LEB I SOL

In the first half of the seventies of the last century, the music scene in Skopje was rather small so the future members of the LEB I SOL often worked in same bands. The first more serious project Vlatko and Garo had, was with the jazz-rock band BREG which leader was Miki Petkovski. On 1st January 1976 Vlatko and Bodan founded LEB I SOL. together with the keyboard player Kokan Dimushevski and the drum player Dimitrije Chochorovski. The first singles “Etida br.3”, “Devetka” and “Pesna za nas” were recorded in the studio of Radio Skopje in only two hours. They had the first performance out of Macedonia in 1977 in Novi Sad. Based on that footage they were invited at the Youth Festival in Subotica. There they won a prize and were widely acknowledged for the fist time and they signed a contract with PGP-RTS. In August of the same year they performed as a foregroup of Bijelo Dugme at the legendary concert “Hajduchka Cheshma”, as well as in Sarajevo, Novi Sad and Skopje. Garo is playing with them as well, after having joined them few weeks before. LEB I SOL recorded their debut album LEB I SOL 1 at the studio of RTV Novi Sad in September 1977. The jazz-rock themes with ethno influences dominate the album, and six themes out of nine are instrumental. All four of the members are composing, though Vlatko is the most productive one. The song “Nisam Tvoj” can be singled out as the hit of that record. They soon climb the top of the Yugoslavian chart and for the second album LEB I SOL 2 are being provided with much better studio conditions. Following the style of the debut album, the second album, besides the highly rate “Aber dojde Donke”, offers the excellent songs “Marija”, “Akupunktura” and “Talasna Duzina”. In 1978, according to the readers of the music magazine “Jukebox”, the most influential in Yugoslavia at that time, they received the title “Group of the year”. The third LP “Ruchni Rad” was recorded at Studio 5 of the Radio Belgrade. The four of them continued to be the authors of their work. The most ambitious themes of this album were the title song “Ruchni Rad”, “Kumova Slama” and “Verni Pas”. Following the release of that album, Kokan Dimushevski left the band. He was replaced by Miki Petkovsi who left LEB I SOL in 1980. After his departure they decided to work as a trio composing music for the theatre plays “Divo Meso”, “Ubavata Vida”, “Srekjna Nova 49” and lots of others. They went on a summer tour, had ten concerts and than in Skopje started preparing their new album “Beskonachno”. They followed their style and the music was adjusted to the trio formation. The LP “Beskonachno” included the remake of the old folk song “Ajde sonce zajde”, Vlatko’s “Ziva rana”, Garo’s “Kasno popodne” and Bodan’s “Skakavac”. That summer Garo, who left the band was replaced by Dragoljub Gjurichic. The LP “Sledovanje” was recorded in the studio of Radio Skopje and for the first time they were producers of their own album. This album for the first time concentrates on vocal songs and “Nosim tvoj zig” received the epithet of a radio hit. In the summer of 1982 together with the KPGT theatre they had a two month tour in America. They performed in clubs and played together with the band Big Country. With the release of the double album “Akusticna trauma” they left PGP-RTS and joined Jugoton. In 1983 for Jugoton they released the LP “Kalabalak”. The guests of the album were Bobi Micev playing the keyboard and Petar Kargov playing the saxophone. The album “Tangenta” was created at the Belgrade studio Aquarius in 1984 having Kevin Heyers as a producer. He was the one who gave the title of this record because in his opinion the music created by the members of the LEB I SOL is grazing different styles. The guests of this record are Laza Ristovski playing keyboards and Nenad Jelic playing percussion. The radio hit from this album was “Kontakt je skup”. The ten year anniversary was celebrated towards the middle of 1986 with the release of the record “Zvuchni Zid” which contained the theatre, film and television music, as well as the themes of the TV show “Bushava Azbuka”, the theatre plays “Osloboduvanje na Skopje”, “Srekjna Nova 49”, “Koshtana” and the films “Shmeker” and “Za sreka se potrebni trojca”. The authors were Vlatko and Bodan. Garo, who in the meantime came back in the band, was also involved in the recording. Soon after, the LEB I SOL were accompanied by the saxophone player Goce Micanov and the keyboard player Kiril Dzajkovski and together they recorded the album “Kao kakao” in 1987. They decide on a significant style transformation of this record and release ten vocal songs. The album is produced by Bodan and Vlatko together with Braco Zafirovski, with the guest stars Bebi Dol, Ana Kostovska and Roni Vaten on Irish bagpipes. The lyrics were written by Vlatko and Goran Stefanovski. There were series of hits released from this record, such as “Skopje”, “Kao Kakao”, “Mamurni Ljudi” and “Chuvam noc od budnih”. The same band formation recorded the following album “Putujemo”. Again they produced it together with Braco Zafirovski and again all the songs were vocal. By having Kaliopi as a concomitant vocal, Zoran Jovanovic as a saxophone player and Kire Kostov playing the horn, LEB I SOL offered the audience the basic theme of the record connected to the physical and emotional journeys. For some time, the keyboard player in the band was Valentino Skenderovski, but soon after Kokan Dimushevski came back and participated in the recording of “Putujemo”. The biggest hit of this album is the legendary “Chukni vo drvo”. One year later in 1990, Bodan and Vlatko released the CD “Zodijak” with music composed for the ballet performance “Zodijak” of the Mcedonian National Theatre. In 1990 Garo again left the band. In May 1991 LEB I SOL went on a tour in USA and Canada. The band is now consisted of Vlatko, Bodan, Kokan and Dragoljub. The concert held at the prestige CBGB in New York is documented on the CD “Live in New York”. This album includes also the recordings of the rehearsals at the studio American, a record of the song “Blagoslov” of the Macedonian Orthodox church in Toronto, the theme “Going back to Skopje” recorded at the mobile studio in Toronto and the remake of the folk song “Uchi me majko, karaj me” recorded in Skopje in October 1991. During their career, apart from the Yugoslavian tours, the LEB I SOL had tours in other countries: - Cypress in 1982 - Russia in 1983 and 1988 - Italy and Spain in 1987 - Ireland, Sweden and Denmark in 1990 In the spring 1992, they sold out the Sava Centar in Belgrade four times in a row and they played at the prestigious club Paradiso in Amsterdam. In December 1995 they had two sold out concerts in the hall “Vatroslav Lisinski” in Zagreb, as well as concerts in Pula and Rijeka. That same year they released the double album “Anthology” with orderly overview of their career. The last concert before the breakdown was at the legendary club Milos in Thessalonica in December 1995. Four years after the breakdown “Croatia Records” republished the album “Kao kakao” on a CD and received the prominent award “Porin” for best re-edition. In April 2006, right after the rejoining, LEB I SOL started work again. Vlatko, Bodan, Garo and Kokan had their rehearsals for the big tour at the legendary studio M2 of the MRTV. The grand ex-Yugoslavian tour is already scheduled. It started with a concert at the Heraklea in Bitola on 4th July 2006. The second concert of the “30th ANNIVERSARY TOUR 2006” was held at the Ohrid Antic Theatre. At this concert, with an audience of 3000, audio and video footages were made and will be published as live CD and DVD editions towards the end of October 2006. As part of these editions will be the new remake of a Macedonian traditional song that LEB I SOL recorded at the Skopje studio “Tra,la,la”. The name of the song is “Raspukala Sar Planina” for which the video edition is already promoted.