A few months ago, I was recommended a band called Raze de Soare by my girlfriend, whose music I loved from the very first listen. They sound similar to older, oriental-pop bands from the Balkans, while also containing some jazzy elements. I later found out that their music belongs to a category called proto-manele, and that it was inspired by a popular Romanian band from the 90s: Albatros. Afterwards, I discovered a type of music unlike anything I had heard before—a band with an extraordinary repertoire, quite different from nowadays’ genres, as well as a revelation about how deeply music is influenced by the society in which it emerges.
Of course, I don’t expect many people outside of the Balkans to know what manele music is. The easy answer would be that they’re a genre of pop-folk music from Romania, but it’s a bit more complicated than that. There’s a huge diversity in subgenres and so it’s difficult to describe. If you really want to understand what this music is about, it would be ideal to simply listen to it. Today’s manele trace their roots back to the music of the 1950s, which emerged in Romani communities as a reaction to the preexisting lăutărească music (a genre sung by Romani musicians called lăutari). It was inspired by folk music, with elements of Turkish musical tradition, and sung at weddings, funerals and other social events by groups (tarafe) made out of instruments like the violin, lăută, nai, and accordion. Manele was similar, and contained lyrics describing idyllicized aspects of Romani life. Things changed drastically in the 1980s with the appearance of Banat-style manele, which combined manele elements with Serbian pop music. This is roughly where proto-manele came to be. In the words of Ion Dumitrescu, a member of Raze de Soare, proto-manele are “somewhere at the border between pop, folk, and oriental music. The kind of music your parents or grandparents would listen to at a wedding in the ’90s.”
Albatros was one of the first bands to perform this type of music. Curiosity got the better of me, so I started listening to more to see what a Balkan wedding from around the time of the ‘89 Revolution might have felt like. Albatros was among the first groups to move away from older manele models, which incorporated instruments like the cimbalom or accordion, instead using instruments borrowed from pop—like the electric organ, synthesizer, or electric guitar. The members of Albatros were teenagers, 17–18 years old, from Berceni (a neighbourhood of Bucharest), who used to play music with their friends in front of their apartment blocks. Within a few years, they became one of the biggest musical phenomena in Romania. They had no record label, so they sold their music at vegetable markets, similar to those our grandmothers used to take us after school for grocery shopping when we were kids.
For me, the most fascinating thing about Albatros is not the idea that my family could have been dancing to this music at 3 a.m. at some wedding 30 years ago, but rather the way in which society and socio-political and economic events influence music to such a great extent. Notably, today’s manele are about enemies, money and women. They’re the kind of music that is often played in the clubs me and my friends would go to during high school to party and hook up. Albatros’ songs tackle less common subjects, tied to ‘90s Romanian society. Their most popular songs belong to a musical category called cântece de cătanie (army songs), about how miserable it was to serve in the military. Songs like “S-a mărit armata”(The Army Got Bigger) , “În ziua liberării” (On the Day of Liberation), or “Hai liberare!” (Come, Liberation) all approach the same theme. Other interesting ones are “Bucharest, Bucharest”, about life in the city under capitalism, or “Este greu sa fii orfan” (How Hard It Is to Be an Orphan), whose title is quite self-explanatory.
These themes repeat so much because they represent the reality of that time. Music is perhaps one of the most faithful portraits of an era, and Albatros represents the perfect, rusty, faded picture of life in post-revolutionary Romania. The truth is, the transition from communism to capitalism caught people unprepared, and instead of prosperity, the first years after the revolution were extremely difficult for most. They were hit by an economic crisis and inflation, which pushed many into poverty. My dad once told me how his family had saved money to buy a Dacia car before the revolution and, after the crisis, all their savings weren’t enough to buy even a fridge. Many had to resort, at best, to buying items from Yugoslavia and reselling them in Romania or, at worst, to illegal activities.
Songs like “Bucharest, Bucharest” talk about this reality—a city full of wise-guys where the only way to adapt to the capitalist world and guarantee a decent living was through scams, or by going abroad to work.
Similarly, “How Hard It Is to Be an Orphan” refers to the reality of the 1990s, when orphanages in the country were absolutely miserable institutions. Children didn’t receive medicine, were malnourished or neglected, and many died just 2–3 years after arriving in an orphanage. On top of that, these institutions were hotbeds of HIV, due to frequent blood transfusions with unsterilized syringes, used as treatment for malnutrition.
Military service was also a universal experience for young men at the time. Useful for a few, but for many it was considered humiliating and pointless, full of hardships. Albatros songs feature young boys eagerly awaiting the day of “liberation” so they could return home, or girls waiting in train stations, scanning the soldiers to see if they could spot their boyfriend coming back from the army.
Music is a mirror of society. By listening to a few songs from Albatros, you get just as accurate an impression of life in those years as if you were reading a history book—because you come to understand the emotions, values, and feelings of the people who lived through those times, something an article or textbook could hardly convey. And this isn’t unique to Albatros—for years, artists have responded to socio-political realities through their art, from Picasso painting “Guernica” as a representation of the horrors of war in his hometown, to Billie Holiday singing about the civil rights movement. Is this an exaggerated comparison? Maybe not. Maybe I didn’t need to bring up a Romanian band that people listened to at weddings 30 years ago to talk about this subject, but honestly, Albatros deserves all the attention.Today, proto-manele is being revitalized by artists who add elements of funk, psychedelic, or electronic music, often under the Future Nuggets record label. Raze de Soare is one example, and one of the band members, Ion din Dorobanți, has participated in several such projects. Even though their music is only a tribute to Albatros, it’s still extraordinary. Plus, their only album has just four songs, so it’s a relatively easy listen.The final question remains: how does today’s music represent us? Whatever it is, it’s the mark we leave on the world—this music is who we are. At the very least, we can recognize that and appreciate it more.
Other posts that may interest you:
Discover more from The Sundial Press
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
