Coffeeshock Company from Austria, whose members are Burgenland Croats, is a music band of original, unique musical style called by band members themself, SuperSkunkRockReggae. Last year Coffeeshock Company won the first prize at the “Planet Festival Tour”, the largest band competition in Austria.

The band was founded in the 2010, and after almost 200 concerts had been played throughout Europe, in March 2013 it released his first album titled Augen Auf Und Durch. The first Band success came immediately after its establishment at the most famous international minorities song contest „LIET International 2011″ in Udine in Italy. With the song Fidlle Gusla in the Burgenland-Croatian language Coffeeshock Company won the first public award and second jury award. Previousely, at “SUNS Festival” in Switzerland, which is the qualifying festival for Liet Festival, Coffeeshock Company won the first award too.

The first prize at the “Planet Festival Tour” enabled the Coffeeshock Company participation in GoTV programme and to perform on Donauinsel Festival in Austria and the Sziget Festival in Hungary.

After Coffeeshock Company released its first album, the band held numerous concerts until the May of 2014. After a short break due the shooting at the Second Austrian TV program, the Band will continue playing concerts, so it will perform in Burgenland and in Romania. In late July 2014 Coffeeshock Company will play as coliner for Goran Bregovic on the Puppet Rock Festival in Plzeň in Czech Republic.

Members Of The Band

The band members are Manuel Bintinger vocals, guitar Rafael Stern, Nicholas Zeichmann bass, Filip Tyran keyboards and vocals, Andreas Karall drums, Marco Blascetta guitar and vocals.

Besides the original musical style, the Coffeeshock Company is also characteristic for performing in three different languages: Burgenland-Croatian, German and Italian. The musicians adopted Burgenland – Croatian as a first language along with German as members of the Burgenland Croats community, who came from Croatia and settled in Burgenland five hundred years ago and who for centuries have maintained their Croatian language and Croatian culture.

For Italian language the Coffeeshock Company thanks to his second singer and guitarist Marc Blascetti who is Molise Croats. Five hundred years ago Molise Croats, like Burgenland Croats, as refugees migrated to Italy to the region of Molise. Burgenland and Molise Croats have a long-term cooperation and cultural exchanges.

The Interview With Filip Tyran

In the middle of the June 2014 I conducted an interiew with Filip Tyran, keyboardist and vocalist of the band Coffeeshock Company tolking with him about this most original band, its music and its plans.

Filip Tyran: “We have been playing together for the last three years. We started as a Croatian reggae band singing in Burgenland-Croatian language, but a lots of that it has transformed in recent years, so we have created our absolutely own style called by ourselves super-skunk- rock- reggae. It is a mixture of several styles, like reggae, rock, punk, jazz and rap. We sing mainly in German, but of course, in our first languages too, the Burgenland-Croatian and Italian, because our second singer and guitarist, Mark Blascetti, is half Burgenland and half Molise Croats. Molise Croats like the Burgenland Croats, emigrated from Croatia and settled in the Italian region of Molise five hundert years ago. Mark Blascetti comes from the village Mundimitar in Italy, and for that reason we have some songs in Italian.”

Lovrinčević Jasna: “Why did you give the name Coffeeshock Company to your band ?”
Filip Tyran: “A few years ago the boys were in The Netherlands, where there are manny coffee shops, coffees … .They find that journey very nice. We are not a soft rock band, we do not make light pop music, we are honest enough and therefore quite shocking, and for that reason we are coffeeshock. We are company too, there are six of us and we are all good friends and so we have become Coffeeschok Company.

Lovrinčević Jasna: “Why reggae?”
Filip Tyran: ” All six of us, we have known each other since the early childhood. Some of us grew up together in Burgenland and here in Vienna and in some other places, so we knew each other well and we always played together a lot. However, each of us had used to have own musical projects before we decided to play together in our own band several years ago. But I have been the last who joined the band, and before my coming into the band, the boys already had been played together with different styles. Each of us had used to have his own band singing in Burgenland-Croatian language. The aim of our new band was to try something new in our community, but at the same time not to forget our own style or identity, to try to go in the new direction with new style and language. This project, which is quite nice and successfully developed, it merges very nicely with the popularity of this band. In fact in the last two years, since we had won the first prize at “SUNS Festival” in Switzerland , and the public award and second jury award at LIET Festival in Udine in Italy in the 2011th , we won the first prize 2013th , the biggest we have ever won, at the “Planet Festival Tour” in Vienna’s Gasometer. This was the biggest competition of bands in Austria among around 120 or 130 bands. We won the first prize, and just before that victory, last year we had released our first album Augen Auf Und Durch. Last year we had about forty to fifty concerts nationally and internationally, from Switzerland, the Sziget Festival in Budapest, northern Italy to Berlin and we played very much at home in Austria, in fact all over the country so that we could look forward to a light but very nice popularity.”

Lovrinčević Jasna: “You sing in German, Croatian and Italian. How does the audience accept it when you sing such a combination of languages? ”
Filip Tyran: “People always have accepted us very well, it means also in the places where they don’t understand us. It is not once happened, but manny times, especially Germans accepted us well even they do not understand Croatian. But for us, the language has been never an obstacle but, in fact, it is a testament of our authenticity on stage, which is always well accepted. We always receive a very good response concerning our concept and our authenticity. This means that our language, which is for some people a foreign language, but for us is our first language, it is not a obstacle to an audience but opposite, it is very interesting for the people in audience. Although I have to admit that we do not sing in Croatian language, 80 percent of our programme is in German so that people who speak the German language, they have a feeling about what we say, what we are talking about what we are actually singing. The lyrics are quite meaningful because our Mani Manuel Bintinger and Marco Blascetta have a lot to say socially, politically and emotionally so that people understand us. The lyrick written in Croatian sometimes we translate, we say what we sing, like in „Zvijezde“ and „Gusla“. The language has never been a problem, and I personally consider it as an added bonus.”

Lovrinčević Jasna: “Social themes leans on reggae tradition. Are you concerned with these issues, or is it just an inspiration for the songs? ”
Filip Tyran: “We have open eyes concering social and political problems and situations which are partly to be angry with it and partly simply to laugh to it. These are great inspirations because its deeply touch the person of artist, who, of course, then writes song lyrics about these situations from his anger, but of course only if we look at the world. Until now I personally have not written songs for this band so I am not engaged in that league, but I know the guys and how they think. They walk through the world with open eyes and all what make them happy and what it bothers them, they “chew” it and it comes back like a song. ”

Lovrinčević Jasna: “How has been created the song „Gusla“ („Fiddle“)?”
Filip Tyran “Gusla has been destroyed“ , it seems to me, it was the first song of Coffeeschock Company. It is actually a folk song. If you know Croatian folk music in Burgenland, you know it is under the influence of Hungarian folk music. Gusla is a classic example. It is actually a folk song. It had used to be for long time the Hungarian song, than it has become for long time folk song of Burgenland. Mali has taken it as refren and has made it suitable to our language, it means, he has connected it into lyrics. We have combined our super-skunk-rock-reggae with very Burgenland-old Croatian song. ”

Lovrincevic Jasna: “How was created the super-skunk-rock-reggae?”
Filip Tyran: “Super-skunk-rock-reggae is our product. Absolutelly original because all of us are musicians who had been engaged with rock music, but actually we came from various music directions. We do not have one direction (in music) in which we walk, and we have our directions in which we walk, but that (music) consists of multiple ingredients. When we all six of us work together, we always produce music. One writes a song, actually two of us. A new song will be born in its form when we work together, produce or arrange in the studio. So we have formed a completely new style consists of six different styles of the six different, musicians and individualists, but who are very well assembled into a collective, and the new style we call super-skunk-rock-reggae. Let ‘s say that is completly new creation, because, what I know no one has mixed like that till now. I don’t know that someone has thrown a rock elements into reggae and than again very funky, than rep has torn into that and than by piano dissected the chords . It has not been conceptually composed really like that, that springs from us and that style has been found, in fact that mixture, and this is the way we walk. “