye Joe style.

Where in the world can you find an album that fuses techno, Euro-pop, and country & western? Answer: right here, with this album. Rednex are a bunch of five Swedish musicians who dress up like cowboys and make songs that mixes all these types of music together. "Cotton Eye Joe" was a huge commercial success all around Europe in the mid-Nineties and this album carries on the theme for a whole hour or so. Many of the tracks are just pure party songs, such as "Old Pop In An Oak" and "Wild and Free" but the Rednex also show their more thoughtful side with the beautifully crafted "Wish You Were Here" and their humorous nature with the very long titled track 8. It's best not to think too hard about this album but just listen to it, get up and party! If you do that, you'll love this album!

This is a great album. The music is fast and keeps parties alive and well. A real crowd pleaser at any Hick party. Even school dances love it. If you like fast country music, BUY THIS CD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeap, it's the happy party-album of the millenium to me! Makes people go crazy.