Category Archives: Reviews

(movie) Tusta-a documentary about Kud Idijoti and struggle that never ends!

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Kud Idijoti from Pula are one of punk bands that has influence on the lives of thousands. Legions of punk and, I hate this word, but I will use it, alternative kids from this region smiled, sang, drank, loved, hated and cried with their songs. Tusta and his band were voice of the generation torn by war, nationalism, hate, death and sorrow. This long awaited documentary finally arrived and played in theatre of our hometown, so it was great to be able to see it at last. The movie is in fact, in my opinion, more a documentary about the band Kud Idijoti themselves and less about Tusta, and the movie is broken in two halves. First half tells the story about the rise of the band and becoming one of the most popular bands in the ex Yugoslavia underground scene. The second half tells about the 90-ies, war and nationalism, the band´s struggle to be the voice in the darkness and because of that they became the target of the nationalist attacks, press silence, censorship and they played very few shows. Subsequently the movies tells private story of Tusta, his loves, life, work and subsequently premature death of throat cancer in 2012. This is a good movie, but there are some things that bothered me. First, former bassist Fric annoyed me a lot with his banter and too much egoism and talk about himself and his importance, the filmmakers gave him just too much space in the movie. Second, there could have been a lot more anecdotes in the movie about life and times on the road which would be great to hear. Third, there are many known and less known musicians, journalists and label owners talking in the movie, but along with their names, the filmmakers could also state who are they, what they do or similar, just write it along with their names. Fourth, I don´t like psychodelic light moments in the movie, at the end especially, if it was meant to be poetic, well it was not. But, this movie is a great documentary about us, scene and times we lived and still live. Tusta was man like all of us, with his flaws and virtues, but he influenced us to be better people, so we thank him forever for that.

(review) Western Settings-Another Year(A-F Records)

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Western Settings from San Diego are back with their second full length album out with A-F Records. I must admit that this band somehow always eluded me and I only listened to them more carefully now when this record came out. The new record contains 11 songs of mid tempo emotional melodic punkrock in the vein of Off With Their Heads or Menzingers, with some indie touches like for example in Better, but what is surely to win you over are straightforward punkrock anthems like the title song or Duckets Is Tight enough to make your day better and bring that smile back on your face. This is smart punkrock, played well, with heart, soul and balls and if you are a fan of such side of punk, be my guest, grab this one, you will not be disappointed.

 

(review)Sicko-In the alternate timeline(Red Scare Industries)

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Remember Seattle˙s Sicko? These guys played an important role in the 90-ies pop punk when pop punk was more punk and less pop, contrary to nowadays. Well, Red Scare Industries released nice compilation of their biggest hits from all era of the band. 19 songs of furious tempo pop punk/melodic punkrock are here for your listening pleasure. I must admit that I never listened to Sicko close when I was a kid in the 90ies but now this records suits me as well as thousands other fans to rediscover this band and their opus again. The hits like Where I Live, Believe, Kathy`s Dance and all the other are sure to win over and re-ignite your old punkrock heart like it is twenty something years ago hehe. Great record!