Interview date: 27.10.2007
Big Foot Mama are back this week with a brand-new sixth studio album, Važno, da zadane. Their nearly twenty-year journey has been an interesting and eventful one – with their debut Nova pravila they breathed new life into Slovenian rock’n’roll, with their second record Kaj se dogaja? they brought a bit more variety into their music, Tretja dimenzija was very diverse in terms of rock genres, Doba norih drifted quite a way from rock, and then came the shock – guitarist and main songwriter Miha Guštin – Gušti left the band to go solo. Zoran Čalić, formerly of Majk and Holderji, stepped into his place and first recorded two new songs with the band, Vrn’ se k men’ and Brez meja, followed by the album 5ing, with which the band returned to pure-blooded rock’n’roll. For their fifteenth anniversary they threw a magnificent concert at Gospodarsko razstavišče with plenty of interesting musical guests, and marked it by releasing the double album Big Foot Mama 15 Let V Živo Z Gosti. We talked about all this, and of course about the new album Važno, da zadane, with bassist, backing vocalist and songwriter Alen Steržaj.
RockLine: Your sixth studio album Važno, da zadane is finally here. With Zoran Čalić on board, BFM are back in classic rock waters – has anything changed compared to the previous album 5ing?
Alen: “We already went back to our rocker roots with 5ing, but at times it was still a little pop-melancholic. Važno, da zadane is a much more hedonistic project, it delivers a fresh dose of true-believer rock’n’roll straight to the forehead, without too much whining, the lyrics are way more party-minded, as befits BFM best, and above all there are more melodic guitar lines.”
RockLine: Any interesting guests on the album, any unusual cover, any special surprise?
Alen: “We made the album mostly from within, the focus is on the new songs, which bring a good deal of freshness, though it’s true we added a cover of Videosex’s legendary Moja mama as a bonus track, which we contributed for the 35th anniversary of Val 202.”
RockLine: The title Važno, da zadane is grammatically incorrect. A person gets “zadet” (high), so something can “zadene” (hit) them… is rock going to corrupt the youth again?
Alen: “The title is deliberately ungrammatical because it’s taken from young people’s slang. If love, passion, adrenaline, natural substances hit you – what’s corrupting about that?”
RockLine: And what “hits” you these days, and in general?
Alen: “Whatever sparks a fire, whatever opens up the day, whatever moves the soul – as long as it hits! That’s what the song says. Everybody knows for themselves what hits them in life, what things they want to give themselves over to, and it seems to us there are way too many brakes and commandments in society that stop people from enjoying themselves without a care. What hits us, as the song says, is love, passion, adrenaline, natural substances, new songs, chocolate, table football.”
RockLine: For many people your double album Big Foot Mama 15 Let v živo was a big surprise, with interesting and respected Slovenian bands reworking your songs – what was it like to hear Katalena, Šukar, Ansambel Lojzeta Slaka and Srečna Mladina, who surely stood out the most for being different?
Alen: “The feeling was phenomenal, because it was really interesting to hear how other musicians see Big Foot Mama, or how they interpret our songs. Above all, we were of course proud that Lojze Slak did his own version of Neki sladkega, because he’s a true legend in every sense, and not just out of politeness to us – his ensemble and his fans took to the arrangement so much that they play it at every single concert, even three times a night.”
RockLine: In the past, Miha Guštin – Gušti wrote more or less all the music and lyrics, with you adding your bit too. Who’s the main creative force for lyrics and music now?
Alen: “An important novelty the new album brings is certainly the more spread-out songwriting: besides my humble bits, Zoran Čalić contributed two songs and Daniel Gregorič one, so the album really is the work of the whole band.”
RockLine: What’s the biggest challenge for you with this release, given that the record industry is going to the dogs? You’ve sold out Križanke and Gospodarsko razstavišče – is there some great all-Slovenia club tour on the cards, shows in bigger sports halls, stadiums, a breakthrough abroad? Maybe selling 50,000 records?!
Alen: “We didn’t put out the album out of any crazy commercial urges, let’s be clear – otherwise we’d have made a much more pop album. Slovenia has its limits and we know exactly what we can achieve. After all, we’ve been moving in this scene for 17 years now. A tour of the bigger sports halls is an illusion that only brings losses. Breaking abroad takes a completely different strategy, and even that’s no guarantee… We only have one goal: to give our fans in every Slovenian town, whether there are 5,000 of them or 200, the dose of rock’n’roll they need – they and we! But of course, Križanke next year isn’t ruled out.”
RockLine: Looking back fifteen-plus years… you were the ones who kept Slovenian rock(‘n’roll) afloat. Your popularity was followed by Requiem, Sausages, Prisluhnimo tišini, also Res Nullius, Dicky B. Hardy, Hic et Nunc, and consequently Siddharta. How do you see BFM in the role of pioneers of the new wave of Slovenian rock?
Alen: “We’re glad you see us as pioneers. We only hope Slovenian history will remember us that way too. A decade ago there was honestly a total dead zone on the Slovenian music scene (especially in rock), everybody looked at us funny, saying rock is completely uncommercial right now. But we said, screw that. And we pulled it off – that’s how we showed that if you’re a good band, you can make it in rock too. We broke new ground, but it’s only logical that the band that came after us had to aim higher if it wanted to build on that ground. And only one of them managed it.”
RockLine: Did you ever feel you could have achieved more? Did you ever wish you were in some other Slovenian band’s shoes?
Alen: “That time when Tomi M. told us that before Siddharta we were so big that we could have sold out a stadium back then. But no, we never wanted to be in another band’s shoes, because, believe me, we wouldn’t trade Big Foot Mama for anything in the world. We have it too good.”
RockLine: Who in the Slovenian music scene do you look at with admiration and respect, who do you despise, and who are you maybe at least a little bit jealous of?
Alen: “We definitely admire Siddharta, Neisha and Lojze Slak. Contempt isn’t a nice virtue, but we do enjoy a good laugh at the various young-talent contests or at people performing at certain pop festivals.”
RockLine: Rock is of course rebellious at its roots, often political too – have you stuck to party rebellion? Do you think politics doesn’t belong in rock, or is it simply not part of your story?
Alen: “We don’t think we’re qualified to publicly judge the work of politicians. In general, of course, we can honestly say we puke at what’s going on in that scene, especially when we see how capitalists treat workers. Since it isn’t safe to live off music in Slovenia, Daniel, Jože and I also go to day jobs, where we run into the capitalist system – that’s how the song Vse se mi upira came about – the title says a lot.”
RockLine: BFM members started out in your student years, and now you’re all more or less in your thirties. But your fans are still 15, 16 years old on average?
Alen: “What makes our band happiest is that every year at concerts we see new faces in the front row who are the same age as the ones who stood there the year before. And we see that young people between 15 and 25 badly need good, energetic, melodic rock’n’roll to let loose for at least two hours. Because that’s all that hits them. And age doesn’t matter – what matters is that it hits!”
RockLine: When are you thinking about a concert with all the former members – including original singer Andrej Kos and of course Miha Guštin – Gušti?
Alen: “Maybe some day in the future there’ll be an anthology concert, maybe when we have nothing left to say and we’re just riding on the past. Right now there’s nothing like that on the horizon.”
RockLine: Is there a song in the BFM repertoire that you’ve never played live?
Alen: “Yeah, a few songs from the album Doba norih stayed there too. Ugh, and Eksplozija – the intro to the previous album 5ing… Maybe we’ll slot it into the upcoming set.”
Photo Gallery
