Artist: Beat Fleet, The (TBF)
Label: Dallas Records
Release: 2010
Rating: 4.5/5
Yet another big success story from our southern neighbor Croatia has finally coughed up its first officially released live album. Although they’ve been around for two decades, their breakthrough was a long and bloody slog. Even though they’re at a creative peak right now, their cult debut “Ping-Pong” from 1997 is considered one of the best Croatian albums of all time, which can be a bit misleading, but it also tells the newcomer straight away that you don’t mess with the Split natives The Beat Fleet. This is a band with barely four albums out, yet every single one of them is a qualitative step up from the last.
Sarcasm is The Beat Fleet’s middle name. Their preaching, delivered through their verses, let’s call them rap recitals, is one of the most refined, subtle approaches around: it strokes you on the left cheek while slapping you hard on the right. Sobering up above all else. The intellectual growth of this superb band keeps serving up a solid yet juicy bone to gnaw on, and that keeps the guys from Split magnetic and interesting to discover at every turn. They bring the truth about the harsh reality of humanity’s viral condition to the listener in a modest, unobtrusive way, through the prism of highly intelligent humoresques. Hip-hop poetry you can only learn from.
What makes this double live album special is that the band doesn’t use any backing tracks or programmed samples to build a backdrop. This time the guys do it strictly with their own muscle power. What’s more, severely limited by the available electricity, they set out to play the entire set in an “unplugged” version. At the Zagreb club Močvara, right on the band’s first birthday, 07.11.2009 to be exact. Needless to say, the club was packed to the last corner.
The selection of material offers the best creative moments from the band’s career. Since the songs are completely stripped bare live, it’s hard to tell when each one was written. That means older tracks like 3-logija jada or ‘Malo san maka, the opening Slobodan stil, the closing St Stanje uma and Ye’n, dva, two from the studio debut, keep all the relevance of the band’s creative authorship and musical confession as they alternate with newer songs throughout the album’s repertoire.
Excellent communication, a high level of understanding and stage awareness among the musicians, a band warmed up to the right working temperature in front of a jam-packed Močvara, a heated, loud crowd that follows the guys on stage fanatically. And we mustn’t overlook the excellent rearranging of the songs, which proves that The Beat Fleet aren’t just great storytellers and sharp critics of social stratification and the injustices dealt to the little guy, but also superb instrumentalists. In hip-hop à la The Beat Fleet, a Dalmatian flavor shamelessly rises to the surface, deepened above all by the accordion, which gives the songs a special connotation and unmistakably reveals the band’s geographic roots. In their acoustic form, The Beat Fleet are a tough, convincing tandem, and the songs in their new arrangement clothes work in a completely different light, which makes this album truly unique and all the more appealing for it. A melodically subtle side comes to the surface, with touches of jazz improvisation and rolling funk sparkling through. With this new artistic reach, The Beat Fleet have made an album that once again exceeded expectations and opened up a new angle on the band’s artistry for the masses.
Even the packaging is sarcastic: tucked inside is a recipe for the Dalmatian treat “fritule,” something even the late Frank Zappa probably wouldn’t be ashamed of. The concert is played without a stumble at a high level of musical and expressive cohesion, and this time it’s genuinely hard to pick out highlights. You’ll have to give yourself over to it completely and choose your own personal favorites. “Perpetuum Fritule” is an endlessly fun live album that paints The Beat Fleet in a new, different light, while also offering an outstanding discographic glimpse into the band’s character and work. It probably goes without saying that many people will regret missing the night when they couldn’t share that energy directly with the band at Močvara. Still, there’s consolation. In the form of a CD. And trust me, The Beat Fleet have once again done their job with flying colors.
Lineup
Mladen Badovinac – vocals
Saša Antić – vocals, accordion
Luka Barbić – vocals, keyboards, harmonica, clarinet
Nikša Mandalinić – guitar
Ognjen Pavlović – bass guitar
Janko Novoselić – drums, percussion
Production
Miro Vidović & Filip Vidović
Track List
CD1.:
1. Slobodni stil
2. Fantastična
3. Tobogan
4. Ye’n, Dva
5. Malo san maka
6. Data
7. Pljačka
8. Nostalgična
9. 3logija
10. Heroyix
11. Bog i Zemljani
12. Lud za njom
CD2.:
1. Šareni artikal
2. Guzice i sise
3. Papilova
4. Alles gut
5. Smak svita
6. Život je lijep
7. Genije
8. Odjeb je lansiran
9. ST stanje uma
