"Whether planned or spontaneous, Babarczy can be counted upon to guarantee something not always appreciated by the concert-goer when it happens, but always discovered when it is absent: variety. This is especially important in a collection of genres that traditionally suffer for a lack of that quality. Twenty reggaes in a row, a score of calypsos nose to tail or interminable raps would, quite frankly, bore me stiff. But the way in which they are intertwined in a Babarczy performance leads me to tell you to go and listen to him again. And again." (A. C. Rouse)
Bucsu a.k.a. Babarczy Bucsu [Bob-art-see Boo-chew] was formed with the crazy intention to prove that pop music is regeressive. As an introspective and shy (better to say funky) musician with some schizophrenic attitude in his „artistic†manifestation, he has played (and is still playing) in several popular bands from folk to disco. This project – his "Bucsu"-self – deals with popular covers accompanied by elaborated rhythmic finger-picking guitar technique.
The name derives from his original one, Babarci (second…) Bulcsú (… and first name), often misheard and mispelled. Actually, búcsú means fiesta or country fair in Hungarian (farewell, literally), that has some pejorative connotations. Búcsús in today’s Hungary are associated with Eastern-European little bazaars selling cheap and shoddy toys with Turbovolksmusik and the actual (or some five years old) summer hits bellowing in the "background". "Mikor megyünk Babarcra búcsúba? [Me-core med-younk Bob-arts-rah Boo-chew-bah]" has been a serious Hungarian insult since Bucsu's nursery years, a special way of asking for being beaten up.
The 80’s have caused Bucsu some kind of a social and cultural shock . As an adolescent, already trying to play the guitar, he was the man of tunes in one of the most notorious classes of a miners’ school he attended. To put it correctly, he wasn’t, but since he was the only person in class who had something to do with making and performing music, he had to play the role of the "class-gypsy" accompanying sing-alongs with his guitar."I always had some dirty business during the compulsory music classes. Others, who had no idea about how to write out a tune, would slip their excercise-books over to me to put the notes down for them. I noticed some of them had scribbled fork spanners and monkey-wrenches instead of the clefs."
The impact of 80’s pop songs from the international mainstream scene and Hungarian wedding-rock – being still an underground genre but becoming more and more popular that time – pushed Bucsu in to a big black gloomy depression that has been haunting him ever since. To cope with these facts he had learnt that what he cannot avoid, he simply has to mistreat."Back in the ninties, I used to be a tobacco addict… I’m sorry… oh God… I just can’t recall those years, they were so horrible… And when I finally gave up smoking, I realized, I had to do something with my mouth. So, whenever I needed a cig I just started singing a song. Usually something silly… or from the eighties. My bathroom ducky, Turbi911 helped me a lot. She used to be a serial killer, you know, but she gave up and has learnt to behave like normal toys. She still has that wicked look in her eyes, and teases me sometimes… but she wouldn’t hurt anybody… I think."
With his repertoire of covers, Bucsu argues for that a pop song can be authentically performed with a single guitar as well, showing that even a hit from the era of the technological craze – that is the 80’s – contains nothing more nor less than a folk-blues song from the 20’s. "It is really all about style, nothing else". With his special way of mixing the dumb with the kitsch and the serious, Bucsu is looking for venues where a whole band would be too much or loud. His motto "lick | suck | deliver" relates both to the energy of búcsú-style people relates and also specifically to his way of treating popsongs and represents his reconciled attitude towards mainstream.