The beginning of the story of the band matches with the one of Zabranjeno Pušenje, in the 80's in Sarajevo, and the one of Dr. Nele Karajlić.
At the time of Do you remember Dolly Bell ?, Emir Kusturica met the members of the rock band. They became friends, and he started to play with them occasionally, to record an album, or for concerts, to change his mind during two shootings.
When Yugoslavia imploded in 1991, the musicians separated and the group stopped for a while. The members still in Bosnia relaunched the band in Sarajevo and made several new albums. Those who left to Serbia, among which Nele Karajlić and violin player Dejan Sparavalo made a new album, joined Emir Kusturica back, and took a new name for the band : the No Smoking Orchestra, literal translation of Zabranjeno Pušenje. Emir's son, Stribor Kusturica also joined the band to play the percussions.
During the shooting of his film Black Cat, White Cat, Emir Kusturica called regularly his friend Nele Karajlić to ask him to compose occasionally, a techno song, a gypsy tune, a folk melody… After a while, Nele asked him : ”but tell me, Emir, who writes the music of your film, anyway ? - Well, it's you !”.
Since then, the No Smoking Orchestra has also written the music for each film of the director. In return, he made a documentary on them : Super 8 Stories.
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Dr. Nele Karajlić Leader, singer, lyricist, composer | Emir Kusturica ”Monsieur Cinéma”, ”Professor“ bass player, then guitar player, composer | Stribor Kusturica Drums |
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Zoran Marjanović ”Čeda, the guru“ Percussions | Dejan Sparavalo ”Leopold”, ”the judge“ Violin, composer | Glava Markovski ”the Head“ Bass |
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Drazen Janković ”Her Dralle Draugentaller“ Keyboards (brother of Nele) | Zoki Milošević Accordion | Neša Petrović ”Blackbird“ Sax |
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Goran Popović ”The pope“ Tuba | Ivica Maskimović Guitar |
A previously unreleased track ”Lost in the supermarket”, composed for the film Strawberries in the supermaket is available on the CD of ATTAC, available on Amazon.fr
The band continues touring in 2012 :