"Kuchenbeat"
Kuchenbeat is a Latvian SKA group, which plays in ska/reggae/balkan/latino genre. They bring only positive emotions to the public and the atmosphere in their songs is always bright.
Kuchenbeat already played in almost all clubs in Riga and in many Latvian areas, like Depo, Spīķeri, Space Dog, Shot Cafe, Mediju Stacija, Space Garage, Fontaine Club, Dirty Deal Café, Makslas Akademija and many others. Also, they took part in many festivals, such as Darom 2005 in Lithuania, LabaDaba`06, Bildes ’06, Fontaine Fest, Positivus AB`08, Positivus AB `09, SKAposta Festival`09, SKAposta Festival`10, SKAnda Fest`10, Zverā`10, LabaDaba`10.
KuchenBeats' birthday is considered to be between 2004 and 2005, when Sanjok and Vadim decided to found their own band. In such line-up KuchenBeat rehearsed for five months and on February, 21st, 2005 gave the first performance at "Saxophone" club. This date is considered to be the day of group foundation. The initial line-up was as follows: Vadim Bankin - guitar, Sanek Ska (Alexander Zhizhin) - vocal, Oleg – bass guitar, Alex - drums.
After that the search of a more stable line-up began and after a jam bass-guitarist Sergey Abolinsh in "Saxophone", Sergey has joined the band. Approximately at the same time the band was joined by drummer Mark, percussionist Girt Kalninsh and accordion player Ilya Shnejvejs (“Forshpil”).
In this line-up the band quickly began to gain popularity not only at Russian-speaking public, and in the summer of 2005 has been invited to play at festival "Darom 2005" in Lithuania.
In September, 2005 Sergey Abolinsh left the band and Vadim had begun to play bass guitar. The place of the guitarist for some time was taken by Edgars Shubrovskis ("Hospitalu Iela"). Until Girt invited Ieva to play guitar in the band. Girt has also invited the first brass instrument player of the band - Ieva (saxophone).
From that time KuchenBeat began to give more attention to SKA and, accordingly, began to search for more brass players (Max - trombone, Janis - trumpet, Oskar - trumpet, Ilze - flute).
In the summer of 2006 KuchenBeat played at "Laba Daba" festival, where they made a great impression on the public.
In the winter of 2007 Mark, Girt, Oskar, Ilze left the band. Later, also Ieva, Max and Janis left Kuchenbeat.
So, from the very beginning of 2008 Kuchenbeat started their new biography. Vadim started to play guitar again and the place of the bass player was taken by Dainis. Sanjok started to study trombone, what utterly affected the look of the songs. Later, talented tenor saxophonist Rajvis (Voiceks Voiska, All Day Long) joined the group and became the leader in the band brass section. Also, on February the 7th, new drummer Rihards joined Kuchenbeat. It was either the date of his name day – a great gift for the band. The skeleton of the group became durable and after their fifth anniversary on February, 2010 they started a new chapter in the history of Kuchenbeat. In spring group was joined by inimitable alt saxophonist Vadim, also at that time phenomenal trumpeter Janis ("Roberts Gobziņš & Resnie putni") became a part of the band.
Kuchenbeat is sure, that with Sanjok, Vadim Bankin, Dainis, Rihards, Rajvis, Vadim and Janis group will be successful and that is why they look only forward finally realized their plans and aims.