Coming to you from Čakovec, Croatia is one of my favorite psychedelic groups: Daliborovo granje. Branching out from some of the usual psychedelic influences, Daliborovo granje creates a unique psychedelic infusion with some Balkan flair. Daliborovo granje is comprised of five members: David Lesjak on bass, Andrija Munđar on drums, Tomica Oskoruš on trumpet, and Filip Toplek and Alan Horvat on guitar. Hainin is their sophomore album, served up with a dose of Balkan folk music, which is a refreshing take on the timeless, classic psychedelic genre. To me, this instrumental album is about as close to perfection as you could possibly get. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve listened to this album, but it gets more and more enjoyable with each listen.
Unfamiliar with Balkan folk music? No worries, here’s a bit of a crash course. You’ll often hear a unique sort of vibrato in the vocals, something that I can really only describe as “trilling”. You’ll also notice lots of brass instruments, complex rhythms, and some influences from traditional Turkish folk music, Greek folk music, and Byzantine medieval music.
For the sake of brevity, I’m going to share my thoughts on the album’s highlights. The whole project is absolutely fantastic, but I always find that it’s better to dive into a few select parts of the album rather than comment generally on the record as a whole.
The album opens with Mehana, a dark-toned track that leans heavily into its psychedelic influences. Opening up with some fast-paced guitar melodics, Mehana feels like it’s putting you under a spell or trance (certainly worked on me!). There’s a tension building through the track – it starts off with quick picking and an almost gentle lead into something heavier that briefly drops the escalating tension. Quickly though, it gets built right back up. I’d say the tension pulls you under almost like an undertow. In some parts of Mehana, I feel like I can also hear some stoner rock influence. The track closes on the true release of the tension that’s been built throughout the track. Overall, Mehana is just an absolutely killer opener.
Coming hot off of Mehana’s heels is Ak-maknadi, where we dive right into some Balkan brass. I feel that Ak-maknadi may just exemplify this Balkan folk-psychedelic fusion. If Mehana was putting you under a spell, Ak-maknadi is the resulting trance-state. The brass and the guitar are creating a musical call-and-response, almost chasing each other. The guitar tone is so quintessentially psychedelic and the brass is so symphonic; they compliment each other really well. There’s a continual “wahhhh” motif throughout the track that breaks up the tension. It is both building and releasing the tension. It’s unexpected, not coming in at regular intervals. I can only assume that it’s made using the whammy bar on the guitar or some sort of effects pedal. Whatever the case, it makes for stellar punctuation on the song. Ak-maknadi is most certainly my favorite track off of Hainin.
Closing out this review is Izgubljena – another dark-toned track. It opens with a bass melody punctuated by drums and highlighted by guitar. I’m always a sucker for a good bass line, and I really loved this one. There’s actually quite a bit of individual showcasing on Izgubljena – each instrument featured on this track gets its time to shine. I think this track really does justice to both Munđar’s drumming and Lesjak’s talent on the bass. The album tends to lean more heavily on guitar-forward tracks, so I really enjoyed hearing the bass at the front during this song.
Overall, I thought this album was an exemplary psychedelic record. The complexity of the album and its individual components are addictive and entrancing. Like I said earlier, I have been listening to this album quite a lot since I discovered it. Hainin and Dalibrovo granje have rightfully earned their place on my favorites list, so I am going to continue to enjoy this masterpiece for decades to come.
You can find Daliborovo granje on Bandcamp, Instagram, SoundCloud, Facebook, and YouTube.
