Zeljko Bebek
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Željko Bebek (born December 16, 1945) is a popular Bosnian Croat singer from Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Bebek was born in Sarajevo. He showed early interest in music, entertaining his mother's guests by singing songs he heard on the radio. He also experimented with harmonica, but abandoned it in third grade of his primary school as he wanted to play guitar and sing along, but the teacher disagreed so Željko ended up playing mandolin. He soon became the best mandolin player in the school so he was allowed to play guitar.
He entered his first band at the age of 16. It was a band in Sarajevo 2nd gimnasium called "Eho 61", where he met Kornelije Kovač, Zoran and Fadil Redžić. When the band broke up, Željko carried on playing with the Redžićs until Fadil entered Indexi. At that time Edo Bogeljić invited him to "Kodeksi".
He was the singer and rhythm guitarist for the band Kodeksi in the 1960s. Around 1969, he met Goran Bregović and the band started playing with him. The band moved to south Italy and had a rather successful career there until Milić Vukašinović entered the band, brought new musical influences and the band started to disregard Željko as they didn't need the singer any more. In 1970 Bebek split with the band, returned to Sarajevo and "re-founded" "Novi Kodeksi" with Edo Bogeljić (who left "Kodeksi" few months after they departed for Italy). The band had little success and Željko soon had to serve in the army.
After a period of hostility, in 1972 (after Bebek's return from the army) Bregović had Bebek sing for his new band Jutro, which soon transformed into Bijelo Dugme.
Bebek continued as vocalist and bass guitarist in Bijelo Dugme from 1974 to 1984.
In 1978 he recorded a solo album "Skoro da smo isti" with drummer Điđi Jankelić, Edom Bogeljić on guitar and Neven Pocrnjić on keyboards. The album wasn't a great success. In 1984, just before leaving Bijelo Dugme he recorded his second solo album "Mene tjera neki vrag".
His solo career wasn't very successful. He recorded only minor hits, including "Šta je meni ovo trebalo", "Da Bog da te voda odnijela", "Kako došlo, tako prošlo", "Sinoć sam pola kafane popio", "Il' me ženi, il' tamburu kupi".
When the Yugoslav wars started, he moved to Zagreb where he continues to live and work. His record labels included Taped Pictures and Croatia Records.
In 2005 he took part in 3 large farewell concerts of Bijelo Dugme.
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