Label: Društvo kočevskih glasbenikov
Release date: December 19, 2019
Production: various producers
Audio finalization: Robi Bulešić
Genre: Compilation / Various artists
Rating: 9.5 / 10
Official Bandcamp page!
A year has flown by and here’s the new “Kočevje špila” compilation. With the emphasis on heart! Wholehearted! This time with artwork that speaks to you directly. Anyone remember those long-gone, innocent days, especially those of you who were teenagers in the mid-eighties, before the invasion of the internet and “smart” phones, when we killed time during the grueling hours of high school classes by doodling on the pages of pocket planners, which were back then an essential accessory for everyone? The hand-drawn heart on this compilation’s cover comes straight out of one of those pages.
This year’s compilation is once again more generously stocked than last year’s (you can read the review of the “Kočevje špila Strip” compilation HERE!), featuring 16 artists (if memory serves, the record for one of the compilations is 21). Some are old acquaintances, but quite a few are joining the “Kočevje špila” family for the very first time. The new “Kočevje špila” compilation opens dead set on rocking out. That’s surprising, because it kicks off with four roaring tracks in a row. As we’ll see, the compilation unfolds in a sort of genre clusters, if I may be a little sloppy about it. In the opening stretch, a mountain of loose, distorted decibels in a punk and metal superstitious key “attacks” the listener, followed by a fleeting “break” in dynamics with an alt-rock track, then the compilation goes on to present artists from the electronic music and hip hop camps, via surf/rockabilly and a blues number, moving on to singer-songwriter territory, before a caressing jazz instrumental wraps it all up.
So. The start of this heartfelt compilation can bring on an actual heart attack in the unprepared! While the thrash and alt-metal, always pleasingly “scalded” Nčodnč (the track B.E.F., read: “Best Enemy Forever”) are a staple of the compilations, and the living legends of Kočevje punk Punkeroschi are back again with the furious slap in the face Gledamo stran – both bands diligently stick with convulsive loyalty to their proven musical guidelines of rage and rabidity – “Kočevje špila” is presenting No Comments and Septic Order for the first time. The album opens with the biting HC track Črna lista – beu prah by No Comments, while the compilation (alongside Nčodnč) gains a second metal representative with the inclusion of Septic Order’s track Mind Infections, addressing the listener septically with an ambitious groove/thrash metal composition. Septic Order return after a one-year break. With new material, no less!
Charlie Butter Fly (Borec) cool down the ball after the opening cannon-fire serve of four tracks and offer a glimpse of artistic maturing which, in the contrast of a recognizable, slightly nasal (Kreslin is nasal too, so what?) yet mid-to-low-pitched (manly) voice and the pleasingly organic, unpolished jangle of guitars, once again works very well in its yield of typically Slovenian dark brooding. Let’s hope the track heralds the birth of a new original release.
Next comes the experimental part of the album. First up are the tried-and-true connoisseurs of “electronic sound nozzles” Extended Veins, with a new instructive “break beat” rhetoric in the track Break It, followed by another new, provocative DJ lesson from Kroosher in Come Back, and then the compilation turns its attention to hip hop moments of organic sound collages with the artists Dirty O.G. feat. Iva (Govorice) and Denied (HipHop NonStop).
The middle of the compilation is spiced up especially by the inclusion of The Over Drive Cats and, right behind them, D.O.G.. Simple as that. The two bands stamp themselves with archaic genres that we Slovenians don’t play very often these days. The first are behind the track A Real Cool Cat, which flirts with rockabilly and surf rhetoric, and if Elvis (Presley, I mean) were Slovenian, in his late eighties today he’d probably be making something like this. D.O.G. contribute the track B lues, which hints at its subject right in the name, though the song isn’t as lucid as Paralelni svet by Marjan Hladnik, from the compilation “Kočevje špila Po Stojni” (2017).
Next up is the singer-songwriter part of the compilation, opened by yet another gorgeous little pop song (with a bluesy seasoning) by Andraž Hribar, Sedi na moj vlak (fans of Hamo & Tribute 2 Love, check this one out), followed by the obligatory inclusion of the legendary Roman Zupančič, who once again reigns over his world of playful melancholy, surrendering with his deep, recognizable voice to the message of the signature track Raztrgani fotelj (this time the piano takes the lead in the arrangement). While Nika & Nejc come off a bit naive with the track Pleševa, though certainly endearing, ClaudiZu bring more songwriting maturity afterwards. Klavdija Jaketič’s female vocals, which at moments don’t hide a mild inspiration from The Cranberries singer Dolores O’Riordan, lead the track Tebi, ki te ni with great feeling, and it delivers a string of “heartfelt” peaks to this “heartfelt” compilation. The very tail end of this edition of “Kočevje špila S srcem” belongs to jazz leanings that unfold in the glow of organic purity and the sonic purism of the refined Goran Bilbija (Hipster), where there’s no shortage of sensual finger-picking softness or of a wonderfully successful fusion of musical compactness and playful tricks of virtuosity.
As always, and for the seventh time running! The compilation “Kočevje špila S srcem” is yet another flawless lexicon of the rich musical pulse of the Kočevje region (“Obkolpje” included), serving up a hefty harvest of homegrown original creativity and an incredibly colorful face of genre (and cross-genre) reconciliation, which for such a tiny piece of the planet and the galaxy is not merely unusual, but downright unbelievable. All in all, a document we have every reason to be proud of!
author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Tracklist:
1. No Comment – Črna lista… Beu prah (03:02)
2. Pankeroschi – Gledamo stran (03:32)
3. Nčodnč – BEF (02:40)
4. Septic Order – Mind Infections (04:44)
5. Charlie Butter Fly – Borec (04:58)
6. Extended Veins – Break it (02:53)
7. Krosheer feat. Annavi – Come back (radio edit) (03:35)
8. Dirty O.G. feat. Iva – Govorice (04:41)
9. Denied – HipHop NonStop (03:45)
10. The Over Drive Cats – A Real Cool Cat (03:24)
11. D.O.G. – B lues (05:04)
12. Andraž Hribar – Sedi na moj vlak (03:29)
13. Roman Zupančič – Raztrgani fotelj (03:53)
14. Nika & Nejc – Pleševa (03:09)
15. ClaudiZu – Tebi, ki te ni (03:14)
16. Goran Bilbija – Hipster (03:45)
