Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Jukič, Robert
Label: Self-released
Release: 2013
Duration: 69:07
Rating: 5/5
If anyone has given their soul to music, it’s without a doubt Robert Jukič. Or maybe music gave its soul to Robert. Take it whichever way you like. So. If there’s anyone who won’t think twice when you invite them to a free-spirited, thrilling jam with a totally unannounced crew, where time and place don’t matter and all that counts is a good vibe and a good »groove« that opens up unique musical landscapes not everyone paints, then the first candidate for something that carelessly slammed together is Robert Jukić. Ladies and gentlemen. A genius »D.I.Y« creator with no creative limits. In the sense of his inexhaustibly curious drive to explore musical experiment. You can’t predict the result in advance, but an idea that develops independently and on its own terms is the elemental starting point for reaching the absolute eclecticism of the forms of music that flow from Robert Jukič’s pen. A Velenje guy, after all. Velenje has always been a hot spot that has given the history of Slovenian music plenty of talents, each in their own musical corner standing as a resolute antipode to the general »grayness« of conformist predictability.
Listing every artist Robert works with would use up all our paper, and this throwaway remark alone is enough to confirm what a respected artist Robert Jukič is in the Slovenian, and the international, musical universe. His previous album Dobrote iz skrinje zarote is a completely different musical story. If Robert Jukič’s name weren’t on it, I’d say it was another artist. Plain and simple. This artist’s musical vision and breadth go beyond any genre frame for us analysts – the »prisoners of the rational«. Stuffing Jukič into a genre is unmanageable, mission impossible, and practically an insult to the artist. Let’s rather say that in Robert Jukič’s case it’s flat-out a forbidden act. It does make sense to look for parallels with Jukič’s album »Radio« from 2009. The design and concept are similar in their basic starting points on both »Radio« and the new »Life«. »Life« is conceptual too, and once again it features a ton of musicians (over thirty) from several countries around the world.
»Life« is an extraordinary picture book from Robert Jukič, the independent creator – the artistic »self-made man«. It’s a multi-faceted foldout that lays out the phenomenon of this creator’s musical genius and the very point of his »self-challenge«. Jukič challenged himself by building the album on the concept of an individual’s life. Any individual, placed at the center of the fate of being part of the social pulse of our days, which in many ways dictates how things will be arranged along the ecliptic of that person’s life path. From birth to death, with everything that comes in between. The whole life cycle of a ticking battery called a human being – any individual. Birth, childhood, adolescence, the rebel moment, the moment of conformist »sobering up« (molting into the »gray mouse«), midlife crises, death, farewell, post scriptum… All of this and much more is covered by the tracks on »Life«. And given the contrasts of life an individual goes through on the road from birth to fulfillment, you can’t approach it any other way than by crossing out all genres, creatively transcending them and simply letting the magic of music lead you and bring you to the elemental core you, as an artist, want to put in contrasting relief and leave a lasting impression on the listener with. Life is a complex battle and music is part of every one of us. It lives in each of us. Every individual is their own conductor of musical information. But a chosen few among us can also translate it and present it to us. That’s how Robert Jukič presents his life through music, too. The album »Life« is a document that clearly sketches Robert Jukič’s great spiritual and emotional maturity, not just as an artist but above all as a person.
So we witness the boundless vividness of how events unfold on this album, where the beginning and the end are »relatively alike«. In the opening and closing parts, the unfolding is a complete reflection of growing up, as fulfillment in the autumn of your life, which you end with death. Picture a flower blooming in spring, later turning into fruit, and when it ripens it falls, and in its place new buds appear, buds that wait out the winter so they can be born again in spring. That’s how the music of this album sails along. Gradually. Through birth, through growing up to the middle crescendo (the phase of an individual’s peak productivity), and back to complete calm at the »zero« point, where the road closes and a new story begins (a new birth). The middle part of the album is marked by an especially colorful bustle of ideas, where the contrasts of life experience in the middle stretch of our journey are also underlined by the outstanding soprano vocals of selected singers. A superb solution and a complete mood swing in how the album unfolds.
Yes. We can say that, besides all the eclectic content in the character of the songs, this album also carries a strong spiritual side. Let’s say a side of high spiritual intelligence. That’s the nature of the concept, and the language of music makes sense of it effectively. Jukič is too experienced, has seen too much and driven too many miles in his career to pull any artistic blunder with his vision on »Life«. Everything on »Life« makes outstanding sense, has a clearly defined place and function, and most important of all is the fact of the extremely effective magnification of feelings (emotional states) the artist wants to highlight or, if you prefer, »bring to life« for the listener, as through the language of music it comes alive in a given period of the life cycle of an individual’s personality.
If the opening Birth is a »calm sail down a little river« of the geographic features of world music, where the organic warmth of percussion and bass guitar gives the clinking of the xylophone an outstanding counterweight, then Adolescence is already a tougher bite, tailor-made for music gourmets and lovers of jazz fusion rooted in jazz that won’t tolerate predictable, calculating and »safe« flirting with the »smooth« format. And that’s an important element that keeps the album outstandingly attractive from start to finish. It’s heavily loaded with musical information that comes out of jazz, so it will demand plenty of spins from you before you’ve explored all the depth of its charismatic and highly valued message.
In the baritone variations, the disconnect of experimental jazz fusion sparkles especially in the tracks Dictatorship, Adolescence, Wisdom of Elder, Dust to Dust and Serenity. These moments could easily withstand a complete »translation« into orchestral arrangements. Push a trumpet into the middle and add a whole orchestra behind it, with a strong woodwind and string section. Remember Miles Davis’s »Sketches Of Spain« and the famous reworking of Rodrigo’s »Concierto de Aranjuez«? On the other hand, tracks like Adolescence and Dust to Dust have almost the character of film soundtrack music. Once again there are sensible parallels with similar collaborations by Miles Davis and Marcus Miller (the albums »Siesta« and »Dingo«). A dark atmosphere often pervades these moments, but one of outstanding artistic content and a charismatic charge of big creative heart that simply casts a spell on the listener in an instant.
Interlude 1: Spiritual Search is a track with the character of the traditional melos of world music, looking out toward the lands of the Far East. After it comes Change the World, where Nigerian jazz musician Femi Temowo takes over the entire performance, vocals included. The vocals are sung in a Nigerian language, and the melos is an eclectic mix of Nigerian musical tradition and jazz fundamentals, with all of the musician’s authenticity and genuineness of expression retained. The »chaotic« Dictatorship is the peak of jazz fusion on the album and of Jukič’s daring in pushing the bar of experiment to the point of utmost bizarreness. A track bordering on the wildness of avant-garde musical adventures, one that might unite under one roof even fans of Frank Zappa, John Zorn and King Crimson. The heaviness of the record’s content, with its instrumental experiment, is »lightened« by the fragile, gentle Farewell: Too Late in the second half of the album, where all the attention goes to the yearning, soft and soothing vocals of singer Lana Cenčič, cleverly »sunk« into the framework of a »shy« string quartet accompaniment of plucking.
»Life« is an album where it’s pointless to stress that the moments of spontaneity and unexpected twists are maxed out. That’s one of the elemental attractions of this top-shelf artistic achievement, of the great eclectic value of totally unique content. It’s a product that works best if you switch off your ratio and, unburdened, give yourself over to drifting along the stream of musical information. Jukič’s eighth album »Life« is thus an absolute coming-of-age leap beyond the musical artistry of this prolific artist’s earlier work, whose musical vision never stops thrilling and surprising. With the album »Life«, Robert Jukič confirms once again that he can create convincingly in literally any musical sphere, we could even say beyond musical spheres. He masters these spheres with an outstanding aesthetic feel for genre crossing, and the result is a new unique pearl of musical artistry. That’s for sure. Robert Jukič’s next album will once again be deliberately turned »on its head« in content and character. And that’s exactly why we keep coming back to this artist’s musical legacy. The element of supreme surprise that »shakes up« the listener completely!
Lineup
ROBERT JUKIČ (Slovenia) – songs and arrangements, electric bass, double bass, harmonium, guitars, percussion, guembri, ebow, qarkabeb, wurlitzer
FEMI TEMOWO (United Kingdom / Nigeria) – vocals, guitar, lyrics
LANA CENČIĆ (Croatia) – vocals, lyrics, Indian tabla
GORDANA HLEB (Slovenia) – vocals
WOLFGANG RAINER (Austria) – drums, effects
IVANA PRISTASOVA (Slovakia) – violin
EMMA WEST (Australia) – violin
ANDREW JEZEK (Australia) – viola
MICHAEL WILLIAMS (Australia) – cello
TWAN THYS (Belgium) – bass clarinet
MAHAN MIRARAB (Iran) – guitar
ARMEND XHAFERI (Kosovo) – guitar
ANDRE CARVALHO (Portugal) – double bass
MURAT (Slovenia) – beatbox
MAHAN MIRARAB (Iran) – guitar
ALEŠ HADALIN (Slovenia) – vocals
LENART KREČIČ (Slovenia) – tenor saxophone
GEORG VOGEL (Austria) – piano, rhodes
JANI MODER (Slovenia) – guitar
DANIEL NOESIG (Austria) – trumpet, effects
JURE PUKL (Slovenia) – tenor saxophone
MARIO VAVTI (Austria)- trombone
JAKA KOPAČ (Slovenia) – alto saxophone, flute
FLIP PHILIPP (Austria) – qarkabeb, balafon
IGOR VIĆENTIĆ (Slovenia) – piano, rhodes, lyrics
TOMAŽ GAJŠT (Slovenia) – trumpet, flugelhorn
NINO MUREŠKIĆ (Slovenia) – khartal, tambourine, darbuka
GAŠPER BERTONCELJ (Slovenia) – percussion
ŽIGA MURKO (Slovenia) – trombone
KRISTIJAN KRAJNČAN (Slovenia) – drums, cello
ANDRAŽ MAZI (Slovenia) – pedal steel
STOP – Slovenski Tolkalski Projekt: MARINA GOLJA, MATEVŽ BAJDE, DAMIR KOROŠEC, FRANCI KREVH, TOMAŽ LOJEN, DAVOR PLAMBERGER, DEJAN TAMŠE – percussion
Production
Robert Jukič & Saša Lušić
Tracklist
1. Birth
2. Childhood
3. Adolescence
4. Interlude 1: Spiritual Search
5. Change the World: Ore
6. Dictatorship
7. Vita: Intro
8. Vita: part 1: Dittatura
9. Vita: part 2: Solitudine
10. Vita: part 3: Paradiso
11. Vita: outro
12. Interlude 2: Midlife Crisis
13. Wisdoom of the Elder
14. Farewell: Too Late
15. Dust to Dust
16. Serenity
