On Friday night, Menza Pri Koritu, a grassroots barn-looking venue occupying a former military barrack, is chock-a-block. A six-piece band is getting ready to play while foreign visitors rub shoulders with each other. One of the three guitarists wears a flower-power shirt, a signpost to the psych-rock manoeuvres the six would undertake during the show.
The name of the band is Lufthansa, a reference to a notoriously unpunctual flight operator connecting the Western and Eastern sides of Europe.
Coming from North Macedonia, Lufthansa are soaked in influences from both sides. Still, their sound is exotic. The geographical location defines the status of Slovenia as a gate to Western Europe for the Balkan world.
It takes two hours to drive from Venice airport and not much longer from Vienna. From the East, Croatia and Hungary are the closest neighbours. Hence, the all-inclusive name of the festival refers to a Latin suffix that implies a quality or condition such as enjoyment or fulfilment. Both define the atmosphere of Ljubljana, with its warm hues, mild Mediterranean climate and lush greenery. With a few concrete blocks from the Socialist era, the city centre combines flamboyant Italian architecture and somewhat Nordic charm, echoing such distant places as Bath and Vilnius.
Yet, the festival venues are off-the-beaten-track. The brick building of the latter conceals a dark venue with a womb-of-a-whale vibe. A perfect place for an art residency, edgy electronic music and theatre of absurd performances. What seems to be an ad hoc psycho-folk experiment actually has a prearranged structure.
