Smak

SMAK biography

SMAK was formed 1971. in Kragujevac, the present Republic of Serbia, by a guitar virtuoso Radomir Mihajlovic nicknamed "Tocak" (the Wheel). The first stable line-up was in late 1974. : Radomir Mihajlovic Tocak (guitar), Slobodan Stojanovic Kepa (drums), Zoran Milanovic (bass), Boris Arandjelovic (vocals) and Laza Ristovski (keyboards).They realesed 3 SP during '74-'75 on which appeared there hit single Ulazak u Harem(Enter to Harem) and they were pregroup for Deep Purple concert in Belgrade '75 ,after successful hit single and exellent concert with Deep Purple they realesed there first LP called Smak 1975. and it was one of the most selling albums of all times in ex Yugoslavia.

At the beginning of the next year 1976. they realesed MLP (mini long play) Satelit which featured their hit song 'Satelit'(Satellite) and one of band's best instrumental 'Biska 2', blues song 'Sumadijski Blues', and the song called 'Put od Balona-Biska 20' which was used as an instrumental solos song. In this period they made a short movie called Smak in New York, which featured their little tour in USA as a promotion of MLP Satelit. Tocak realesed his first solo album R.M.Tocak, and it became best selling album in Yugoslavia in year 1976. Their next single was out at the end of '76 Ljudi nije fer/El Dumo.

During 1977.-78. Ristovski was replaced by first Miki Petkovski ,which played on LP Crna Dama 1977. one of the best selling albums in Yugoslavia, and then by Tibor Levay on keyboards, with him they made LPs Stranice naseg vremena 1978. and English versions of these two albums Black Lady and The Pages of our time 1978. ,while in the period 1979.-81. Dado Topic (ex-TIME,ex-Korni Grupa) collaborated with SMAK as producer and occasional guest vocalist on single Na Balkanu before the band broke-up in late 1981.

In 1980, shortly before split, they made LP Rock Cirkus which was destined to be one of the most selling albums but because of yugoslavian president's death it had not gotten much popularity. After that, they made 3 farewell concerts in capital of Serbia and Montenegro, Belgrade attended by more than 10000 fans.

The original line-up gathered again in 1984. and with Dado Topic made LP Zasto ne volim sneg, which was dedicated to Tocak’s dead brother, after that they had splited again. In 1986. with a new keyboardist Milan Djurdjevic they came back and made LP Smak 86, but after that splited again. The forth comeback of SMAK happened in 1992. with Ristovski again as a member, when they mostly played concerts in Serbia and issued a live album odLIVEno1992. featuring the best serbian harmonic player Pera Joe. In '92 and '93 Točak was promoting his second solo album and a soundtrack for the movie Byzantine Blue 1993., which won a prize for the best soundtrack Christal Prisma awards.

Finally, in 1994 SMAK re-appeared again, this time along with Tocak and Stojanovic they added younger musicians: Dejan Stojanovic Kepa Jr. (second drum kit), Dejan Najdanovic Najda (vocals), Vlada Samardzic (bass) and Milan Milosavljevic Mikica (guitar). Smak relesed album Bioskop Fox(Cinema Fox). After 4 year period Vlada Samardzic (bass) left SMAK and went to Bearkley music collage, replaced by Sale Markovic. With Sale they made albums Live wihtout audience1998, Egregor1999, Live 3.mart.2000. Kragujevac klub 'La Cinema' 2000.

SMAK was celebrated for Tocak's virtuosity in guitar playing, modelled on Jimi Hendrix's and Jimmy Page's style, and for interesting and powerful, if not always successful, fusion of hard rock and jazz, prog rock, jazz rock with strong blues backing, with Arandjelovic's falsetto vocal often used as an instrument rather than singing. "Ulazak u harem", a folk-inspired instrumental issued as hit-single in 1975, showcased Tocak as one of the guitar-heroes and legend of ex-Yugoslavian music scene of the 1970s, while albums "Crna dama" ("Black Lady") 1977. and "Stranice naseg vremena" ("The Pages of Our Time") 1978. were highly celebrated among prog fans and were even released in English versions for the Western market. Their reunion, from the second half of 1980’s onward, turned the musical direction of the band into less-inspired mainstream hard rock, abandoning any prog elements, but after re-appearing in 1994. SMAK turned back the musical direction back to hard rock, fussion jazz with prog elements. As a comparison, one can mention similarities in style with artists such as Led Zeppelin,Deep Purple, Taste, Doobie Brothers,Santana, Leb i Sol.

SMAK discography

1975	Zivim...Biska 13-Biska 16	Singles
1975	Ulazak u Harem-Sto Ptica	Singles
1975	Ulazak u Harem-Epitaf	Singles
1975	Smak	Studio Album
1976	Satelit	Singles/EPs/Fan Club/Promo
1976	Ljudi nije fer-El Dumo	Singles
1977	Crna Dama	Studio Album
1977	Ulazak u Harem,Plava Pesma - The best of	Boxset / Compilation
1978	Nevidljive Terazije-Hitopadeza	Singles
1978	Stranice Naseg Vremena	Studio Album
1978	Black Lady	Studio Album
1978	Dab In The Middle	Studio Album
1979	Na Balkanu	Singles
1980	Rock Cirkus	Studio Album
1981	Zasto Ne Volim Sneg	Studio Album
1986	Smak '86	Studio Album
1992	odLIVEno	Live
1995	Bioskop Fox	Studio Album
1996	The Best Of Smak	Boxset / Compilation
1996	Star? Mlad. Vecan?*	Boxset / Compilation
1997	Live Without Audience	Live
1999	Egregor	Studio Album
2001	Istorija	Boxset / Compilation
2002	3. Mart 2000. Kragujevac Klub La Cinema	Live

and many unoffical Live albums(Live 1992,Live in Zupa '98...),many unrealsed songs(Biska,Na Drinu,StaKapKara,Kepo,Novi Novi Dan,Swap,Egregor...)on some of them apearred bassist Lola Andrijic,which played a couple of concerts in 1974. with Smak.

[link]

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.