Kühlschrank

Kühlschrank is a one-man band project by Simon Fugina, who released the album Konec nekega obdobja [The End of an Era] last autumn. The album contains 13 tracks written over the last ten years and, as the title suggests, represents the culmination of an era.

"The first half of the album is devoted entirely to storytelling in the style nurtured by the New York alternative rockers Interpol, among others. Simon's vocals are static, the themes he deals with in relatively complex but not always abstract combinations of thoughts mostly refer to the movements, touches, looks and feelings of someone in the poet's immediate surroundings," writes Matjaž Ambrožič in his review of the album.

Kühlschrank first appeared on the Slovenian music scene in 2012, when he was featured on the compilation Imamo dobro glasbo [We Have Good Music] with the song Skrivnostno nebo [Mysterious Sky], in which the self-taught musician already sketched out the outlines of the themes to which he remains faithful to this day. His lyrics are about relationships – to himself and to others, to the world and his surroundings – and about the perception of the space and time in which we live. Or as Miroslav Akrapović wrote in his review of the album: "The End of an Era: a gripping solo debut that, despite its melancholic note, does not lack sincere passion. The intimate lyrical confession is always accompanied by a dramaturgically sophisticated soundtrack that not only underlines the lyrics but also draws the space in which they took place. Kühlschrank expertly blends his guitar acoustics with the 1990s music aesthetic that emerged at the intersection of the island's alternative indie rock and infamous Britpop."

Kühlschrank does not allow himself to be pigeonholed into a specific genre although he does not deny the strong influences of Britpop, the iconic Smiths and other giants of the British music scene such as Radiohead, Depeche Mode and David Bowie.

Selected by: Radio Terminal, the first Slovenian online radio station that presents new and urban music in an interactive way.

Photo: Žiga Lovšin