19 Gadi Pirms Sākuma ‎– 19 Years Before The Beginning LP
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19 Gadi Pirms Sākuma ‎– 19 Years Before The Beginning LP

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“Sometimes our own creations surprised us,” says Inguna Rubene, flute player, guitarist, bassoonist and songwriter for 19 gadi pirms sākuma (19 Years Before the Beginning). Created with the idea of lasting for a single performance, 19 gadi pirms sākuma developed into one of the most delicate, intriguing groups in Latvia’s 1980s and early 1990s music scene.

Formed in 1988, the band arrived at a time when the Soviet Union was showing the first signs of unravelling. Latvia remained an occupied country, but experimental audio and visual events organised by a generation of young artists started to challenge the boundaries of what could be allowed.
19 gadi pirms sākuma started because we wanted to prepare a musical programme for an exhibition organised by Hardijs Lediņš, Juris Boiko [both from the band/performance collective NSRD] and other avant-garde artists at the Aizrobezu Art Museum [now the Art Museum of Riga Bourse]. It could have remained as a one-time musical project if it were not for two journalists from West Berlin who were at the exhibition,” Rubene reveals. “They asked for the band’s album, but there was none.”

From there the project quickly picked up momentum. The band: Inguna (vocal, flute, bassoon, rhythm guitar) Daiga Mazversite (Daiga Mazvērsīte) (synthesizer), Ilgvars Riskis (Ilgvars Rišķis) (percussion) and Viesturs Slava (keyboards, guitar, programming, vocal); improvised a studio in Riskis’ apartment and with the modest equipment available to them set about recording.

Much like their contemporaries and collaborators NSRD, 19 gadi pirms sākuma’s music captures frustration with their own reality, and a playful drive to make up a new one. “19 gadi pirms sākuma played a very different music from the one that was popular in Latvia and the Soviet Union then. The lyrics of our band are rich with unexpected characters and sometimes even absurd images,” says Inguna.
It was a very exciting time; we played and improvised a lot. Every artist in 19 gadi pirms sākuma put their own sense of freedom, power and energy into the songs.
In the years since that initial burst of life, 19 gadi pirms sākuma remained active. In 1990 their track Nakts ir mana zemapziņa was released on the Ienāc Ausīs compilation of underground Latvian music, the first record released in Latvia following its independence.

Tracklist

A1 Pāri Upei 4:08
A2 Aspekti 4:32
A3 Ruhig 3:49
A4 Niknie Zvēri 4:41
B1 Nakts Ir Mana Zemapziņa 3:37
B2 Singapūras Vējš 6:14
B3 Kurmja Deja 3:39
B4 Die Wilde Frau 3:24


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