Recently, "Undercode” fans got a breath of fresh air – the first solo album of Ivan Špeljak had been released. Those ones, who had an opportunity to buy this album, already enjoy listening to its distinctive sounding. The other people, who didn’t or just couldn’t have done that, can read this review to make sure that this album is worth buying.
Let’s start from the early beginning.
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Ivan at the concert, supporting «Grave Digger»
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Ivan had the attempts of making his own songs in the middle of 90’s. At that moment, he had already been playing in the local hard-core band named "Dare to Go” which was quite popular in Croatia (for more details read this interview(Russian)). The style and music of that band was "a little bit inappropriate” for him, but what he could do – that was the only way to earn for living. Moreover, the promoting of own ideas to the band could be quite risky, because they can’t be always successful. So Ivan, having played lots of songs and solos, started playing by ear, making something own. Nothing was perfect from the beginning, of course. Anyway, Jitz was getting more experienced by analyzing his samples and looking for mistakes.
Ivan recorded one of those short samples on the blank space of the "Balance” tape by "Van Halen” in order to keep it for the future. That was a piece of song "New Hope”. So, that date can be considered as the first date of working on the solo album of his own. This work wasn’t regular, because Ivan was participating in bands "Undercode”, "Big Rock” and also he was playing as an invited solo-guitarist in many events. All this stuff couldn’t let him think deeply about his ideas for the album.
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Cover of the album
«Restless Days and Sleepless Nights»
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When the exertion began to reduce (because of the breakup of "Undercode” band) Jitz decided to go deeper into his own career as a solo player. A simple question "What if I will make the album by my own?” stuck in his head and so he decided to take a shot. However, nothing went as planned – Ivan didn’t gain the full control over the process and so the money and time was wasted, giving no results. At that moment, Ivan realized that the entire job should be done by your own in order to control every single thing. By that time, he had already had his own small studio which was chosen as the base of his project. The title of the album "Restless Days and Sleepless Nights” speaks by itself – Jitz worked hard on it, taking every single moment of his free time, sometimes even his time for sleep.
Soon, he realized that help from others is necessary. However, those ones, who can help, must know and follow precisely the wants of the author. This is why Ivan invited his close friends to work on the album. They were Marko Karačić (current bassist of "Undercode”) and Davor Keranović (ex-drummer of "Undercode”).
The composing of the album was quite hard, but those efforts made good – the progress was huge and the sounding of songs became much better. Moreover, as the styles of each musician mixed, this led to the unique sounding of the album, which can’t be mixed up with something different.
Now we’re moving to the album itself.
The first track, which is called "Please”, meets us with the buoyant opening of the drums and the solo guitar. This guitar will lead us through the entire album. My friend Vlad noticed that Jitz uses his guitar to express his thoughts, ideas, which he wants to share with us. Just try to close your eyes and listen for the melody – your imagination will begin to draw lots of pictures, objects and places. Melodies are quite simple, but easy to remember, because they sound very harmonically.
There are 8 songs on the album. Each of them is unique, different from others and it tells us about its own theme. Let’s take "Dream On” as an example. The first time I heard it, my mind started to draw the image of the night sky, crowded with the bright stars. If you start looking deeper, you’ll begin to fly past them to the space, then to different galaxies, nebulas and other stars.
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Something like this is being imagined when you’re listening to «Dream On»
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Same is for all the rest – images are being drawn, pleasant moments from your life are being revised. In my humble opinion, criticizing is not appropriate here. I don’t want to do that, because the emotions, which the album presented to me, are positive and lovely. Awesome! I would like to say huge "thank you” to Ivan for such vivid impressions.
In addition to that, every single song is different from others. There are some fast and bright ("My Wish”, "Wanna Ride”) and also there are some calm and sad ("Sorrow”, "Farewell”). This album is so wonderful, that there is no single penny spent regretted.
There is something more to say: this masterpiece is meant to be listened in a peaceful and quiet place with you lying under the blanket and having you eyes closed. The full excitement is guaranteed as soon as you will finish listening to the whole album – you’ll be surely filled up with so many different positive emotions that it’ll be hard to express them to others. What can I say – this album is brilliant. Ivan is a genius and it’s felt in every single note.
As Ivan says: "I wanted to make this album for everyone, not just for musicians. It’s more in melodic style, rather than in technical.” As we can notice – he reached his goal.
Also Ivan likes to play and compose heavy music like hard-rock or metal. He says that it has different energy, which charges you with totally different emotions. However, sometimes he wants to play something more peaceful and melodic. That’s why this album was released. I hope that this album won’t be the last of a kind.
"Where do you get the ideas, inspiration for melodies?”
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Performing on the stage
in «Big Rock» band
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I asked Ivan this question. The reply was simple: improvisation. I was surprised: "So, you just take the guitar and start playing? Wow!”
He answered: "I played a lot of music and I improvise a lot. So, you know in which key you are playing and everything else is clear – just keep following the rhythm, the band and that’s it. I can’t explain how, but I hear melodies when I’m playing. Of course I make mistakes, because I am not a robot or a shred machine. Everybody makes mistakes, because improvisation is a very slippery terrain.
Most of my ideas came from improvisation and usually first improvisation is the best. "Dream On” is an example of this improvisation. Music is everywhere around me - my brain is always playing something. Often I can't sleep because of that. I can't describe that, or influence on that. It is like the river of thoughts which flows without stopping. Sometimes I think about finished songs and try to add some final touch to them. It can be some new melody or pattern.”
"OK if you hear melodies, that means that you're a genius in music, isn’t it so? I believe that the ability to improvise is something very great and hard to reach.”
His reply changed my mind completely: "I always claim that is good to know some theory. If you understand what you are playing or why something was played on that specific chord pattern, your creativity speeds up rapidly. Everything is written in musical theory, but lots of people think if they learn some theory they will become heartless robots, because lots of classical musicians are playing like them. This kind of drill in classical schools often leads to wrong attitude”.
Also, Jitz shared some interesting facts about making of this album: "I sometimes record my ideas in my studio, but more often on my cell phone. It's always near you and it’s always turned on (at least mine cell phone). Some ideas were made usually through improvisation; some were leftovers from other songs or ideas that I didn’t use. For example: "My Wish’s” chorus theme with arpeggios. That part came to me when I was working on "Big Rock” song called "Još Malo i Gotovo” (en. Almost Ready) but it was to euphoric for it. However, I saved that idea.
Also, I will make video for "My Wish” this week. It will be about my girlfriend (her name is Željka) influence on my creativity. Also, when I record or compose new song she always asks about the name of that song. If song isn't called "Željka” it is not a good song. By the way, we have a word "želja" in Croatian language, which means "wish”. So, that’s why one of my songs is called "My Wish”. Women, you can’t without them.”
What is the secret?
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«All you have to do is practice!»
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Ivan is a self-learner and he believes that it’s possible to reach his level: "All you have to do is practice! The word "practice” is the key word here, because it should be permanent. You just can’t succeed without it, because you’ll always forget something, lose your style of playing and so on. Also, don’t forget about learning some theory. That’s it.”
Well, as you see, everyone can be a great musician. The thing is – you must want to be such a person.
To sum up, I would like to express huge gratefulness from each member of the undercode.ru for such a splendid, pleasant-sounding and distinctive album! It proves that guys from "Undercode” will make such a great "Post-Apocalyptic”, which will shoot above the stage like huge cannon filled up with metal and flame and guys will get their fame as deserved.
Thanks to Ivan for answering my questions about the album
and to FreekNik for the information he gave me
SteadFast
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