<< Interviews this month
file under alternative / pop
You thought you’ve heard it all before, don’t ya? You think you can’t be surprised anymore, isn’t it? Yeah, you love so much music and you have tons and tons of cds and MP3s and you really know what you’re talking about, mmh? All these rock and those metal bands are great, sure, you know them all. But does all these bands bring some really, REALLY new music for your supersaturated ears? You think you know it: hardly. But then I know you haven’t heard of KULTUR SHOCK before. They ARE different. Way different. Maybe they’re even a bit too much for you to comprehend. Maybe you won’t like it the first time. Doesn’t matter. Once you’re able forget the iron rules of heavy rock music you’ll dig this band completely. Cause Kultur Shock totally rocks! But it could be that you don’t know it yet.
Text: Evil Dr. Smith
It's a cliché to start with, but I think it's especially for a band like Kultur Shock quite necessary to start with. And that is: what kind of music do you play in Gods name!? Can you describe your music in a way that will trigger the mind of the reader? If you would ask me, my simplistic answer would have been: Kultur Shock are the System Of A Down from the Balkan. Less simplistic would be like a namedropping queue of Rage Against The Machine and The Mighy Mighty Bosstones meets Manu Chao and The Gypsy Kings singing songs of Frank Zappa with Le Mystere Des Voix Bulgares supporting as background vocals. Does this make any sense?
Gino: Well if you want to compare us with others, I guess, you answered your question already, although, I'm sure you saw (while you were doing it), that you must use at least 4 different bands to describe ours. In that case it makes sense. On the other hand, these are all the bands (that we like and appreciate their work big time) with very profiled style. KS is a "reality show”! We are doing what the fuck we feel in that moment. Unlike the shitty entertainment on TV (that I'm sure Europe is broadcasting as well as USA), we are really real. Unfocused Bosnian plumber, crazy woman from Detroit, young Japanese boy who doesn't talk, paranoid suburban Bulgarian, a nerd that looks like Bill Gate’s younger (less successful) brother and middle-aged Bosnian (with half shaved head - half with dreadlocks), who's pretending that 42 is still OK to be on the stage, have nothing in common. The only music we can make together is KS.
Anyway, you're journalist, put us somewhere, according to my experience, doesn't mater what we say, you'll put it wherever you want.
We are a metalzine from Holland. Do you think Kultur Shock is relevant for us? Or... are we even relevant for Kultur Shock?
Val: You are the ones to determine if we are relevant to your readers. ‘FUCC the INS’ got a great reviews in Metal Hammer and Kerrang! couple of years ago and since then our sound has followed a line of development in the same (FTINS) direction. Somebody called it "music for thinking metalheads", so I guess it's relevant. We are getting great response from different audiences starting with the fusion scene, going through the punk and metal scene and ending up with traditional folkies. Go figure! Radio B-92 in Belgrade calls it a "national hard-core" and in Bulgaria we are distributed by Wizard, which is a dedicated metal label.
Gino: C-mon, man, sure, we're both relevant to each other. If you were not there, who would acknowledge us (the fact: last summer the owner of "Piranha Records" almost had a heart attack when he heard Fucc The I.N.S.) and if we were not here, who would piss off all the purists (both metal and folk). How boring your life would’ve be, writing just about "speak English or die" bands?
Gino, I've understand that you were in your previous life in Bosnia Herzegovina an incredible workaholic. You performed all kinds of art: music, theatre, film, fashion, adult entertainment (?) and was quite successful with it, judging the gold records you achieved and people like Joan Baez who came to see your theatre shows. Why did you left Europe to take away a job from a hardworking American in Seattle?
Gino: Did you ever try to cross a EU border with a Bosnian passport? Don't if you really don't need. Everybody in KS is always waiting for me on airports. For "some" reason, I'm always "randomly selected". Now the average European is going to say; "that's because of the refugees seeking jobs in the EU." No shit! And that makes it OK? All of the sudden discrimination sounds OK, and just a couple of minutes ago the same average European was criticising Bush for being a fascist pig. Of cause he is, but what is Berlusconi, Aznar and the others? I came here because I had to. War ended in my country and my secular work wasn't "in" any more. USA (Clinton administration) gave me an international art exchange visa to come and do work with their artists (Phil, Joan Baez).
Regarding my past, I did it somehow the other way around, the backwards from the usual way. Usually when you're young, you have a garage band, you're changing the world, you're politically active (usually left) and latter you get married, become mainstream, part of establishment, and make money. I’ve got married (and divorced two times!) fairly early, recorded mainstream records, enjoyed glamour, made living by the age 28. When I was 30 war happened. If there wasn't for war, I'd probably be a record label owner or executive, making lives miserable for many bands. Instead, I lost everything (just money, businesses and houses - nothing important) and realised the real value in life. That is to do what the fuck you like - not what other people would like you to do. Human life is too short to waste it on the marginal things like material wealth and to do stuff that you're not going to be 100% happy with it. War is a terrible thing. It gave me a lot of pain (meaning: loosing a lot of people I loved - not a property), but in a way crystallised my personality and made me work on it latter, so I can now be proud of the man that I become.
Theatre is my love. I'm still in it, writing composing, directing (just now I'm working on a play). I'm teaching (part time) on the drama department of Cornish College Of Arts in Seattle. I don't do much acting any more. I suck as an actor anyway.
Fashion - not any more, but I'd love to.
Adult entertainment - one dream that never came true! (I'm still interested!!!)
Did you have to start all over again in America, or did you already know (some of) the guys that are the embodiment of Kultur Shock and was it a set-up plan even before you came to America?
Gino: Yup, it's a strange world we live in. After the tours, plays and when my co-operation with American superstars came to it's end, I was again just a foreigner without a job. That is the first time in my life, I went out to find a job. I'm so grateful for that experience. I was a truck driver, a manual worker, a bodyguard in mental hospital and latter even a councillor for mental health (!?!). KS happened here, not planned and because it needed to happen. Now I'm a member of a garage band, which is changing the world! How many people are blessed to be living a second youth? I wouldn't have it any other way.
The band exists now for about six years and the first album that was released was a live album: ‘Live In Amerika’. That's quite unusual, to start with a live album. No label was crazy enough to contract you, so you self financed the whole bunch?
Gino: We did not have money for recording in the studio that is why it's live. Knowing the nature of the business from before, if you got the "animal", you need to keep it going. Working bands are releasing albums, that is what they do - if not, then they are cover bands. Regardless of a quality and readiness, you got to get rid of a material that you're playing, so you can put it aside, so you can go on with your life and work. If you're waiting for the right moment - it might never come and the enthusiasm for the project might die. I've seen it so many times. Every album is a capture of a history of the band. If it's poorly recorded (not that it is), or not perfect, it is suppose to be that way - it is who we were in that moment. It needs to be captured just the way it is, otherwise it's a lie, and I told you before, we are a reality show.
Then ex-Faith No More bass player Billy Gould found you. Or you found him. Can you tell me something about this and what his share is in the multiculti-metal worldpunk sound of Kultur Shock?
Val: Bill Gould is not just a producer on the last 2 albums. He's our brother, we share similar views on music, industry issues, politics, relationship and ethics, which I suppose elevates our relationship to a good friendship. We talk on a daily basis and work together quite closely. He is probably the dream producer, since he let us do whatever the fuck we wanted as far as songwriting and arrangements are concerned and is being the best critic in the studio. You can definitely hear his influence on the sound of the band in the last 2 albums. As far as how we found each other, the story goes like this: When KS released "Live in Amerika" on Gino's Pacific Records, the album fell in Christ Novoselich's hands. He gave it to Jello Biafra and Jello gave it to Bill, since everything on KoolArrow Records is weird and challenging- that's how Billy likes it. A phone call later we were making plans to work together.
The songs on 'Fucc The I.N.S.', your first studio album, were about 60% "Public Domain". Your live album was even completely filled with traditionals. How's that on your new album, ‘Kultura-Diktatura’? Did you found the creativity to write more original tunes and lyrics, or did you dig up a lot of authentic East-European dances and words once again?
Gino: ‘Kultura –Diktatura’ has two traditional melody lines, a couple of hundred years old as well as a poem from 19th century by poet Alexa Santic. Everything else is KS. But, let's talk a little about original ethno music. The only way for media to know who wrote what, is if we write it in the credits on our album. We can write, like many others, “composed and performed by KS” from the beginning to the end and nobody will know shit. We were once asked why are we playing Bregovich's Chai Shukarie (!?!). That is how much media knows about traditional Balkan music. Face it; we are the only ethno artists really giving the credits to our heritage. The curse of being a reality show - again.
One traditional song on that first album, 'Mastika', is once played by Slobo Horo, a popular Balkan brass-band from Finland in the early nineties. Pure coincidental or did you find inspiration in this band and maybe artists like The Ukrainians and Gogol Bordello; the only artists I can think of that have some slight, VERY SLIGHT similarities with your potpourri-music.
Val: Ha-ha-ha- (I would loose ha, ha) Gogol Bordello, Slobo Horo... Gino, Mario and I grew up with this music! I've heard Mastika and similar since I was born. In Yugoslavia and Bulgaria folk music was heavily promoted and every time you go to a wedding, there was a crazy ass band to blast this stuff over and over again. You end up thinking in odd meters, not learning it academically...
And if not, what kind of artists - traditional as well as modern pop music - should we check out to get a historical know-how of the musical background of Kultur Shock? Trying to be the smart-ass journalist: Orkestar Bobana Marcovica and Mica Petrovic's Brass Band perhaps when it comes to traditional Balkan music? For the modern part: I know Right Said Fred already, so you may skip this one... (KS incorporated ‘Too Sexy’ in one of their songs on the ‘Fucc The I.N.S.’ album)
Val: We kind of drawing on our personal experiences in many projects we've been part of. For instance, Mario is the Balkan folk melodies driving force in the band and he's mixing it with his love for blues and Zeppelinesque rock. Gino is the most versatile front man I've ever worked with. Try to make someone singing folk ballad and hardcore rock rap in the same tune: he can do it and he loves it. I grew up playing Priest and Maiden covers, did some wave-punk and love riffy guitars with a ton of good tube distortion. Masa is Tool influenced. Chris drums everything from rumba to fast and loud punk beats with the same passion and Amy draws on her love for avant-garde and off the wall sounds in her sax and clarinet solos.
Your new album 'Kultura-Diktatura' was not only produced by Billy Gould, but also by the indierock guru Jack Endino. What's the reason that you choose for this (rather famous) producer? Because he lives just around the corner? He normally produces quite different stuff, but did he like your music (and what's his share in the sound of the new album)?
Val: Jack recorded the first demo of the band years ago and has been our supporter on local Seattle level since then. When we called him for ‘Kultura-Diktatura’, the question was not if, but when and how. We were looking for his expertise in dark, open, raw, tube, 2 inch tape sound and loud beefy drum tone and he absolutely delivered, Jack's the Man.
Playing these two albums in a row, I must say that the new one is even a little better than 'Fucc...', which was great already. Lyrics seemed to be a very important issue for the band, but what I don't get it is that on 'Fucc…' there was no lyric sheet included. Not even an explanation of the lyrics. My Slavic (and other?) languages are not very up-to-date recently, so tell me: why didn't you included (a translation of) the lyrics on 'Fucc...' and will this happen on the new album?
Gino: Romeo & Juliet (in Balkan - different religion way), Sex, Party, Alcohol, Drugs, gambling, and all the other things that at least for a minute, or one whole night call your attention from brutal reality. Immigrant sorrow. Sorrow of the ones who stayed in crippled motherland. These songs are there because you can die any minute and somehow you decided to sing 'till that happens. Like you have just five minutes to live - five minutes to sing.
Can you tell me something in general about the lyrics of your second studio album? Is there a red line, or are all lyrics dealing with different matters and subjects? On the other hand, I think that I know where the last song 'Too Late To Fornicate' is about...
Gino: Our last album is a reaction on everything around us in this historical moment. Raising fascism. I can even say that we are living New Expressionism. Announcing the end of the world, as we know it by our outgoing performance as they once did with their extreme wild colors.
‘Tutti Frutti’: I like your ice cream. Give me your ice cream. If you don't I'll call you a terrorist and take it away from you anyway, cause I'm stronger.
‘Morto’: Italian opera singer is dying for five minutes, while singing the aria.
‘Horse Thief’: The difference of mentality between Gypsy horse-thief running in front of police, smoking pot and Japanese friend telling him a story about the rabbit and the turtle.
‘Alma’: Song in Spanish inspired by the horrific oil spill in Galicia. We saw it when we played there and we had to make the song. Literally song is about the snake speeding in the see and our plan to kill the snake in seven years when it goes to sleep. Song contend Zapatista's slogan "Todo Para Todos, Mada para Nosotros.
‘Mustapha’: The conversation between two people who experienced war on their soil. If you did not feel it you cannot know it. Song was sung in Arabic and English between me and Yasin, the Algerian singer if band Cheb Ballowski of Barcelona.
‘Romana’: United Nation decision to deny it's name to Macedonia and to name it The Former Yugoslav Republic Macedonia, just because Greece as the NATO member complained about their name.
The female vocals bring extra ethnic elements in the sound. In the song 'Hashishi' they sound like a harem enchanting erotic anthems to a wealthy oil sheikh and in 'Nightmare' they suddenly brings up cooled Scandinavian groups like Värttina and Hedningarna in a techno-dance Waltari-mix in my mind. Has this something to do with the fact that the album was mixed in Oslo?
Val: Well, not really, any similarity is pure coincidence. We never try to sound like anybody or anything, but ourselves. So, whatever sound or an idea comes to our mind and we dig it, we just go for it and damn the consequences. When it comes to Oslo, Billy and myself chose Ulf Holand and LydLab Studios, because of the incredible tone and the amazing engineer that he is. He brought this Euro sparkle in the sound that you can't really get in the States. So, as usual, the best presentation of what we want to say musically, is when you combine the New and the Old World. Cool, huh?
Are those female voices multiplied samples of the voice of your sax player, Amy Denio, or did you hire a real female choir? And what about playing live: are those voices on tape, do we get a mini-Mystere Des Voix Bulgares on stage or should the girls in the crowd sing these parts?
Gino: No, all women were Amy, Val and I. That is what you gona see live as well. No tape, just us, as much as we can.
Like I said before, Kultur Shock reminds me a bit of System Of A Down. It has got the same vibrant, energetic and political energy, including East European folk elements. SOAD completely overwhelmed me the first time I heard them and with you it's like the same. Within a few years, SOAD had conquered the world, people picked it up by the millions. So what about Kultur Shock? Great expectations or are you already a big hit in America?
Gino: No we are not. We are an alternative band who got lucky. American music is divided on Black and White. We're neither, that is the reason that we'll probably stay alternative (at least 'till the revolution).
I don't think a lot of people here in Holland know you. But that will change very soon, cause in the first weeks of May you’re going to play a handful of shows in Holland. Is this the first time you've been here in Holland and what do you expect from it? And...what can we expect from Kultur Shock!?
Val: We've never played in Holland before and we are very, very curious! Our working motto is that we play every show like it is the last one in our lives and we'd like to be remembered with something good. If people come just to listen and gawk, they are not gonna get the best of us. Just have few beers, loosen up and dive into the 90 minute nonsense: the more audience is a part of the experience, the more we can give them. Including a chance to get laid after the gig... If you can't do it after KS show, you can never do it. Party!!!!
Gino: One thing I promise; we'll do every song like it's our last one.
Speaking about Holland. We have held here an old man that was once your president. Like all dictators do when they are on trial - remember Pinochet, Soeharto etc. - he acts he is sick. He stays more in bed than showing his face to the judge. What do you think The Hague Tribunal must/will do with him? And what do you think of him yourself?
Gino: I've seen with my bare eyes what he and his colleagues did and this is what I learned: A crime against me and my beloved ones will not make me a criminal. I will not wish death and misery to anyone. Not even to him. Instead, I'll remember the ones who we loved and are not with us any more. I'd always rather talk about them. They deserve to be talked about - not him.
http://www.kulturshock.com
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