Regoc - Just So

A child's drawing of the band's namesake, a gentle giant from a children's tale.

I was surprised to find out that this excellent (and, sadly, sole) LP from Rijeka's noise-rock purveyors Regoc was not available for download in the "blogosphere". The only links I was able to find were dead for a long time, but the record's cult status actually surpasses its scarcity; tons of 100 € records are readily available for download in multiple locations, so one should expect a 10 € record which does enjoy some notoriety to pop up everywhere. Anyway, I'm glad to be able to make this music available again, as it is no less interesting than most of its celebrated contemporaries in the Touch & Go/AmRep circles. This post adds the only other officially released song by the band, whose members later featured in the long-running Very Expensive Porno Movie (the bonus song being "Blimp" from the "Best of Indie Rock - Made in Croatia" compilation). I hope you like it and rush to Discogs to grab yourself a copy!

The LP sleeve is great, too.

Track listing:

1. Toyota (2:54)
2. Super Song (3:20)
3. Fogy Frost (2:49)
4. Water Rat (2:03)
5. Dear Brenda (2:25)
6. Scorbut (5:16)
7. Goofy (3:24)
8. Maestro Violante (3:33)
9. Tirip Tap (3:57)
10. Blimp (4:50)

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Gipss - Uh!

In relation to yesterday's post - it turns out that my girlfriend has a copy of the Gipss full-length CD, so here's that, too, for your slightly lesser enjoyment. Listening to the two releases back to back it's obvious that the album is much less "noise rock" than "RI rock", which to my ears feels to have aged rather more poorly. Still, it's not a bad album, some songs are quite good (I especially like the title song "Uh!", which has not appeared on the EP before, like most of the other better songs on the album - albeit in different versions), and it should be preserved as a document; so here it is!

Track listing:

1. Slika (3:56)
2. Zemlja (1:51)
3. Raspuce (2:46)
4. Sam (3:30)
5. Sijun (2:26)
6. Neda (2:13)
7. Program tvog kompjutera (3:21)
8. Djevojcica (2:29)
9. Uh! (Zig-zag) (2:46)
10. Nahrani me (2:41)
11. Sunce - Ride (7:11)

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Gipss - Vragoder e.p.

Gipss were a '90s alternative/noise-rock band from the city of Rijeka, who released this 7" EP and a full-length album before disappearing in obscurity. The album can be found elsewhere on the net is out of print and not available, just like this EP (I've just realised the album's been taken down from Mediafire - I'll try to find a copy or maybe even rip my tape), and differs from the EP by having female vocals; the singer from the EP has left the band by then, if I'm not mistaken. Their sound is in the vein of Croatian '90s alternative scene, so if you like the type of stuff that can be heard on "Feathers, Wood and Aluminium" you'll probably enjoy this.

Track listing:

1. Djevojcica (2:36)
2. Nahrani me (2:39)
3. Ride (2:22)
4. Raspuce (2:44)
5. Neda (2:09)
6. Bullets Fly (3:00)

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Paraf - Demo

Woohoo, finally!!! I have a five-song demo recording by PARAF, one of the most important Yugoslavian/Croatian punk bands ever! This is only a small part of their demo legacy - there are lots of songs which were never released in any form, and which I have yet to hear - but these five songs, mostly later re-recorded for their debut single and LP, are still a thing to behold. The sound quality is wonderful, the lyrics less polite than on the officially released versions (the exception being "Narodna pjesma", which was released on the "Novi punk val" compilation LP in this same version), and this studio recording of the song "Goli otok" is the only one I am aware of, so what are you doing still reading this?!

Track listing:

1. Rijeka (2:11)
2. Narodna pjesma (1:52)
3. Moj zivot je novi val (1:48)
4. Zivjela Jugoslavija (2:21)
5. Goli otok (2:15)

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Glasshopper - Glasshopper

Another noise rock band from Croatia, this one came from the harbour town of Rijeka. Rijeka had had a very vital punk rock/new wave scene from the late seventies onwards, and the local "Ri Rock" sound has been hailed and loved so much that I think I am not alone when I say I'd had enough of Rijeka's daring, aggressive, arty and theatrical rock sound for about four lifetimes. Long and fruitful ones. This band, however, didn't really have anything to do with its hometown's rock tradition, which is good, and it was a good band, which is even better. They had appeared on two of the compilations I shared with you some posts earlier, and this is their sole official release, a seven song CD on Earwing Records/Carnival Tunes. From what I gather some of the guys from the band have continued with other bands and the band leader Marin now leads a reportedly great, but abysmally named group "Marinada". I haven't heard any of that stuff so I will shut up and leave you with this very good mini album.

Track listing:

1. Control (3:03)
2. Black Shoes (3:43)
3. Give Me That Night (2:39)
4. Ants (2:36)
5. La guerra es finida (2:32)
6. Bark (2:17)
7. Song (3:27)

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Very Expensive Porno Movie - Postfucking Happiness

I bought this CD in 1999, at the "Zivjeti kvalitetnije" anarcho-crust festival in the hills near Pozega, Croatia (also the site of the wonderful Dirty Old Festival, in its 12th year now!). I remember how I arrived at the festival site, went straight to the record stalls, and spent all the money I have brought for the next two days on: one cassette (I don't remember which one), one fanzine called Zedno uho, one 7" record (the Red Aunts one), and this here CD. After two days of begging strangers for a drop of mayonnaise, stealing cigarettes out of people's car trunks and getting wasted on homemade brandy, I came home and was finally able to enjoy this fine peace of Dutch-via-Croatia noise rock art. The great artwork containing MS Paint sketches, hardcore porn movie stills and violent children's poems is a bonus you won't be getting here, but I will share the music, which is, well, a very good aural representation of the artwork.

Track listing:

1. Fuck You (3:49)
2. Top (1:33)
3. Oral (0:54)
4. Anal (3:14)
5. Vaginal (0:14)
6. Sedlo (2:41)
7. Kokos (1:56)
8. Djevojcicice (2:10)
9. Ste kad jeli govno (0:12)
10. Pet puta bez vadjenja (2:42)
11. Barbie alcos (1:40)
12. Exer sise (3:46)
13. INTRO (3:44)
14. Zubari (4:13)
15. Smokva (3:32)
16. The Man with the Hat (2:02)
17. Na ustama drek drzali (0:11)
18. Jebem ti mater (2:23)
19. Moana Pozzi's Soul (2:25)
20. V.E.P.M. (3:19)
21. John Holm's Death (4:33)

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(You'll notice that this file is hosted on MediaFire, not MegaUpload - the reason is simple, I have RTFM-ed the MegaUpload Terms of Use and found out that all files hosted by them are deleted 90 days after the last download. I will move all the old files to MediaFire in the next few weeks.)