Zach Condon and Coffee Shops

If you're not on the Beirut bandwagon yet, no worries. Chances are Zach Condon and his merry musicmakers are playing at your favorite kaufehaus right now! Now I'm not a regular coffee drinker, but I've been in my fair share of them over the past few weeks studying... or people watching. We'll go with studying. That sounds better. My numbers could be off because I don't have a calculator and/or am exaggerating to make a point, but I would say that approximately 84% of the coffee shops in my area have one Beirut song on their playlist right now. I don't blame them. The antique-European sound and the unique instrumentation (via their "About Me" on MySpace: "a trumpet from Paris, farfisa organ, accordion, piano, ukelele, mandolin, glockenspiel, violin, cello, tambourine, The air powered organ I bought on twelth street, Congo drum donated from the neighbors....A broken microphone stolen from the university of new mexico...") set them apart from a lot of bands out there. Add Condon's vocal chops to the mix, and it's hard to imagine anyone doing anything else other than sipping coffee and having a worldly, philosophical conversation. Or, you know... "studying."