DESPITE their youth, the six members of the Warsaw Village Band are steeped in the traditional music of their native Poland.

They remember their country's past and keep it alive by utilising, in a subtle way, modern sound effects.

They are on a musical quest for the haughty and anarchic, but pure Polish spirit. They play folk dance melodies, ancient pagan songs from the wild wood, and ballads, including one about a wily woman outsmarting the Devil.

Their music-making assaults your senses like potent vodka. They call it hardcore, rather than commercial world music.

The two percussionists, Piotr Glinski and Maciej Szajkowski, give the band plenty of ballast. They are aided and abetted by Wojciech Krzak playing violin in the old Polish style, with the instrument cradled on his lower left arm.

The band's distinctive sound is down to the "white voice" singing of its three female members - Maja Kleszcz, who also plays cello, Magdalena Sobczak on dulcimer, and Sylwia Swiatkowska, on violin and old Polish fiddle.

Their singing can sound harsh to the Western ear, but it was exciting to hear them sing complicated lyrics, fast and furious in beautiful unison.

The band's ensemble playing, with its heady cocktail of different sound textures and rhythms, gradually built up in intensity as the musicians immersed themselves in their traditional repertoire.

The song inspired by wild horses was particularly powerful, while a more laid-back piece, called Grey Horse, reminded me of the Mississippi delta blues.

Updated: 11:21 Wednesday, February 09, 2005