Gjurmët

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Gjurmët
General information
Genre (s) New wave , synth pop , post punk
founding 1980
resolution 1986
Last occupation
Migjen Kelmendi
Armando Gjini
Tomor Kurshumliu
Petrit Riza
Bekim Dyla

Gjurmët (dt. The tracks , Eng. The Traces ) was a Kosovo Albanian New Wave band and post-punk band from Pristina in Kosovo , which was founded in 1980. Along with Elita 5 , TNT , Trixi , Fisnikët , Ilirët and Minatori, they are considered to be one of the most famous bands in the socialist autonomous province of Kosovo in the former socialist Yugoslavia .

history

The band was founded in 1980 by Migjen Kelmendi (vocals, rhythm guitar), the son of the writer and journalist Ramiz Kelmendi. Migjen Kelmendi studied law at the University of Pristina until 1983 and later worked as a radio and print journalist as well as a writer and translator. When the band was founded , he was inspired by Western New Wave music, but also worked traditional Kosovar-Albanian musical influences into the work of the band.

Gjurmët released their first album Gjurmët in 1985 on cassette on Radio Television Pristina after the band had finished the recordings a year earlier. In 1986 the band split. In 2002 the album LP was released, a compilation of recordings from the 1980s.

Kelmendi then made a career as a journalist after stays in Canada and the USA. He became editor-in-chief of the Contact program on Radio Television Pristina , later production manager of the Kosovar edition of Albanian satellite television and finally director of the television and literature program on the public broadcaster Radio Television Kosovo . He also gives the he founded the weekly magazine Jáva in gegischen (d. H. Kosovo Albanian) dialect, the magazine Epoca and the cross-genre magazine for literary theory MM out. He published several books, for example the novel The Gate of Time in 1994 , Carere Patria in 1997 (Notes on Impressions and Experiences in Albania) and Toward Home in 1998 (Essays on America). In 2007 he received the Press Freedom Award . He publishes and publishes under the name Java Multimedia Production publications such as Who is Kosovar? Kosovar identity. A debate. (2005). With his editorial work he tries to give space to the discourse on Kosovar-Albanian identities and, in particular, positions beyond nationalisms and racist ethnicization .

Social context

In terms of content, Gjurmët deals with the interests of young people and the social and cultural changes in Kosovo in the 1980s. The band acted in the field of tension between the international music played on Radio Luxemburg and modernity on the one hand and the cultural repression of rock bands singing Albanian in socialist Serbia on the other.

An example of Gjurmët's oeuvre is Hero I Qytetit Pa Lum (German hero of a city without a river ), for whom David Bowie was stylistically and in terms of content groundbreaking with his song Heroes and whose theme the band members applied to their own life situation. Gjurmët wondered in what form they could be heroes in their city. They answered this question by saying that they cannot be heroes because their hometown Pristina has no river . It was filled in and they live in the only capital without a river - they are the heroes of the city without a river.

Running a rock band was seen as political positioning at that time. After the unrest in Kosovo in 1981 , the band members - like many young intellectuals - identified with the Albanian nationalist opposition under the influence of the University of Pristina .

In the 80s Gjurmët performed at festivals in front of up to 5000 spectators, z. B. at the BOOM Pop Festival with bands from all over Yugoslavia.

Discography

  • 1985: Gjurmët (album released on cassette ) on Radio Television Priština
  • 2002: Self- published LP (album released on CD , compilation), retrospective with recordings made between 1982 and 1988

Texts about Gjurmët

  • Migjen Kelmendi: To Change The World: A Short History of The Traces , (Eng., Ger. Change the world: A short history of the Gjurmët. ) JAVA Multimedia Production, Pristina 2001- The book describes how the rock scene in the Balkans included the band Gjurmët were involved in the political processes that later developed into the war in Yugoslavia. (The English translation of the band name Gjurmët is traces .)
  • Migjen Kelmendi: Gjurmet LP (story)

Web links

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  1. ↑ Migjen Kelmendi , author page on the website of the Barcelona literary festival kosmopolis , accessed on April 2, 2013
  2. ^ Robert Elsie: Historical dictionary of Kosova , "... from the period 1981-1986, as the head of a Prishtina rock group called Gjurmët"
  3. ↑ Darko Hudelist: Kosovo - Bitka bez iluzija. Centar za Informacije i Publicitet, Zagreb 1989, p. 124
  4. ↑ a b Interview with Migjen Kelmendi: “Rock Music Anticipated the Crash of Yugoslavia”. In: Hello my name is Holiday (blog) from January 17, 2011  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed April 2, 2013@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / mynameisholiday.wordpress.com  
  5. ↑ a b Info section on Gjurmët's Facebook page , accessed on April 2, 2013
  6. ↑ Migjen Kelmendi on the website of the relations project , accessed on April 2, 2013
  7. ↑ Hero for a day. In: Falter No. 19 2007, accessed on April 2, 2013
  8. ^ [Robert Murray Davis: Question Time. Kosovars debate the taboos and shibboleths surrounding their relations with Slavs, Albanians, and the world. (Review by Who Is Kosovar: A Debate. ) In: Transitions Online, May 2, 2006], accessed April 2, 2013
  9. ↑ Chris Keulemans: Naked in the mosque: Nationalism in Kosovo. In: "cafebabel.com" from September 15, 2006 ( memento of the original from August 12, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed April 2, 2013 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.cafebabel.de
  10. ↑ a b To Change the World: The History of The Traces in DiBiDo, the Central and Eastern European Online Library  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed April 2, 2013@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.dibido.eu  
  11. ↑ Radio Helsinki (editors: Esmir Pashaj, Nebije Rrustja): Rock'n'Roll in Albania - in the footsteps of Gjurmët In: cultural broadcasting archive. March 31, 2013 , accessed April 2, 2013
  12. ↑ a b c Migjen Kelmendi (I), Kosovo on the website of the European Stability Initiative , accessed on April 2, 2013
  13. ↑ Hero I Qytetit Pa Lum by Gjurmët with text on Youtube ( Memento from July 7, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on April 2, 2013
  14. ↑ a b Barbara Spengler-Axiopoulos: Heroes in the city without a river. A group of young intellectuals tries to give shape to the Kosovar identity.  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of January 11, 2006, accessed on April 2, 2013@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.nzz.ch  
  15. ↑ Julie Mertus: Kosovo: how myths and truths started a war. University of California Press, 1999, p. 29 ff.
  16. ↑ Gjurmët: Gjurmët , album on Discogs , accessed on April 2, 2013
  17. ↑ Gjurmët: LP , album on Discogs , accessed on April 2, 2013