INDEXI (MC DISKOTON)

Since this cassette release bears again the eponymous title, I will call it "Brown Album" for easier identification. This release is mostly of interest for collectors because the sound quality of the tape is not high.

Still, the content of this cassette is interesting and is even a bit of a curiosity. Out of 12 tracks, nine was released in February 1976 on Diskoton label as a vinyl LP under the title "Svaka je ljubav ista (osim one prave)" as a solo album by Davorin Popovic "Davor", the lead singer of INDEXI. But, essentially that whole album was the product of INDEXI as the band in terms of songwriting and performing. It was only due to some dubious contractual, or marketing reasons that the material was released as a solo album by Davor.

During that period of late 1975, INDEXI actually, for the first time in their career, entered the studio with new material specifically written for the purpose of album recording. That LP was released and promoted during the "solo" concert by Davor in February 1976 in Sarajevo's crowded Skenderija hall, which was in fact the gig done by the complete INDEXI line-up (Slobodan A. Kovacevic, Fadil Redzic, Milic Vukasinovic, including ex-drummer Djordje Kisic and newcomer keyboardist Nenad Jurin). A few months later, Diskoton released the INDEXI 7" EP with 4 songs: "Moja Hana"/"Stani malo zlato moje"/"Putovi"/"Nocni susreti".

This cassette "Brown Album", which was released by Diskoton probably in summer or autumn 1976, apparently without the knowledge or approval by the band, contains the entire material from Davor's solo album but now repackaged and credited to INDEXI. There are three bonus tracks taken from the above mentioned INDEXI EP ("Nocni susreti" was released both on the EP and on Davor's solo album!). So, we can say that this "Brown Album" cassette was in fact an expanded re-issue of Davor's album "Svaka je ljubav ista (osim one prave)" but now issued as the INDEXI release. From this perspective, "Brown Album" would act as the first long-playing release of INDEXI containing new studio material made specifically for the album, two years prior to the release of the first official studio album "Modra rijeka"!

Unfortunately, the production and sound quality of both Davor's vinyl LP and of this INDEXI tape are very bad (see the review of Davor's LP for detailed analysis), so this material has often been neglected in the anthologies or written essays about INDEXI. It's a pity, since in my opinion one could find here several brilliant songs (apart from those 2-3 well-known hits) that remain almost unknown to the public. And most of these can be classified as a sort of progressive pop, or "prog-related" music, to use Progarchives' classification.