If I listed all the artists that are shomehow important for me, it would rewuire a separate blog and much free time which I don;t have but surely this is not the last note about music on my blog. I will write about English-singing bands as well. Let's start with the most inspiring band I've ever heard.
KSU (the name comming from late 1970s' car licence plates in krośnieńskie district) is a Polish rock band formed in 1977/8 in Ustrzyki Dolne. They started playing covers of hard rock and progresive rock bands such as Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd but the songs were mostly to difficult for beginning musicians. One day they heard punk rock in one of Western radio stations and decided that the energy and simplicity of music played by Sex Pistols, UK Subs and The Damned were applying enough to change KSU's style. They were playing mainly in their region at that time but were enthusiasticly welcomed at the New Wave Festival in Kołobrzeg in 1980. Only in 1983 did they start writing their own songs but they've always had Polish lyrics writen mainly by Maciej Augustyn, a historian and brother of the first vocalist, Bohun. In 1986 Eugeniusz 'Siczka' Olejarczyk, the guitarist, took over the place of vocalist and band leader. He is the only member who has played in KSU from the beginning till today.
Through more than 30 years they have recorded only 5 studio albums (and, unfortunately, another 5 compilations of re-recorded older songs...), played fewer live shows than many popular rock bands and struggled with constant line up-changes but they received the status of a legend, largely thanks to the uniqueness of their music. They began playing harsh but melodic punk rock but through time have developed their own style based on combining the energy of punk, hard rock catchy guitar riffs and touching folk melodies. All this, together with characteristic bitter, poetic and existential lyrics describing social issues or Bieszczady Mountains' beauty as well as hopelessness of life in the provinces, creates an unique feeling while listening to KSU's music.
So try to feel what I feel. :)
Quite nice :) When you wrote "punk", I thought "Oh, no!" But as you've said, it's not that, really. I wish radio stations were not so lazy. Instead of playing the same singers and bands again and again, they should look around for something fresh, like KSU.
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