Author: Urban Bolta
Location: Orto bar / Ljubljana / Slovenia
Concert date: 19.01.2013
Attendance: 150
Ticket price: 10€
The new year has arrived, and with it the season of never-quite-kept resolutions, fresh starts, and bigger or smaller shake-ups in the life cycle of the average Joe.. and along with the swapping of calendars came a new gig season, which the coastal good-time guys Zmelkoow from the Slovenian Littoral kicked off in the second half of January with a show in Carinthia, before heading back, as per their old custom, to a spot well known to them and their fans – Ljubljana’s Orto bar. Hardly a year goes by without Zmelkoow dropping in at this beloved club venue; over the years they’ve practically become part of its furniture.
To keep all that gig-roaming around our little country from getting too routine for Zmelkoow’s loyal fans, the Littoral boys give their tours a theme. Not long ago they did a fully acoustic tour, then for the 15th anniversary of the record »Čiko, Pajo in Pako« came a run of shows where they played that album front to back, and this time a new idea sprouted in their cabbage patch: a psychedelic repertoire under a motto in their trademark jokey style: Zmelkoow »PSY-kadelik« Jura 2013. Gangnam Style, Littoral-style? Nope! The project was actually conceived before that Korean oddball became world-famous, and the abbreviation “PSY” refers to a mash-up of psychedelia and “kakadelic” – the band is going to be crapping all over psychedelic waters (for the first half of the show), whether you like it or not!
Before Zmelkoow, the minimalist stage of Orto bar was taken by local rockers Radio Zoo, but unfortunately, with them hitting the stage so early, I missed their set entirely – I promise to make it up to the band with a report at the first opportunity!
After a short break, the first to march onto the stage were the Zmelkoow brains in the form of their leader Goga, followed by the rest of the crew shuffling in behind him – with bassist Žare bringing up the rear, naturally! Spread out across the stage were also Koščak on the drum kit, Anuša on keyboards and backing vocals, and Lenart on saxophone. In the first part of the show, a good 50 minutes of instrumental philosophizing wrapped in psychedelic cellophane, they strung together just four tracks of marathon length. The free-handed gravitation of fingers across instruments – or, put more simply, spontaneous jamming in the style of the psychedelic and even avant-garde rock of the sixties and seventies – turned out to be a really interesting experiment, even if the content was average (for the music connoisseurs). You have to understand that the Zmelkoow story is built on a humorous message, while the music itself was always secondary for them. In the long jams their merely average command of their instruments came to the surface, so the overall sound was at moments not juicy enough, despite some brilliant fills along the guitar – keyboards axis, that is, the Goga – Anuša tandem. Who knows, maybe Zmelkoow got the idea for an interesting psychedelic project while recording their latest album »Čista Jajca«, whose tracks Big Ass, Je pesnik jedel mamile? and Slovo režiserja fit that context like a glove! But music is a universal language, so despite my remark, the Orto bar audience enjoyed every minute of it, even though the more entertaining half of the show was still to come.
The second part of the show was the usual Zmelkoow fare – boozy and fun, with the obligatory interludes of Goga’s ramblings through every corner of his own humorous imagination. From the disco queen Densi Mayalone, through Strelowood and Ko-Po, we strolled our way to the biggest Zmelkoow hits – in the currently fashionable protest style, the crowd actually forced the band to play Sergiota and Poredne goste. The saxophone proved a winning addition, as Lenart colorfully enriched the sonic vocabulary with inventive touches, even though in the choruses the mostly drunk crowd easily drowned him out. The peak of the night came after the clock had already struck midnight: Več kot spijemo and Bit are still two of the most beloved Zmelkoow tunes, practically folk-song classics among rock-loving youth.
Zmelkoow proved that they remain the masters of tongue-in-cheek fun – and what’s even better is that they keep serving their loyal followers tours with a fresh theme every time. This past weekend the »PSY-kadelik« tour successfully got its conceptually intriguing machinery rolling, so there’s no need to worry about its success at the upcoming stops!
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