Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Seine
Label: Moonlee Records
Release: 2017
Rating: 4/5
»Sno sna« is basically the singer-songwriter debut of Ivan Ščapec, a former member of the Croatian punk noise outfit Vlasta Popić. To be more precise, it’s released under the name of the band Seine. Flanking the man in the lineup are Dimitrij Mekotanović Petrović (drums), who also played in Vlasta Popić before (only on bass guitar there), and bassist Boško Mijušković from Straight Mickey And The Boys.
The ideas for this album took a long time to come together, and the record boasts exhaustive confessional variety and a strong, artistically mature character. Front and center are the poetry and especially the vocal delivery of Ivan Ščapec, which grabs all the attention here. Indie folk rock steeped in alternative rock sentiment. That sentiment is really a kind of distant echo of Ščapec’s work among the sonic terrorists of Vlasta Popić.
The use of acoustics is a key building block this time, giving the album its distinctive look. The compositional strokes are short, concise and totally unpretentious, yet decidedly minimalist. One of the basic axioms of musical expression, »less is more«, works brilliantly here. The production is agreeably organic, live-sounding, and effectively sets the components of the overall sonic picture against each other. In this setting, the penetrating, melodic yet incredibly warm bass line turns out to be an element that colors the otherwise trivial rhythms of sacred simplicity, the ones on which individual songs float »dreamily«, and it gives the songs an important pulse, a contrasting shade.
Ivan Ščapec’s voice gives this record a very special character. A casual listener would declare it a woman’s voice in an instant, but it isn’t. With exactly this voice Ivan Ščapec breathes all of the songs’ individuality and peculiarity into them, and with such a special vocal delivery, full-blooded sensitivity and lack of pretension, the messages reach a special expressive range, which gives the album the pedigree of a one-of-a-kind original.
Precisely because of the (mostly melancholic) vocal delivery, whose dreaminess is dressed in gentle, soft but clearly placed touches of instrumental accompaniment, the album carries a noticeable psychedelic sentiment, and the voice occasionally takes on the outlines of an extraterrestrial address, as if coming from beyond, outside of reality (Spavam). In the melody the voice often flirts with the heritage of traditional folk tunes typical of the geographic region of Croatia that Ivan Ščapec comes from (Varaždin and surroundings). The peak of this charm is the songs Bubamara, with a hint of cabaret chanson, and Janko, performed »a capella« style, which on their own come across as rather irritating standalone tracks. Integrated into the body of »Sno sna«, though, they bring an important element of dynamic variety and plot development. If we’re looking for the album’s most attractive note, that is, the already-mentioned, extremely special indie rock element with accented guitar-engraved phrasing, with Ščapec’s standout vocal character above it, alongside a fairly standard musical integration of the folk moment, then the almost ideal example of such a blend on the album is Ko. In terms of well-judged songwriting, it’s also perfectly suited for radio airplay.
The result is an absolutely unique and special album that, in terms of musical artistry, is hard for anything to get close to. As such it takes a clear and special place in the wider geographic region of the Balkan Peninsula, within an otherwise rich, incredibly lively and colorful, even daringly adventurous alternative rock pulse, which is experiencing a new bloom these days in the territory of the former common state.
Seine – Svog
Line-up
Boško Mijušković – bass guitar
Dimitrij Mekotanović Petrović – drums, backing vocals
Ivan Ščapec – vocals, guitar
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Brane Norav on tracks 4 and 10.
Production
Boris Mladenović
Tracklist
1. Spavam (04:24)
2. Svog (04:14)
3. Privatno Tijelo (03:55)
4. Bubamara (01:55)
5. Ko (02:52)
6. Kritika Čistog Razuma (04:22)
7. Puška (03:01)
8. Janko (02:33)
9. Šilo (04:19)
10. Ljubav (03:56)
