The Nikšić punk band “Punkreas” released a new EP a few days ago called “Makni mi te ruke!”, which includes three songs - “Nikad”, “Ljakse” and “Tri linijie”. The songs were recorded in February at the Nikšić studio “Disorder”, and this time the recording engineer is Bojan Dobrilović while he did the mixing and mastering Bojan Bojanic.
"Punk and crossover come to the fore this time and this becomes the recognizable hallmark of 'Punkreas'. Faced with the growth of petty bourgeoisie in their environment, the band, as before, reacts by bringing lyrics such as 'Nikad', 'Ljakse makse' and 'Tri linijie'. The EP is called 'Makni mi te ruke!' which represents a recognizable narrative of the society we live in," said the members of "Punkreas" with the announcement of the EP, for which the cover art was created by artists and friends of the band Damir Garcevic i Nenad Cvitičanin.
The drummer spoke to "Vijesti" about the performance where he will promote "Makni mi te ruke!", new songs, and the video he recorded with his other band "Mučin" for the song "Glas". Đorđije Njunjić, which with Goran Dabović (vowel), Veljko Vučurović (bass guitar), Bojan Kandić (guitar) and Mihailo Bulajić (guitar) makes up “Punkreas”.
You recently released an EP and a large number of music portals from the region reported the news. How satisfied are you with that part, as well as with the audience's reaction to "Makni mi te ruke"?
We know most of the people who run or write for a portal personally, primarily through the music portal Mulj for which I write, then through the show I edit, which is called “Premotavanje”, to the bands with whom we often played in the region and we met with these people at concerts. On the other hand, I have long been in the business of sending everything related to the band's work to people, preparing and packaging it so that the news can be found in the media more easily. From that point of view, I can really praise all the Montenegrin media that have really given significant space to authors from Montenegro in recent years, and your portal as a significant source of news is doing a good job of promoting it, which is confirmed by this text. Everything that happens in art and music holds the attention of readers and audiences for a very short time, so we can talk about this initial impression of the first people who heard the EP and the comments are very interesting, certainly good for a reason, because it seems to me that people understood the message very well, which is very important to us, now the EP must come to life at the performances.
Why is the EP called “Take Those Hands Off Me”?
We have somehow always avoided localisms, jargonisms, and so internally we always apply those platitudes that are often a trigger for lyrics. That is our environment, that is our narrative for decades, and we have heard it many times. “Take your hands off me” is a naked expression of our own reaction to the frustrations that happen to us. It seems to me that this sentence clearly reflects the state of the environment we are in and the defensive attitude that people have towards something incomprehensible to them. Some will say that it is hostile, some that it is a mentality, but that attitude is there, it is a part of us and as such we included it in the title of the EP. And as I said, it seems to me that people immediately understood the message.
The album contains three songs - “Nikad”, “Ljakse” and “Tri linijie”. How did they come about and how long did you work on them?
We have a certain rhythm of making EPs, because we gave up on albums because we simply think that people don't get to the end of the album and some songs are left neglected by listeners. Sometimes we wonder if three songs is too many? However, the choice was narrowed down to three and we worked on them slowly for a year, while we started with ideas, riffs, jamming at rehearsals, putting them together piece by piece, throwing something out, and in the end they get a form that is final and with which we are satisfied. They were created simply by observing the society around us, and our commenting on the same phenomena. Somehow it became a specific expression for our band and these topics are mostly about society or looking at the individual and ourselves within those phenomena.
The songs deal with topics that are more relevant now than ever before. How much can songs influence the audience?
We believe that society is a process that depends on many factors, and if you record one moment, it is interesting to see how much it changes over time, and how current it is, as you say. Many people believe and we often hear that “nothing changes here” or “it is much worse than before”. Confronting society in this case, for us, because we are a small country, reveals a lot of holes, inconsistencies, suffering, fear, a lot of negative phenomena, which is why we point them out. Not only to state them, but to confront them. We think that this way of expressing ourselves at concerts is not just for fun, of course we do not run away from it, but we think that we somehow therapeutically go through these difficult topics and moments. Of course, for us, the band and concerts have a therapeutic purpose, and therefore for the audience.
Are you planning to film the songs?
Just as much attention should be paid to the videos as to the ideas for the songs. It often happens that the videos have nothing to do with the band that recorded them or the essence of the songs, and that would not be good for us. To what extent would the video contribute to the development of this EP is a big question. Of course, we do not shy away from the video, but we do not record it at the cost of being seen on YouTube. A band that deals with engaged music should, above all, promote itself through concerts and reach people. Because we do not think that the revolution of both mind and body happens by sitting and watching YouTube.
You will be promoting the EP live soon. When and where, and do you have any more gigs planned?
A promotion has already been scheduled at the House pub in Nikšić on May 11th. This will be a kind of return of rock and roll to the city in a big way, because the bands “Off Duty”, “Štrijk mozga” and the young hope who have already positioned themselves with the audience “Quiet Dogs” have returned from hibernation, so this will be an all-night marathon party that will bring a lot of good things and everyone will be able to enjoy. Tickets are on pre-sale, and the capacity is limited, so I urge everyone to buy a ticket in time. As for other performances, summer and festivals are coming, there are already some invitations, but that is still being defined so that in addition to that we almost always do a tour in the fall-winter, and that will probably be the case this time as well.
At the same time, your band “Mučin” released a video for the song “Glas”. Who was in charge of filming the video?
That's right. The band released a video for the song "Glas" which is from the first EP that was released in November last year. We filmed the video at "DKC Pomorandža", and it was filmed by our friend of the band Mladen Vujović who people know from the band “Qtera”, now “Sandraun”, he edited the video. We were also helped a lot by a great friend, an excellent guitarist Lazar Markovic, while he helped us a lot with the equipment Ilija KaluđerovićWe designed the lighting, shots, and direction ourselves, and people's reactions have been phenomenal, which is very encouraging for our first video production.
Can we expect more material from the band “Mučin”?
For me, “Mučin” has been unexpectedly well received by the regional audience. We even managed to get into the regional publishing label Geenger records, which has very good bands and releases in its catalog, and that is an incentive to continue. A second EP is already being prepared, which will be released in a month or two for the aforementioned label, and in May we are going on a tour of Serbia to the cities of Novi Sad, Belgrade and Smederevo, while a concert in Podgorica is also expected, there are invitations from Croatia, Slovenia, so the story around “Mučin” is developing in the best possible way.
What does it generally look like juggling two bands, while also working in parallel? Who is the priority, and who "suffers"?
The priority is always family and work, of course. Sometimes the band talk gets intense and it steals a lot of free time, then it calms down and there is space for something else to do. If things are arranged well, boredom is not allowed to take a place in life, which is the point. If you asked someone else, they would probably say that each of these parts of life and work is suffering, but what can you do (laughs). For now, everything is coming together!
Bonus video:
