"It was clear to me that something unusual was happening this summer when I saw a video from a graduation party on Hvar where a guy, who seems to be a high school student, sings Balašević's 'Oliver' inspired, surrounded by dozens of mobile phones recording him. At the time, I thought it was just one of the graduates who grabbed the microphone from the music and sang his favorite song in Croatian: "...you were still a girl!"
Five sold-out concerts
Jakov Jozinović from Vinkovci, a student at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Zagreb, is 20 years old and at first glance he is a very average guy, of medium height, with long hair like the one worn in the eighties, dressed simply.
While I am writing this text, Jakov has released his fifth concert in Belgrade's Sava Center, and as things stand now, he will break the records of many stars who have been on our scene for decades. After selling out the first two dates in an incredible half an hour from the opening of ticket sales, Jozinović revealed today on Instagram that all four concerts are sold out and that he has scheduled another concert for April 17 next year.
Childhood
Jakov has already held a concert in MTS Hall, which was filled to capacity, and due to great interest, he scheduled his first concert in Sava Center, which sold out in less than half an hour.
As reported by the media, the tickets for the second term "burned up" even faster. At one point, almost 15.000 people were waiting on the ticket sales page to buy their copy.
This 20-year-old has come into the limelight in the last few months, even though he still hasn't recorded his first original song. Few of them connected that Jakov participated in music competitions even as a child.
There, his talent was noticed by the actor Enes Bešlagić, who was a member of the jury, and now he reminded his followers of Jakov's participation when he was only 12 years old: "When someone is born with a gift like Jakov and then he knows how to use that gift in the most beautiful way possible by spreading positive energy and love. And then, nine years ago, I said the following at a competition when he was 12 years old: 'As a boy, you fight with girls who have a more melodious voice, but that charm of yours makes us forget everything. You say you didn't think you would get all five chairs. And then God gives you such energy to buy us. If you had faked it, I would have fought for you to the end!'
Screaming girls
On the recordings of Jakov Jozinović's performance, which in recent days have transformed the virtual space of the former joint state, we see hundreds of girls who scream when the singer appears on stage and then sing with him in rapture from the first to the last minute of the performance.
Dozens of memes have been recorded on the subject. In the latest, in a park in Belgrade, a girl approaches a guy and says: "Darling, I have something to confess to you!" Terrified, he says: "I hope it's not the worst!". She replies: "I cheated on you!". The boy was relieved: "It's good, a stone fell from my heart! I thought you were going to the concert of Jakov!".
Balašević and the owners of his rights
Jakov does not have any of his own original songs, he performs covers of songs by Đorđe Balašević, Oliver Dragojević, Toša Proeski, Džiboni and Zdravko Čolić, but certainly his trademark is Đolet's "Oliver" from the beginning of the text - and that gives the whole story a strange flow.
Namely, two and a half years ago, after the "Trail in Endless" festival in Vela Luka on Korcula, I wrote that Oliver Dragojević will continue to live in new generations, while this can hardly be expected for the equally regionally popular Balasevic:
"Namely, Balasevic's family banned tribute bands from performing his songs, removed from YouTube all recordings of concerts that are not on their official channel, even the video of the farewell that the people of Novi Sad organized on the banks of the Danube two days after Balasevic's death.
The owners of the artist's copyrights were so consistent that even the students of the Svetozar Marković High School, which Balašević attended, did not receive the required written permission to organize a (non-commercial) event in honor of their famous student, so the director decided on her own to allow them to do so.
Two years ago, the Balašević family initiated the story of a museum dedicated to the famous artist, but as the public in Novi Sad reacted quite violently to the location (the Quay of the Raid victims next to the Danube) and the concept itself (a hotel was supposed to be opened inside the museum), that idea was apparently abandoned.
Although opening a cafe-restaurant modeled on "Falco's" in Vienna would be much more appropriate and it is certain that with his music, memorabilia and specialties that Balasevic loved, such a place would be full of fans from all over the region - the family showed no interest in such a thing.
Then, look at the devil, a kid from Vinkovci appeared and conquered the region - and that with Balašević's "Oliver", the same Oliver who forbade all others (even many times less commercial tribute bands) to sing Djolet's songs. It remains unknown whether Olivera gave the young man from Vinkovci, what students would say, a "green light" to perform Balasevic's songs at his concerts, or wisely waited for Jakov to sell the tenth Sava center and then pay him the bill.
