Ouzo Bazooka // The Eisenberg Review
Photo by Yuli Gorodinsky
Over the past two decades, Uri Brauner Kinrot has quietly shaped one of the most distinctive musical movements in the world. As the driving force behind Ouzo Bazooka and a key player in groups like Boom Pam, Balkan Beat Box, and Firewater, he has helped define a strain of modern Middle Eastern psychedelia that blends surf grit, Anatolian soul, and cinematic funk.
With Kapaim, the new Ouzo Bazooka album, Kinrot returns to a more solitary mode of creation. Written, performed, recorded, and mixed almost entirely solo in his Eilat studio, the record floats in that golden space between groove and atmosphere. These are instrumental head-nodders built on hypnotic basslines, dusty synths, and spiraling guitar work. Think “Nautilus”-era Bob James meeting Selda Bağcan in a desert mirage.
Kinrot’s impact goes well beyond his own records. As a producer, he has played a behind-the-scenes role in elevating voices like Liraz and Rasco, helping to shape Tel Aviv’s current wave of cross-cultural, psych-soul futurists.
We caught up to talk about the making of Kapaim, his work as a producer and arranger, and how the music of his region continues to evolve. Cosmic, rooted, and unmistakably his.