DRUGI NAčIN

They say that autumn is the saddest but also the most beautiful season of the year. This is exactly how you can describe the entire atmosphere of this masterpiece of ex-Yugoslavian rock music. Each song has a smaller or larger dose of melancholy, which when combined with beautiful poetic texts, impeccable instrumental section, and unreal vocals, create a sublime musical masterpiece. The band's line-up which included polyphonic singing and two flutes made Drugi Nacin to be welcome as a great and unique refreshment on the rock scene. If there is "chemistry" in music, then it is very visible on that record. masterpiece. Songs like "Carstvo Samoce", "Lile su ki?e" and "Stari grad", composed by singer, guitarist, and flutist Ismet Kurtović always pushes me into another dimension effortlessly. The interesting thing is that the album was rejected by two Zagreb labels PGP Belgrade finally agreed to release the album only because their executive liked, the gatefold cover sleeve without even listening to the music This beautifully designed concept record on the theme of loneliness is one of my all-time favorite albums recorded in Yugoslavia.

Drugi Nacin are one of the heavy hitters from the 1970s Yugo rock scene. Often described as sounding like Tull or Deep Purple I think they do from a rock view but perhaps not as much from the prog viewpoint. They certainly rock in the vein that Purple and Tull will rock with murky keys/guitar and wild flute respectively but they are more hard rock than prog, not going as far into experimentations as Tull or Purple might. You're not going to find anything like "Passion Play" here. But you will find some 70s hard rock with proggy influences and good atmosphere. Drugi Nacin reminds me of listening to LebiSol a bit in that you have a prog rock whose sound is highlighted by the regional music influences. I don't think Drugi is to the level of LebiSol but it's not a complete bust, there are some worthwhile moments. Just not enough of them. It is written that this album was recorded in 22 hours, a testament to the way rock bands used to be able to work.

The album begins on a shaky note with "Opet" and "Carstvo Samoce" which sound like a pair of early Foghat demos. But the third track "Na Mom Dlanu" clocks in at nearly 10 minutes and it is here where Drugi Nacin come to life from a prog fan perspective. Beginning slowly with somber and reflective mood this sounds, as others have mentioned, like the Yugo version of "Child in Time." The vocalist has a throat like Gillan and wails like the dude in New Trolls. The rhythm holds slow and deliberate until the guitar leads begin and then pick up just a bit in finesse. The mood of the notes and bends suggest sadness and longing. They play with much feeling but are simply not as accomplished as some of the virtuosic talent that other groups possess. This falls under enjoyable but average 70s rock which I enjoyed hearing because it comes from another country and I like hearing new things from faraway places, but honestly if these guys were just another American band from my own backyard I wouldn't have much interest. "Lile Su Kise" begins with a thunderstorm and acoustic folk music with flute. The very light drumming and organ compliment the wistful vocal and flute in this mellow track, one of the albums best moments. "Zuti List" begins with flute and bass laying down some nice melody to a simple drum beat. The bass player is actually my favorite link in Drugi Nacin, he plays in an animated lead instrument fashion that I love rather than just background. Some nice distortion laden guitar breaks in here and there but again only the average is achieved. "Stari Grad" is last beginning with ringing bells and a nice bass line and flute. This track is the album's best with heartfelt vocals, some acoustic textures, and again excellent bass lines. The flute pops in and out again add to the beauty. The high pitched wails chime in at the end to annoy me one last time. (I wish this were an instrumental album!)

Drugi Nacin is a decent hard rock experience that many of you may like much more than I. I enjoy the bass lines and the Yugo-rock flavors but besides that I am not overwhelmed by the material as some are. I can appreciate that the album was important in its time and place but it has not held up all that well. "Lile Su" and "Stari Grad" rise to 3 stars or perhaps 3 ½, but the balance of the tracks are 2 stars. Not awful but nothing necessary either. 2 ½ stars.

Heavy, heavy, heavy, prog rock! In a very first second the opening Opet (means Again, not OPETH) you'll hear a scream similar to a Ian's in Highway Star..we're on a ride!!

And we have a damn good rockers here, great riffing, great flute. That's what this albums is all about. And beauty. Great melodies. Catchy guitar riffs. And cheesy production (some hilarious amounts of reverb here and there).

When the opening riff of Carstvo Samoće (Empire Of Loneliness) starts I'm able to forgive this band everything! Heavy prog as it should be.

Na Mom Dlanu (On My Palm) is a PURPLE/HEEP - type ballad, and a decent one at that. Maybe a bit dissappointing, conseidering it's a 11 minute piece, I was expecting it to be a heavy prog epic. Elements of ballad and bluesy culmination, more or less.

Lile Su Kise (The Rains Were Lashing) was a big success. This is the most typical example of 70's Yu-rock, and it's a good one. 7/8 rhythm, overdubbed ambiental sounds of rain, lovely Mellotron pads, vocal harmonies. Approach, URIAH HEEP fans!

Great autumn instrumental, Zuti List (Yellow Leaf). Utilizing funky groove and a band's trademark, two-layered flute melody overdubbed in fifths. A hippie-trippie jamming, straight from the Hair musical. How could I dislike it?

Finally, there's 7 minute Stari Grad (Old Town). Misty, mystical. Intro executed with spoken words and bell sounds - this is a song about, love, genesis, revelation, religious experience, what? Lyrics are mentioning an old cathedral, the bell sounds, the dance of light. Pozgajec is singing how he instantly forgot about Bach when he saw a shadow in the eye. Brrr. Perhaps it was just a love song, but there are so many religious connotations I'm quite surprised the song was published back in the day (we had our censorship).

One hell of an album. Excuse me, angel. One angelic album. Debut. The one and the only band's worth worshiping.

A nice starter, but not even close to their 70's work...Old songs are remixed and have that "modern" rock sound, which is absolutely cheesy...

However, there are a couple of nice tunes, but they've lost their progressiveness for good. This album contains mostly melodic ballads, occasionally spiced up with some flute solos. Some of the tracks are more than bad, they are absolutely dreadful. But there are still a few nice guitar solos, although they remind me of DIRE STRAITS somehow. The whole album sounds like a ballad pop-rock occasionally spiced up with few TULL-esque flute passages, Knopfler-like guitar solos and IRON MAIDEN/DEEP PURPLE moments at their worst. If you're decide to give this band a go, try the first album...this one is only for completing your collection.

After seven years break, DRUGI NACIN delivered the second album to dissapointment of prog lovers.

"Ponovno na putu" (Eng. On the road again) is actually a decent pop-rock effort with several highly popular hits. The biggest were a summer ballad "Pisi mi" and a silly, almost bubble gum "Ringispil". The best track is easily "Dileme", the only featuring their signature flute sound. The remaing material is a mediocre albeit very listenable pop-rock with easy feeling and good guitar work plus solid production. Sometimes it is close to American style AOR/Southern rock.

I would rate it as non-essential **1/2 stars, still not enough to be considered "good" for a demanding listener.

One of the most innovative bands on YU rock scene was Drugi Nacin (pronounced "Droogee Nacheen" and meaning "Other Way"), a band from Zagreb which had started their career in earyl to mid 70's after issuing a number of singles 1973-75. Their first album was a great breakthrough for the prog movement. Before them, the only other prog act was Korni Grupa, who however weren't a pure prog band and therefore this album can be considered the first true progressive rock album in Yugoslavia.

One wouldn't guess that at once however, as the first song "Opet(Again)" is opened with a crunchy rock riff and is really more of a rock song. Then comes "Carstvo samoce" which has a good and long guitar passage in the middle and the end. The highlight of the album is unquestionably "Na mom dlanu (On my palm)", a moody 9-minute gem. It deserves to be called psychedelic and somewhat reminds me of Vanilla Fudge. "Lile su kise" is an interesting song by Ismet Kurtovic, the chief composer, guitarist, flutist and singer. It encompasses everything from folk-rock to rhythm & blues and finishes with a quasi-baroque organ solo after 4 minutes. The instrumental "Zuti list(Yellow leaf" offers a nice jam, if a bit too long and monotonous, before the song "Stari grad (Old town)", another aching love ballad, closes the album.

For it's time and place, this was truly a daring experiment. Unfortunately, it wasn't received very well and was soon forgotten at a time when mainstream rock acts like Bijelo Dugme, Indexi and Yu Grupa ruled the charts. Drugi Nacin would reunite in '82 to produce another album, "Ponovo na putu (On the road again)", which however was just a shadow of their incredible debut.

Branko Pozgajec, the founder of the original line-up re-formed the band in 1992 just to record this album of old hit-single, majority of which did not appear on LP before. Although they did a decent job, the music is more MOR with some boogie/hard rock attempts. Flute, the trade mark of DRUGI NACIN, appears only on few tracks, and the best are "Obecaj mi proljece", "Opet", "Dileme" and "Prodje ovaj dan". I would like however to see a release of a compilation of their old original singles, not the remakes like this one. So I guess Pozgajec wanted maybe to attract new younger listeners to their music by offering their old hits in a new outfit, but for me it does not work. Too poppy and less proggy! But worth having until the desired compilation is born. 2,5 stars for making me hear "Prodje ovaj dan" again after 25 years.

This is the legendary first album of DRUGI NACIN and one of the classics of 1970s prog in exYugoslavia! It was highly popular too and went on to become "gold" record, meaning it sold more than 100 000 copies across the country, which few rock bands achieved. It is characterized by a loose concept of loneliness and lost love, with quasi-poetic lyrics in a post-hippie vein. Even the song titles could be interconnected making a sentence in English roughly "Again the empire of loneliness on the palm of my hand, it kept raining on the yellow leaf and the old town". Cover sleeve was one of the first gatefold designs at the time so allegedly it convinced an executive producer of the record company to release the album in the first place! Music style ranges between hard rock of the first two tracks to more mellow improvised jams with solo parts of the flutes and guitars to power ballads like "Lile su kise" and "Stari grad" which were concert favorites. It can be described as hard prog with touch of psych jams, like early URIAH HEEP (hard rock ballads with high pitched vocals of Kurtovic a la David Byron) or JETHRO TULL (solo flute with strong guitar riffs). Even during the punk/new wave era of the early 1980s DRUGI NACIN played regularly on tours across fromer YU countries and were warmly welcomed everywhere especially when they played the entire set of this album, which they did frequently along with their famous DEEP PURPLE covers. Highly recommended album to every prog rock listener, however it is a bit below the masterpiece level due to weak production and sometimes not too convincing performance.