Kemal Monteno "Žene, žene" LP (1975)

Interesting collaboration between legendary nightingale from Sarajevo and celebrated croatian lyrics writer Ivica Krajač.

A little unexpected perhaps because Kemal Monteno was definitely capable of writing both music and lyrics (in fact,I always find him singing best when he does his own music) and although Ivica Krajač was very successful (cult rock album "Dnevnik jedne ljubavi", rock opera "Gubec beg" and basically lyrics for the whole croatian pop scene at the time) I don't hear anything spectacular here - Monteno had a firmly established image of romantic troubadour and Krajač follows this path, tailoring lyrics with heartbreak that Monteno himself could write in his sleep. I mean, did Monteno really needed somebody else to write about "long days", "suffering", "yearning" and so on? That was exactly what he was doing himself for years!

Music wise it's pleasant mid-1970s pop, interesting only because it cleverly moves away from huge orchestrated sound of Monteno's earlier work - no more conductors,strings and old fashioned mammoth big bands that so many singers still copied although it was the previous decade fashion. Monteno was not the only victim of this phenomenon, many singers of his generation had to fight with moth-eaten old-timers who lead huge "big band revue" orchestras and his first LP suffers from this, his beautiful voice often buried somewhere far behind strings and brass section.As a change,here we have very simple arrangements (dated now of course,but remember this is 1975) and focus is on voice that soars to the skies. Monteno himself wrote all the music and it's a guilty pleasure to hear him in the golden years. Several songs have surprisingly upbeat (almost r&b) sound - we are talking about wah wah guitar on Kemal Monteno album - and its almost certainly the most happiest album I heard from him so far. If you were thinking that Monteno was only ballad singer, listen the title song or Shaft-like instrumentation of "Bit ćeš mlada" and you are in for a huge surprise.

Ballads are killer of course. "Pjesma zaljubljenika" have such irresistible singalong refrain that it must be one of the prettiest songs he ever recorded.