Manele/chalga is the type of music I can't stand.

Sorry to hear that. You must be Serbian? :D

If we're into Serbia, do not forget about their verion of such a music, called turbofolk. The lyrics are as "complex" as in previous genres, but there's also one big issue with that. I mean, many of those Serbian songs were deeply connected with nationalism during the civil war in former Yugoslavia in 90s. Unfortunatelly, I can't tell you more right now due to the very late time, but I'll back to that plot soon.

Excellent. I await your contributions.

The most symptomatic sign of nationalistic and xenofobic disposition of turbofolk was the relationship between famous singer Svetlana "Ceca" Ražnatović and Serbian warlord, leader of paramilitary group, Željko "Arkan" Ražnatović.In some way it determined the lyrics of many turbofolk songs, reffering to struggle with Croats and Bosniaks - sometimes they were very severe and harsh. Maybe they weren't "cruel" or "brutal", but it was enough to encourage some "patriots" to make war crimes.

To be honest, neither Croats nor Bosniaks were better with that. On the other side of frontline "Thompson" rock band was very popular. Initially they sung about the independence of Croatia and the need of resistance from Serbia. But later their lyrics also were quite equivocal - kill any Serbian.

War is never black and white, it's a multitude of greyness. Nobody is 100% good or bad. But music may erase the bad view of our deeds and over-recount the cruelness of our enemies. We need to have it into account.

*coughs*

Need some more recs Misspoptart or anyone else from this thread.

Really goregous version of Ederlezi, a balkan gypsy classic, popularized by Goran Bregovic through his band Bijelo Dugme and their version called Djurdjevdan



And of course by the version used in Kusturica's classic "The time of the gypsies"

Btw, I realize this thread is for a particular type of gypsy music that is NOT very related to the above posted, but there are no other Gypsy music threads so...

Kalyi Jag - 2 szám Shej Sabina ÉS E Shukar Shej (A szép lány)