The sweat drains from us
I know you feel it
A fire surrounds the city
And we just want more
(Schieserbitterlemon, While the fire surrounds the city)
......
No matter how you explain it to yourself, the Hali Gali band collective - armed with an angry sound, mysterious, rebellious and sometimes a little dreamy - has been bringing order to the register of new Serbian musical forces for a sufficient number of years. Their current, second joint album, with all its might updates the space in which they live and create, introducing elements of magic, stream of consciousness, idiosyncrasy, catatonia, euphoria, wild disobedience and conscientious objection in relation to each individual's own life here and now. Never louder and more refined in its decibels and verses, Hali Gali #2 the compilation reminds you that you're not just a hypnotized pile of raw meat, but a tricky tangle of nerves with their own moods and needs.
The year is 2024. From Belgrade and Yugoslavia new wave forty-odd years have passed. That's roughly how much time passed from the Second World War and the formation of the FNRJ to the mentioned ex-JU version of the liberator new wave genre. Now, whether the bands from the more than diverse Hali Gali scene are the latest wave of sound revolution in the region, or a native artistic phenomenon that has no equal in the history of the popular culture of this land, only time will tell (Time?!). Well, let's go in order.
photo: Strahinja AnđelićThey killed Butler.
They Killed Butler is the new band in the Hali Gali constellation. With his determined version post-hardcore aesthetics in the poem Tuesdays, sometimes, following the path of his older colleagues from St. Damn, these guys deliver some of the best on the compilation without a doubt. Their high-risk "tuning" in the introduction and immediately afterwards a precisely implemented gesture of brutal resistance to the existing state of affairs - makes them a refreshing novelty in this gifted community. Key lyrics: “Trapped/Powerless/Watching/Patience running out/Still in my world/Everything's fine”. A brilliant expertise of today's turbulent spirits.
photo: ana ĐurovićSitzpinker
Sitzpinker are old friends from the previous compilation. The apparently indifferent voice of Dunja Mijačić in the track A moment of safety, actually most sensitively defines the climate within the generation of young people who are faced with the insufficiency of common sense to successfully swim in the ethical pitfalls of reality. When Sitzpinker says: "I'm carried by the waves/In my head/A moment of security/When I think I understand everything/The essence disappears", then we ourselves become aware that the night is definitely an intoxicating time of the day of untamed girlhood and youth, when that "dread of the dawn" of Jack White, eosophobia as it were, awakens a primal fear that the morning will (not) change everything. One of the favorites from this record.
photo: nadja kastratovićSt. Dog
Ingenious St. Pseta, here as the parent duo, demonstrate their superiority in the domain of radical vocals noise. Their contribution to the compilation with Shut up, I will be silent too, reminds us of everything we've ever loved about this unique band. The unexpectedness of expression, the detection of the ubiquitous "phenomenon of deterioration", the contradiction of the possibility of catharsis - after all, read the novel Ubik Philip K. Dick, with a foreword by Stanislav Lem. Key lines: "Silence echoes in the words/But your mouth keeps talking/Eternity will remain deaf, we don't understand each other". Oh, do you?
photo: promoYou see
On the trail of some updated YU group and The Black Keys, the band Wieselj changes its author's course again, now in the direction of domestic tribal duba with Jimi Hendrix in mind. Their scattered inspiration is found in Black Magic spiritual fulfillment in the midst of a kaleidoscope of different expressions rock technique, a sincere and authentic blues inspiration transcends decades and centuries, flowing into the new millennium quite naturally: "He puts a bottle in my hand/I drink electricity/It twists around my waist/That's voodoo".
photo: Aleksa BartolProto type
Proto Type in track Wishes observes the state of affairs from shoegaze looks at The Smiths, with a certain undertone of Eyesburn due to Miloš Stevanović's participation on trombone. The nocturnal voice of Nikola Čučković reaches intoxication with the self in the waking present of a twenty-year-old. Key lyrics: "All mine is now yours/When I fall you pick me up/One touch is enough/So that I know you can do anything". Does it come to your mind Captain Esid Electric orgasm?
"Spring is hiding under my pillow"! At least that's what Gazorpazorp, a band from which we've been expecting a lot for a sufficient number of years, claims on behalf of an entire generation. Their dashing alternative rock it's much less close now grunge signals of former live performances, and much more compact power pop which can be imagined on every current top list. Go Gazori!
The young forces of Daza join the hardened Hali Gali pioneers with a mature sound in their magical song in the mother tongue To you, yes you – and, you know what, they're doing great. Several decades later, they revive the spirit and vocal attitude of Ekaterina Velika, in their own way, but as a kind of homage to Milan Mladenović and the best that he intoxicated us with in his most famous band. A little dark tones certainly don't hurt, and the lyrics: "Find me/To wake me up/And you, yes you" remain mysteriously speaking in your dreams.
A nice surprise of the compilation is Cactus Fields, which with their optimistic voice revives the memory of the brightest stage of the group Yarboli and the eccentric normality of Ty Segall, a dislocated poet from the West Coast of the United States. As they sing about taking off into the ghostly night – we soar with them, but without any fear. It will be that their navigation is reliable and we are still ready for some action under the stars in their world where there is no sleep.
But, Scheizerbitterlemon, what a band, what a song! The very beginning of the track While the fire surrounds the city it makes you tap your heels, like some legendary song by The Rolling Stones. Jovan Sibinović and friends raise high the torch of the latest passionate rock and roll, which is emerging right now in Belgrade, extending the renegade line started with Partibrejkers, and continued through who knows how many Bunji faces of this unique region. And when you think that in the case of Scheizerbiterlemon, it's practically always about love songs: "All I wanted to know/That I still belong with you" - you can only faint from inhaling sensuality.
photo: nemanja knezevicKOIKOI
And, finally, the ethnos-tinged epilogue of the compilation from the original imagination of KOIKOI u Via mimosa. Like the former Yugoslav progressive psychedelic bands in the encounter with modern technological powers, which make them exactly the missing piece in the magical puzzle of SFRY history. A bit of mysticism at the end? Why not: "Through the flames I call you/In this place I live alone/Lie there and be a flower/I remain buried".
photo: nadja kastratović...
THERE IS NO ONE HERE BUT US
Probably no compilation in our recent past rock the scene did not have as much importance as the original one Hali Gali, released at the end of 2019. That album served as a manifesto of Belgrade bands of the latest post-Repetitor generation. It turns out that all of them, more or less, began to be inspired by the evident historical success of the Repetitor group to impose their neo-garage transcendence on the wider regional and even global market.
The year is therefore 2024. The original admiration for the famous Belgrade trio is slowly fading, as are the references to meritorious greatness. new wave, and zero points of authenticity of domestic rock and roll. All these patterns are still heard in the recordings, but only in traces and distant associations. The groups gathered for the long-awaited sequel Hali Gali
2 (Pop depression/Umbrella), today they find their foundations exclusively in themselves, that is, in an extremely individualistic view of the world suitable for a digitized society, which they announced on the previous compilation. In the meantime, each band has grown up and relies only on its strengths and understanding of the moment. This is the real sound of the 21st century.
You probably haven't even noticed that there aren't many albums released during the year in domestic popular music. Record production is falling apart, because few people have the talent, courage and need to say something that lasts longer than three minutes. A release like this is an indication that at least in the musical underground of the city there is some glimmer of hope, and that at least there is still life with a full heart. In the performance of bands with Hali Gali #2 compilations, we still need rock and roll to unleash this massive suffocation!
