Location: Cerkno / Bar Gabrijel / Slovenia
Date: Thursday, 07.02.2019
Leon Matek is a Slovenian singer-songwriter who, art-wise, is a multi-talented creator, so it’s lucky that among all his other pursuits Leon still finds time for music. Films, painting and working with people in distress are just a few pieces of his exciting everyday life. Lucky us. That’s exactly where he draws his inspiration for writing songs. He’s an excellent and incredibly insightful poet, and in his music his voice and acoustic guitar have always been joined by the accordion. The way his compositions fuse with that instrument is, in fact, one of the key elements that gives him a special place in the Slovenian musical universe.
Cerkno again. As always. Bar Gabrijel. On the eve of Slovenian Culture Day. Leon Matek Kvartet. Voice and guitar belong to Leon, of course, the accordion to Jaka Kastelic, who creates and lives in Berlin, then there’s the incredible Sergej Ranđelovič “Runjoe” on drums and bassist Marjan Gradišar, a man practically inseparable from Leon’s musical career. The new album, his third solo studio effort, “Srce imaš tako veliko”, is Leon’s freshest piece of work. It saw the light of day last October, and Leon is of course still promoting it as eagerly as he can on Slovenian stages. Since violinist Petra Onderufova, who played on the album, wasn’t around, the quartet asked the young and promising Idrija violinist Danijel Bogataj for help, and he stepped in to pull off the numbers where the violin simply can’t be missing.
Leon split the program, i.e. the performance repertoire, which ran an hour and a half, into sort of sets. To warm up, he first took the crowd back to the debut album “Zrno” (2007), followed by a showcase of the new album, then a jump to the second album “Most”, and another return to “Srce imaš tako veliko”. Blocks of three to four songs from each album, alternating. Some older numbers certainly weren’t left out, among them the quietly anticipated and more-than-obligatory Ljubezenska, which simply can’t be missing from the set.
Leon Matek is an absolute oddball on the Slovenian singer-songwriter scene. Not only is he a lyricist who shakes you up, jolts you, wakes you up. He goes about it very head-on, with no fancy dressing-up in metaphors, which could drive someone up the wall if they couldn’t dig out the message. He can be very penetrating and unrestrainedly passionate when he’s giving away his love, and incredibly cunning and biting when the conversation turns to the delusions of the brave new world we’re enslaved to. He’s an awakener, a beautiful awakener. And there was plenty of that awakening this evening. The accordion remains an integral instrument, contrasting and coloring the space within the songs as it chameleon-like shifts its sonic nature, from Andalusia and France to the Šentflorjan Valley, of course, and all the way to the melos of arabesques. The occasional pairing with the violin boosted the mood and deepened the dramatic moments. Playful bassist Marjan follows all of Leon’s moves with a glow throughout, and not even Runjoe stays out of his sights. The man with the sexiest hairdo of the evening, one that Johnny Rotten himself would envy, teams up with the refined and magnificent “feel” drummer Runjoe to provide a contrasting counterweight full of warmth and dynamics. Together with Sergej, he builds the perfect frame in which Leon and the rest of the crew are comfortably “sprawled”.
Needless to say, Leon was of course the center of attention. Sensuality, passion and deep feeling are just another name for him. Every song, a new face. In everything. Leon is certainly a skilled link between songs, and with his cheeky sense of humor he holds the audience’s attention in a hugely likable way, and nothing in the performance goes unnoticed. Not even the odd little, totally innocent and painless flub (ah, that damn acoustics, nothing escapes it). But the crew of musicians is outstanding. And the performance consequently no less so. The older songs carry the hallmarks of proto-rock and even maybe punk, while the later creations show the incredible maturing of a musician who, through his singer-songwriter nature, swings compositionally from straight-up folk to the erotically whispering bosom of the blues, or swirling blues-swing. Melos and vocal charisma, meanwhile, put Matek in a special place of artistic originality. The new album was more heavily represented in the set, and since there’s a whole seven-year “hole” between it and its predecessor, it’s clear the songs on the new record have an extremely strong character. Polished. In terms of poetry as well as arrangements. They’re a reflection of our lives, the glitz and misery of the past seven years, and when Leon has the enforcers bleeding us dry in his crosshairs, along with the moronic reality shows and the general decay of healthy communication ruled by FaceBook and whatnot, he becomes the voice of all of us. Even when he’s carried away by passion and the glow of love, he stirs emotions in the listener and awakens all kinds of feelings.
The concert was of course far from as serious as one might gather from the end of the previous paragraph of this piece. Leon decorates everything with a mildly roguish and mischievous touch in the way he communicates, effectively breaking down every possible barrier in connecting with the audience. There was plenty of that, and although attendance wasn’t quite what they’d have wished for, Nataša sat in the front row, and that fit perfectly with the performance of Ljubezenska. Quite a bit of adorable blushing could be spotted.
In the closing part of the show, the band again turned more attention to the new album (Zakaj bi protestiral?, Ti si ples vesolja), then, wanting the crowd to get their heels moving, wrapped up with the cheeky Pleši, pleši dekle, followed by a “saboteur” encore with the song Nocoj si moja. The song comes from the album “Spohane viže” (1997), from when Leon was still in the duo Juhej in vuhmepiš, and he accompanied the performance with a remark that it was written back in his high school days.
An excellent club show in every respect, with the band playing like they know the room like the back of their hand and no shortage of genuine emotion and passion. A gig that flew by incredibly fast. An hour and a half turned over in an instant. Almost too fast. Matek’s “checkmate” in Cerkno.
author: Aleš Podbrežnik
photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Setlist:
1. Poljubi me
2. On je pozabil
3. Pridi, bova šla čez sedem hribov
4. Kdaj je umrla iskra v tvojih očeh
5. Najraje bi ta dan preklet prespal
6. Hočem veliko več
7. Ko te pogledam v oči
8. Grenko slovo
9. Most
10. Drago se boš prodala
11. Ljudožerci
12. I Live In FaceBook
13. Pazi, pazi, padu boš
14. Ljubezenska
15. v gozdičku
16. Daj nehaj že govorit
17. Zakaj bi protestiral?
18. Ti si ples vesolja
19. Pleši, pleši dekle
20. Nocoj si moja
