Author: Urban Bolta
Artist: Riblja Čorba
Label: City Records
Release: 2012
Length: 49:49
Rating: 3/5
Riblja Čorba is back with a new album! They stick to the rule of a new studio release roughly every three years, and despite how often they put them out, they somehow manage to keep the quality at a halfway decent level. Sure, their curve started heading downward in the late eighties, in the years leading up to the fratricidal war, but over the last decade they’ve still managed to find a form that presents the legends of Serbian rock to the younger generation in a credible light.
Čorba put out the album »Uzbuna« a good three years after its predecessor »Minut sa njom« (2009). That album kicked off a new era for Čorba, bringing some fresh touches to their sound. Bora Đorđević finally ditched the nationalist and politically motivated lyrics and found an alternative in deeper love lyrics. Đorđević, also known as a poet with his own poetry collection, has always had a refined knack for writing lyrics, so even the simplest love lyrics, once you get the cynicism, can be read on multiple layers, even if, for lack of competition in that field, he’s taken a big step back over the past two decades. His lyrics are no longer as sarcastic, witty and sharp as they used to be. Čorba’s new album »Uzbuna« sticks to the themes of its predecessor. After the tragic fate of Bora’s previous wife, the Čorba frontman has already found himself a new lover, and maybe her presence, intentionally or not, shaped the lyrical side of the album, since it’s heavily woven through with love themes. Judging by Čorba’s new promo photo, which graces the back of the album and in which they look pretty fired up, you’d think Bora and the warriors (as Riblja Čorba were called right at the start) had gone back to more aggressive pro-Serbian themes, but fortunately that’s not the case.
With »Uzbuna« Riblja Čorba knowingly set out to recycle their classic eighties sound. Not only did they team up again, after almost thirty years, with producer John McCoy, who long ago took care of the sound on their legendary albums »Mrtva priroda« (1981), »Buvlja pijaca« (1982) and »Istina« (1985), but every other building block of the album is also devoted to the hunt for that lost sound. The cover was designed by their old collaborator Jakša Vlahović. It’s a modernized version of the »Mrtva priroda« cover, and according to Bora, the decision for this move lies “in their fight against new technology, which is killing authentic artistic forms in music”. What’s more, the track Monetarni udar was also born from recycling an old riff by Čorba’s late guitarist Rajko Kojić. Čorba knowingly subordinated every last element of the album to the search for the sound that shot them to the stars of Serbian and Yugoslav rock, and to top it all off for retro nostalgics, the album also came out on vinyl, for the first time in more than twenty years.
In this fresh search for themselves, though, they only partly succeeded. They did shine with their pleasing interweaving of guitar riffs, keyboards and Bora’s verses layered over them, but it’s the lack of compositional creativity that holds them back from making yet another possible masterpiece to cap off Čorba’s rich discography. Youth is gone, and with it the era of Čorba’s most beautiful ballads, which ended somewhere around the time of the album »Ostalo je ćutanje« (1996). The mighty ballad Užasno mi nedostaje, with the distinctly morbid mood of its resounding keyboards in the background, is one of the darkest songs of Čorba’s career and also one of the album’s better moments. Sadly, though, the twelve songs don’t add up to a solid whole; a few of them merely serve to fill out the fifty-minute runtime, a good example being the tracks Od čega ću bre da umrem and Kad me već lažeš (izgubljen), with below-average lyrics and nondescript instrumental ideas. The mood on the album keeps swinging back and forth. Proof that Bora’s charm hasn’t completely faded yet comes from the playful Lelek Serba, for which they borrowed the musical backing from the Peruvian composer Daniel Robles, and the witty, French-sounding Šerše la fam. Guitarist Vidoja Božinović held on to the blues more firmly than on previous albums, the blues that strongly shaped Čorba’s sound early in their career. Appealing guitar solo spots are the album’s stronger side, and the harmonica in the title track Uzbuna is further evidence of the search for answers in the blues. As is customary with Čorba, the album is closed by its strongest track, Sam sam pao sam se i ubio, this time the work of guitarist Božinović. All the components, from the acoustic intro, electric guitar and Purple-esque Hammond keyboards, underline the sensual core of the vocal delivery, which, paired with Bora’s lyrics, is a kind of requiem for wrong life choices, because of which he never (as he sings in the song) experienced true love. It’s a track with all the potential to stay in Čorba’s live repertoire long after the promo tour for »Uzbuna« has wrapped up.
The nineteenth studio album from Serbia’s biggest rock band will no doubt be warmly received by their fans, but it’s pretty much guaranteed not to deliver any sonic revelations for the rest of the listening public. On »Uzbuna« Čorba went looking for a retro sound and, to some extent, found it, but to top it off, the album lacks that youthful compositional spark that would lift it above the rest, which in their old age has been thoroughly clogged up with blood clots. But never mind, Čorba will be back with a new album in two or three years anyway…
Line-up
Bora Đorđević – vocals
Miša Aleksić – bass guitar, backing vocals
Vidoja Džindžer Božinović – guitar, backing vocals
Vicko Milatović – drums, backing vocals
Nikola Zorić – keyboards, backing vocals
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John McCoy – bass (5), backing vocals
Sava Ristić – harmonica (1)
Gane Pecikoza – backing vocals
Goran Jović – backing vocals
Milan Popović – backing vocals
Miljo Radonjić – backing vocals
Slobodan Marković – backing vocals
Production
John McCoy
Track list
01. Uzbuna
02. Užasno mi nedostaje
03. Sam sam pao, sam se i ubio
04. Šerše La Fam
05. Šta ćeš da budes kad porasteš?
06. Između sna i jave
07. Kad neko ljubav urekne
08. Monetarni udar
09. Malograđanska
10. Od nemila do nedraga
11. Od čega ću bre da umrem
12. Lelek serba
