Monday, September 29, 2008

Swinging Slovenia

This is probably one of my most favorite Slovenian songs ever.

Mala Terasa (Little Terrace) by Bele Vrane (The White Crows)



There are a fair amount of under-appreciated properly kitschy tracks from the 60s swinging Ljubljana days. I've heard quite a few on Radio Student and also occasionally on a late night bus ride back from Ljubljana but this is the only song whose title I ever remembered. Does anyone know if there are any compilations out of this kind of stuff? It'd be great to pop this into the car when on a ride, instead of cursing the awfulness of current Slovenian music.

UPDATE: LerumSLO has a bunch of this stuff on their Youtube channel.

8 comments:

Ales said...

Heya, sure there are!

http://www.mimovrste.com/katalog/435/pop

Numbers 4, 12, 15, 16, 21,... ;) you can listen to most too, i think :)

Autumn Whitefield-Madrano said...

Fun!

Another question for you about music in Slovenia...is it just me, or are they really into reggae? I kept hearing it on the radio, then learned about the annual reggae festival in Tolmin, raising a curiosity to an official WTF.

Camille Acey said...

There is no big reggae craze. Some kids are into it. Some aren't. And yeah there is a reggae festival or two. But there are also numerous classical music festival and a few different heavy metal festivals. What radio station where you listening to? If it was Radio Student, then you were probably hearing the ad for the reggae festival, I remember them playing it a lot last year.

The Slovenian obsession with Spanish-language soap operas (to the point that many of the teenagers here have gleaned at least basic level Spanish skills) is way more WTF than the interest in reggae, IMHO.

Anonymous said...

I bought my kitsch here: http://www.bof.si/sl/search.cp2?class=all&q=popevka

Autumn Whitefield-Madrano said...

Ah, just a weird coincidence, then--thanks. (I don't remember the radio station--we were driving and flipping through stations.)

Thanks again for maintaining this blog--my first trip to Slovenia was great, and I intend on returning. Your town in particular was lovely--we only stopped in for the beekeeping museum as we were en route to Bohinj, but it's on the top of our list for a revisit.

Camille Acey said...

@Woman - Sorry I missed you. Thanks for coming to Slovenia, we hope to see you back soon! :) I am curious, what brought you here?

Autumn Whitefield-Madrano said...

The national slogan, of course. I, too, feel love.

Besides that, an interest in Eastern European culture (me) and economics (my boyfriend). Neither of us had ever traveled outside of Western Europe so we thought Slovenia might be a nice way to get our feel wet before we ventured into lands that would be more difficult to navigate (Bulgaria, the Baltic states). We loved Slovenia but it didn't do that at all--I felt like I was in, say, Germany. Which made for a pleasant, easily navigated vacation, but I remain unschooled in Eastern Europe!

Camille Acey said...

Yeah, people often conflate "Slavic" with "Eastern European", Slovenia is definitely no gateway to Eastern Europe. It might be a bridge to Southern Europe but definitely not Eastern. It seems like Czech Republic might have been a better choice, but glad you made the "mix up" and were able to make it here. :)