The Car Is On Fire
The Car Is On Fire was a Warsaw band formed in early 2002, and over the following decade it became one of the more distinctive names in Polish guitar-based indie music. Even the band’s name, taken from the opening of Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s “The Dead Flag Blues,” suggested that this would not be a group approaching rock in the most obvious way. In its first phase, the lineup included Kuba Czubak, Jacek Szabrański, Krzysztof Halicz, and Borys Dejnarowicz, who handled guitar and keyboards. From the outset, the band moved between pop catchiness, garage-rock energy, and more angular alternative rhythms, something already clear on the 2005 debut album “The Car Is On Fire.” The follow-up album “Lake &...
Artist Trivia
- The band’s name is neither random nor neutral, because it comes from the opening words of “The Dead Flag Blues” by Godspeed You! Black Emperor. That immediately places The Car Is On Fire in dialogue with a more ambitious alternative tradition than standard early-2000s guitar rock.
- The original lineup was not just the classic core trio, because Borys Dejnarowicz handled guitar and keyboards until 2007. That matters because the later image of the band as a trio can blur the fact that its early sound was shaped by a broader and more nuanced personnel setup.
- Between 2007 and 2008, Michał Pruszkowski passed through the band as a multi-instrumentalist. It was a short episode, but an important one, showing that the lineup was not entirely fixed even after the group had already developed a strong identity.
- The 2005 debut album was described as a blend of garage rock energy, melody, and angular rhythms, which shows that from the start the band did not sit comfortably inside either straight rock or clean-cut pop.
Discography
4 releases
Lazy Boy
Album2011
Ombarrops!
Album2009Lake & Flames
Album2006
The Car Is on Fire
Album2005
