Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Ljubljana / Orto bar / Slovenia
Concert date: 22.04.2011
Attendance: 70
Ticket price: €5 in advance | €7 on the day of the show
Adam, the very synonym for creative Slovenian rock, are a year past their debut Alfa (review, interview) and they’re still as fresh and full of energy as the moment they played their first gig. What’s more, the quartet — Gregor Jakac on drums, Anej Kočevar on bass, Peter Dekleva on guitar and backing mic, and Damir Lisica on lead vocals and theremin tinkering — has matured even further, the chemistry between them is edging closer to perfection, and there’s more energy than ever. A year on, Alfa live is still the omega. It’s also been about two years since the band’s last show at Orto Bar (report), so the timing and the stage last night were just right for a proper anniversary of Adam’s debut album.
The names speak for themselves, no need to introduce the musicians one by one. Still, watching these guys on stage is a whole different thing: how they deliver their own music in front of a crowd, how much of themselves they pour into the performance. What we saw last night was a show “par excellence”. It was a performance where every aspect of the true idea of music, of real music-making, comes together; Adam play music for its own sake, and when that’s the primary goal of musical geniuses, the result is, of course, outstanding. Every true music lover who walked into Orto Bar last night, probably without knowing it, walked into a musical utopia. And an opportunity like that is damn rare in Slovenia.
I don’t know where last night’s glow and charm came from. The guys weren’t just having a good day, something else was clearly at work. Watching the guitar wizard Dekleva do his thing was magical — he put a spell on the crowd, which is why the chanting of his name was totally justified. The fact is that “Pero” knows exactly how to handle his instrument, but incredible command of the guitar isn’t everything — it was above all the personal investment and the emotion that made his performance so praiseworthy. The guitarist all but bled onstage. At one point he even surprised himself and needed a short break to come back from the trance that the end of “Včeraj, danes, jutri” had put the whole audience in. I won’t even waste words on the jamming between songs — but it’s best when the musicians themselves enjoy the playing, because that’s when all sorts of noodling and improvised bits come naturally, and “Pero’s” playing had no shortage of them. The same kind of swaying, and even more eccentric stuff, could be seen from Damir Lisica, who showed fantastically how far Adam’s music reaches beyond just the ears and the right hemisphere of the brain — together with the phenomenal lyrics, it reaches all the way to the heart. Last night we felt butterflies in our stomachs, adrenaline in our veins, goosebumps on our skin, hearts beating way too fast. Through it all we tapped out the rhythm with our feet, a rhythm that came all by itself and answered to the name Gregor Jakac. If his performance doesn’t coax a smile out of you, then nothing will. Gregor’s surplus of energy, yet another proof that the best music comes from the desire for it, added the final pieces to the Adam mosaic; the picture was completed by Anej Kočevar, “Pinky,” as “Dado” called him last night, who likewise showed off a nice number of tricks from the bass players’ guild.
We clearly heard the whole of Alfa last night, with only the track “Ključ” missing, but Adam made up for it with “Tekoči kristali,” a song that’s on the compilation “Rokerji pojejo pesnike VI,” which came out, logically, as part of the project “Rokerji pojejo pesnike”. It’s set to the poetry of Nino Flisar, a poet, editor and publicist. The setlist was thus more or less complete; the biggest fans (well, surely the rest of us too) might have wished to hear an acoustic version of a song or two (e.g. “Punker”), but that’s pretty much wishful thinking. Still, we can definitely look forward to Adam “unplugged” in the future.
Last night’s gig could leave only audiophiles cold. Let’s be honest, the instruments were a bit too loud and the vocals too quiet, at least in the first part of the show. “Dado’s” voice was hard to make out in the onslaught of the booming rhythm section and the guitar’s countless effects. Plenty of us knew the lyrics by heart, but I feel sorry for those who maybe hadn’t heard them yet; for the most part, what reached our ears from Damir was the vocal line and not much else. In the second half of the show everything got turned up a notch, so standing under the speakers was downright dangerous; at least the vocals were audible this time. I’m only mentioning it so the band keeps striving for perfection, because what I just wrote in no way spoiled the show as a whole.
It’s incredible that even a band like Adam gets only an average turnout, although I can’t say there were few people there last night. But there were too few for a band of Adam’s caliber. Today’s average Slovenian scene points all its fingers at them, at their originality, skill and quality. I’m convinced that if Adam were English with English lyrics, they’d break the world market, because their music and live performance far surpass not only the staleness of Slovenian rock, they can hold their own against the best the world market has to offer. So let my last words be words of encouragement and a call to action — to Adam, don’t give up and keep going the way you’ve set out so far, and to Slovenia’s couch potatoes, get out of your dens and come to a show that will knock you on your ass.
photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Setlist
1. Teater 2. Grlo 3. Brez strahu 4. Dar 5. Pot 6. Pridih 7. Alfa 8. Novi svet 9. Dom 10. Modrost 11. Otroci brzine 12. Potovanje v neznano 13. Odnosi med srečnimi 14. ČB spletni tok —encore— 15. Herointeror 16. Tekoči kristali 17. Punker 18. Včeraj, danes, jutri 19. Revolucija
Photo gallery
