On February 14, exactly 3 years after their first visit to Bulgaria, Laibach made their second performance in Sofia. We use the word "performance" absolutely deliberately, as that's exactly what we were offered by the Slovenian avantgardists - a unique audio-visual symbiosis of melody, rhythm, voice, light...

A few minutes before 9 p.m. the group's official spokesperson, Ivan Novak, awarded the local audience with the Bulgarian national anthem pouring out of the speakers. This made the crowd totally euphoric, and afterwards the actual show began. With the introduction to "Germania" the two big screens on the stage were activated, showing a constant multimedia flow of animation, archive movie cuts and parts of Laibach videos, while the musicians themselves started appearing one by one: Primoz Hladnik (Silence) behind his wall of synths, followed by keyboarder Luka Jamnik (ex-Niowt), drummer Janez Gabric, female vocalist Mina Spiler (Melodrom), and finally - Laibach's face and voice, Mr. Milan Fras.

Photo by Svetoslav Dragiev

During the next hour we witnessed the performance of the first 12 (out of 14) songs off Laibach's current album, "Volk" - from the already mentioned interpretation of the German national anthem to the pan-slavic march "Slovania". What we didn't hear was only "Vaticanae". However, this fact was compensated while listening to "The Great Seal" (the anthem of Laibach's virtual state, NSK, which is on No. 14 in the band's latest CD): That's when the scene was rearranged, and the musicians appeared in front of the audience again - without Mina Spiler, but with two lovely blond singing percussionists, Eva Breznikar and Natasa Regovec. With their help, and with the start of "Tanz mit Laibach" off "W.A.T." (2003), the "dance" part of the concert began.

The band played "Alle gegen Alle" off "NATO" (1994), as well as four more tracks off "W.A.T.", namely "Du bist unser", "Hell: Symmetry", "Achtung!", and the logical ending of the evening, "Das Spiel ist aus". After "the end of the game", sometime around 10:20 p.m., we heard a "Laibach Medley" including remixed parts of songs like "Opus Dei", "The Final Countdown" and "God Is God", a.o. At the same time, the whole band (except for Ivan Novak, as usually) went on stage again for the last time, bowed to the obviously satisfied audience and said goodbye...

Words: Nicki Vassilev.

Photos: Svetoslav Dragiev / SME.

More photos of Laibach's show in Sofia can be viewed in our Gallery.