Last year there was a great gig in legendary club Unterhund at carnival weekend, Fakofbolan from Pula, Croatia provided mighty set and I still remember it with a smile on my face.

This year, carnival weekend came again and what better way to celebrate than with punk gig, line-up package of two punk bands from Pula. Ormož is a lovely little town, circa 20 kilometers from our hometown, so we went there in the evening hours knowing that gigs usually start late in Unterhund. There were a lot of merry masked people over there, drinking booze, having fun and preparing for the gig start. Around ten thirty SAŠA 21 took their place on stage. This trio is relatively new band in the Croatian punk scene led by legendary ex Kud Idijoti guitar player Sale Veruda, who plays guitar and sings for Saša 21, with two younger guys on drums and bass, making them punkrock power trio. The guys call their music boogie punkrock, I don˙t really know what that means, but they provided nice 45 minutes of energetic melodic punkrock with lyrics in Croatian language. I don`t know their material, because they have one full length album out and it is only released on lp version so no digitals. They have only two songs on YouTube, so real underground hehe. Whether it is helpful or they damage their own band with such decision it is a matter of opinion. Some of their songs really reminded me of Kud Idijoti, guitar melodies and Sale˙s vocals. Although the response was not so eager and there were not a lot of people in front of the stage, as Saša 21 got deeper towards the middle of their set, the situation improved and I was happy to see with how great amount of energy and smiles on their faces all three guys in the band deliver their music although Sale Veruda is way over fifty years old the guy has a lot of explosive in his bones and much respect to him for that. The vocals are somewhat quiet in the whole mix but Saša 21 ended their set triumphantly with their single Vesna 2.

After a quick stage makeover there came time for FAKOFBOLAN legendary streetpunk band from Pula, Croatia, who are one of my favorite Croatian punk bands in last 25 years. This was my third or fourth time that I watch them live in one year and I still remember their fantastic set at last year`s Punk Rock Holiday. I am not one of those guys who shit and whine about the sound a lot, but the soundman yesterday night was criminal. The main vocals were too quiet for both bands, then Šapo˙s vocals suddenly grew louder, bass player` s back vox were too loud and I had non stop feeling that something is breaking up in the sound, like guitar falls out, or drums or bass, and this spoiled Fakofbolan`s set for me a little. This is not band`s fault because they played all of their hits from all of their releases from older favorites like Kota 313, Ropstvo je sloboda, Ostali smo, Da li znaš and similar to couple of songs from their last come back album which is now like six years old already. They tried one cover by Scuffy Dogs-Heroji which I had hard time to recognize hehe. I guess Fakofbolan is not for playing covers they have enough of their great songs, no need to try that. First couple of songs in the set were somewhat reserved by the band and the crowd, but somewhere in the middle of the set, party started and never ended until the last two encores, so there was over one hour and fifteen minutes of great streetpunk like we are used to get from the band. The guys were all smiles with people singing along, stage diving, doing all kinds of crazy dance and enjoying the gig. Apart from technical difficulties, this was another great night, great gig and much respect to all the crew in Unterhund who promotes and keeps the flame of the scene alive here.