Neskrotený

Hrdza (Rust) is a Slovakia-based band inspired by the East European folk traditions, consisting of Slavomír Gibarti (vocals, guitars), Susanna Jara (vocals, percussion), Lucia Gibarti (vocals), Dominik Maniak (vocals, fiddle), L'ubo Šamo (vocals, fiddle), Matej Palidrab (accordion, vocals), Pavol Boleš (bass guitar, vocals) and Marek Szarvaš (drums). They have been on the music scene for almost 20 years, achieved success at the national level of the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest and went through to the finals of Czechia Slovakia's Got Talent competition. On their newest album, Neskrotený (meaning ‘Tameless’ or ‘Unbroken’), they arranged 11 original compositions and three traditional folk tunes sung in Slovak, Russian and Ukrainian, together with 11 guest musicians.

Despite the potential of the versatile musical collaboration and instrument arrangements, it is quite a disappointing collection of radio-manufactured and hit-oriented songs, with almost exactly the same production ideas on each track. The album opens with ‘Veru Mi Je Dobre’, a Slovakian folk song scored for simple guitar drones with plain vocals, and it remains the best track on the record, followed by hackneyed folk-pop and folk-rock compositions.