★★★★★
With "Roots," the Gipsy Kings' first album for world-music label Nonesuch since 1996, the eight-piece flamenco group once again reasserts itself as one of pop music's most precious acts. Many of the tracks on this all-acoustic album recall the band's finest music, particularly stuff off their self-titled debut...
- www.soundspike.com
2010-12-07
★★★★★
Sound: Spanish (well Catalonian, based in France, so what I imagine traditional spanish music to be). Layers and layers of sweeping classical spanish guitar (sometimes as many as 7), husky, rasping vocals, the occasional accordian or horn and hand claps galore. A dense, fast paced and vibrant sound that's musical, soulful and alive. // 8 Lyrics and Singing: As a total non speaker of Catalonian/ Spanish, the words could be anything...
- www.ultimate-guitar.com
2009-11-15
★★★★★
If they hadn't covered "My Way," maybe the one-worlder in me would adjust his horizons to embrace flamenco guitar and let the rest pass. But there it is, and don't riposte indignantly that "My Way" is a French song--that's the point. Their florid Andalusian emotionalism is Europop's cornball showbiz alternative to soul. I'll take Al Jolson, who invented something.
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
On their first two Stateside releases, this six-man troupe from the south of France merged dazzling flamenco guitar with synthesizers and a rock backbeat to create a style that was novel, virtuosic, pleasant, and slightly brain-dead...
- ew.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
This surprise 1989 smash introduced the world to the Gipsy Kings' signature rumba gitana, a hybrid sound that combined guitar-driven Catalan rumba (a subspecies of flamenco) with gently percolating North African percussion and just a touch of manouche jazz from the French side of the Pyrenees...
- www.globalrhythm.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
After two decades on the road, you'd think this group would simply put another record in the machine and go on tour, but that's definitely not the case here. Sure, the guitar-rich, flamenco sounds are still the Kings' dominant mode, but there are quite a few surprises, as the band has sought inspiration in Latin American folk music this time out. Of particular interest to longtime fans and neophytes alike are the acoustic reggae-inflected "Pueblos" (which could have been recorded by Maná), and ...
- www.globalrhythm.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
This surprise 1989 smash introduced the world to the Gipsy Kings' signature rumba gitana, a hybrid sound that combined guitar-driven Catalan rumba (a subspecies of flamenco) with gently percolating North African percussion and just a touch of manouche jazz from the French side of the Pyrenees...
- www.globalrhythm.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
Be forewarned: from its first propulsive beats, Gipsy Kings will put a spell on you. An authentic band of Gypsies from the south of France, these relatives of the renowned Gypsy singer José Reyes will steal you away on their seven-man guitar caravan to a freewheeling kingdom of Gypsy rock. It's a boundless realm where Spanish flamenco and Romany rhapsody meet salsa funk, by way of Morocco and the Middle East, and where hot-blooded passion reigns supreme.The Gipsy Kings offer a king's ransom of ...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08
★★★★★
Without much media attention, the Gipsy Kings have developed into a heartening crossover success story, as well as world music superstars. "The Best of the Gipsy Kings" is an 18-track, single CD compilation that includes much of their finest work, though...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08