Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Nula Kelvina
Label: Celinka
Release: 2015
Length: 38:12
Rating: 4/5
Ever since their 2011 debut »Možgani na paši«, Nula Kelvina have been winning people over with their presence and one-of-a-kind musical charisma. This is a band whose poetry and melodies sober up and rouse any listener. A reflection of the sharp intellect of its frontfolk. Across their output, Nula Kelvina have always unsettled, teased and provoked. In just the right dose. Healthy and down-to-earth. Their stage show has always come with a touch of theater, which enriched their stage design while giving crowds a full-blooded good time.
The new album, though, is meant to embody stage theater in its live performance from start to finish. A kind of play. The record carries a clear red thread throughout, built on two worlds. Two worlds locked in constant war. Men and women. The relationship between them is never ideal. Thank goodness it isn’t, or it would be boring. Marko Boh, the main driving engine and creative visionary behind the musical direction of Nula Kelvina, took a running start this time and went at relationships between men and women with the biggest appetite, in all the various acts that any everyday love-life incident between two people brings. We’re talking heterosexual love relationships, then. Even if they all seem pretty old-fashioned these days, thankfully not outdated. In his poetry, Boh keeps adding that mild bite, that mild bitterness, mildly clouding the thought of the ideal love relationship, while in the glow of his masterful wordplay he once again comes across as razor-sharp lucid and sarcastic. That’s why »Levak na Luni« is a riot from start to finish. Just like the band’s previous two releases.
To make the album ignite as authentically as possible, both on stage and in the studio, to ring true and relived, and to create the feeling of virtual reality when you blend the pieces with it live, the band invited Pliš singer Aleksandra Ilijevski to collaborate. Most of the songs on the album feature a male-female duet of Marko and Aleksandra, while some are sung entirely by a single lead vocalist (male or female). The song Nisva še vrgla is actually a re-dressed, re-adapted version of the song Nisem še vrgel from the debut »Možgani na paši«, and something similar happened on the new album to the debut’s title track itself. The lead single Maškerada is a song that appears twice on the album. It would make no sense at all if there weren’t a big, clear gap in genre and execution between the two versions. In the first version, sung entirely by Marko Boh (Maškerada), it’s the vocal expression of rooster machismo, while in the second (Mam te rada), done in the form of a cabaret chanson, Aleksandra steps in, soft and tender.
The album opens the way Drenov grič ended. With the same tone, which through the manipulation in the intro Drenov Grič – Luna slowly rises in a shrill climb and conjures up an actual flight to the Moon (straight out of Drenov Grič). The lucid intro flows into the title track Levak na Luni. The confession is embodied by the album cover itself, and by the lyrics, which are really the only thing on the album that departs from the red thread of male-female relationships, though even the closing Življenje diši doesn’t escape it entirely. The levak here is the individual who bows to life as dictated by the 1% of world conspirators and limitless billionaires. Always pushed down and bent over. And that’s actually most of us. We’re all levaki. And we keep quiet. Let’s admit it. The Levak on the Moon, though, is the one who escaped this crazy Earthly slavery and finally found his peace on the Moon. Musically, Nula Kelvina come across as an outstanding outfit. The performance of the material is excellent, the interpretation of Marko’s poetry sparkles to the fullest, helped along by Aleksandra Ilijevski’s exceptionally beautiful and sensual voice. The duet works with a hugely attractive, compatible contrast that it builds up at key moments. In that sense Marko and Aleksandra really do play like an old married couple, which is exactly the point of magnifying one of the feelings this album’s message is meant to give birth to. And the band pulled it off. Also not to be overlooked is the new excellent guitar work of Gašper Kržmanc, who really sparks in the instrumental passages in the middle (the middle eights). By placing just the right balance of notes, or rather their arrangement, within shorter but juicily vivid solos, he keeps swinging the development of moods and so keeps the dynamic flow of events in the songs at a high level.
Musically, Nula Kelvina owe a great deal of thanks for their inspiration to the figure and work of The Beatles. The band also adds elements of blues, rock’n’ roll, cabaret chanson and reggae to its musical exposé (the newly adapted version of the song Možgani na paši). The music is first and foremost subordinate to high musical value, but with a rustic connotation. Hence the parallel with The Beatles. The tracks are compact and catchy fast, which makes this an album whose songs could comfortably fill the radio airwaves. And if these times were truly kind to real creativity in musical art, this kind of music would slowly turn around the face of the Slovenian charts and gradually heal the impoverished face of the Slovenian music mainstream, where listeners’ receivers are usually bombarded with pure musical garbage.
In short. »Levak na Luni« is an excellent new musical achievement that entertains enormously, while through Marko Boh’s sparkling and lucid words it also shakes up and wakes up the listener. It’s also a big preview of the full-on theater excess awaiting us at upcoming encounters with Nula Kelvina, when they perform the entire album on stage! If its predecessor “Drenov Grič” defined the stylistic foundation of Nula Kelvina’s music, then its successor “Levak na Luni” cements that direction: vivid authorial charisma and artistic originality.
Lineup
Aleksandra Ilijevski – vocals
Marko Boh – vocals, keyboards
Gašper Kržmanc – guitar, backing vocals
Klemen Kotar – bass guitar, saxophone, backing vocals
Miha Kržmanc – drums, percussion
Production
Nula Kelvina
Track list
1. Drenov Grič – Luna
2. Levak na Luni
3. Maškerada
4. Vse odvečne besede
5. Kako si?
6. Kako naj ti povem?
7. Nisva še vrgla
8. Prebudiva se v sanje
9. Le zaspi zaspi
10. Možgani na paši
11. Življenje diši
12. Mam te rada
