Gospodar Storms Into Ortofest Once Again (2013)

Name: Misþyrming (Owls Woods Graves, Profanation, Gorrch), Ljubljana (Orto bar), Slovenia
Start: 2026-10-20
End: 2026-10-20
Location: Orto bar

Arhiv Arhiv Last updated 11 June 2026

Author: Aleš Podbrežnik

Location: Ljubljana / Orto bar / Slovenia
Concert date: April 23, 2013
Attendance: 180
Ticket price: €8.00 / €12.00

Avtomobili are a legendary Slovenian art rock band. They’ve got such a strong catalog of original material, and I do mean »really strong«, that every time they play it on stage, you can’t pick a favorite song. The second you do, you’ll be doing an injustice to the next one (or the previous one) in the set.

Over thirty years in the saddle, over thirty years among the most prominent acts on the Slovenian rock map, and a band that shaped the face of Slovenian, and Yugoslav, mainstream through the eighties and nineties. Avtomobili don’t age. They just ripen. The new album »Pozna pomlad« – RockLine review HERE, brought a fresh dose of creative dynamite that keeps Avtomobili’s engine running! And yet it feels like, after all these years of holding out, and years of delivering a whole string of excellent songs and albums to the people, the band still hasn’t gotten proper recognition for its artistry from its home country. Bands this important for preserving the tradition and heritage of Slovenian rock culture, like Avtomobili in our case, get honored in other countries with at least a series of stamps. At least that. Canada protected Rush’s music years ago with a special decree, as a kind of cultural monument. A stamp featuring the cover of their most successful album »Moving Pictures« (1981) came out recently. And the Republic of Slovenia? Can it recognize the meaning and quality of its own artists’ rock music? I’m talking quality, not connections and cronyism? There we go. Better to cut this train of thought short right here. Somewhere, someday, on another planet, where the world will be kind and honest.

A new gig and a new experience full of gorgeous moments that lift you out of your everyday grind for a little while. That’s a meeting with Avtomobili. Once again. For the second year in a row, Avtomobili packed Orto bar to the last corner as part of Ortofest. Only the turnout in 2009 was a bit weaker, when Orto bar was just half full. The band wears the Orto bar timeline on the pinky of its left hand. They kicked off 15 minutes past ten in the evening and wrapped up at exactly midnight, encore included. In line with the required protocols, in other words. A sliver of the band’s rich experience shows in a detail like that, minor as it is.

The band, who released their new studio album »Pozna pomlad« last October, opened the show in that same spirit. With the song Bar pozabe, which comes as a peculiar surprise to ears used to the evergreens. A dark track that builds, builds, builds its atmosphere slowly and ratchets it up with calculated tension into a chorus crescendo where it finally thunders in proper rock fashion.

Loud. Too loud at the start. The early classic Ona nosi uniformu could still sort of put up with those settings, but the slight crackling of the somewhat clumsily dialed-in sound was distracting in the evergreen Drugačno nebo. Then, during Kaj si hotel, a great new song from the new album »Pozna pomlad«, the sound guy took pity on more demanding ears and, for the next evergreen, which calls for particular sophistication in performance, Gorica, set up a balanced sound. And that’s how it stayed in the room until the end of the show.

If a gig works, it means it effectively woke up sincere emotions. In the band’s musical message, as well as in the hearts of the people in the crowd. And this time was no different. The crowd cut loose, and all the girls came to life too, finally heading out into the nightlife in their high heels and making a big contribution to the packed club. Spring is clearly here. Avtomobili’s unique artistry is what draws people in. They manage to cross the figure of a seductive melody with a distinctive »signature« to their music, which also attracts the attention of more demanding listeners.

A quintet of top-notch musicians, led by the indestructible Vuksanovič brothers, does the job superbly. What stands out in the band’s playing is the exceptional chemistry of the five, as well as each individual’s work. The arrangements of the evergreens are upgraded with transitional figures, extra detail, and spiced up with improvised inserts, whose refined execution once again impressed, especially in the outros. These were elegantly built up by the multilayered musicianship and remarkably sharp playing of Booshee and David Morgan. It’s thanks to the two of them that Avtomobili can sound even more artistically daring today, since there are many figures that carry the musical story even more maturely, all the way to the foundations of jazz. And the warmth of the bass lines adds that quality of charming funk, which the live image of the band’s rock-solid repertoire has picked up over the years, especially the newest original songs from the album »Pozna pomlad«.

Thank God. Finally a Slovenian band that doesn’t have to play covers to fill Orto bar! The crowd joined in, of course, and above all they didn’t miss the masterful inserts by David Morgan and Booshee. Avtomobili are a real pleasure to watch. They strive for perfectionism, and that desire is so clearly on display in the band that ordinary music fans actually get stage perfection played to them. They simply play fantastically. And it’s hard to knock them off course. The chorus melodies of the evergreens called the crowd to join in automatically! This subtle work by the quintet, all the finesse, the filigree moves, all of it was further highlighted in the intimate club space.

And who successfully crossed Slovenian rock with reggae, or dressed up the intro of a song… Khmm, I’ll try to be banally clear – say Roxanne (The Police) into their own original spin-off? Avtomobili and their Gospodar! And it was fun once again when the crowd wanted (as always) to turn into the chorus too early, while Marko still had one more verse to sing.

The hangout flipped around in an instant. The concert experience with Avtomobili confirmed once again that you can never get enough of their shows. Their musical output remains a timeless masterpiece. No more, no less. So it’s worth looking through this year’s calendar again to find where the band’s next show is.