LAIBACH: MUSICK : ENCORE By Editorial Staff 14 October 2026 In Audimix, Electronic / Avant-Garde Reading time: 4 minutes Although Laibach were founded at the beginning of the glorious 1980s, the band that emerged from Yugoslavia are anything but a typical ’80s outfit. Forget bright colours and pop: Laibach are more synonymous with dark sounds, conceptual art and the exploration of musical boundaries. Not that they necessarily have a problem with pop music - after all, in 1987 they released a cover of Opus’s smash hit “Live Is Life”. Their version, however, was decidedly sinister and marched along in an almost military fashion. On their latest release, *Musick : Encore*, which features previously unreleased material from the original *Musick* sessions, they move considerably closer to pop. This is primarily down to the remixes by acclaimed artists such as Silverwingkiller, Richard X and Punchbag. The surface is therefore accessible and catchy, but underneath it still seethes in unmistakably Laibach fashion. The distinctive vocals stand out in particular, even when female singers join them on some tracks. Indeed, several Slovenian guest appearances here make you sit up and take notice. These include Manca Trampuš, frontwoman of the Slovenian indie band Koala Voice. Guest vocals from Bojan Cvjetićanin, lead singer of the Slovenian band Joker Out, give a song like “Faith No More” an additional dimension and a fascinating anthemic texture. *Musick : Encore* still possesses Laibach’s characteristic martial quality, but also an almost unfamiliar and often surprising melodiousness. Ultimately, Laibach remain impossible to pin down completely, and that is precisely what makes this band so exceptional. No one navigates industrial, electronica, synth, techno, EBM and post-punk with quite the assurance and style of Laibach.

Proud to be the Mastering Engineer on this album and songs

# It's Time to Write the Right Songs: Laibach Deconstruct Music at Fléda Petr Fejtek | Text and Photography Published: October 20, 2026 Children of the algorithm, welcome to a Laibach concert. This is not entertainment. The Slovenian group holds up a depressing mirror to contemporary society through the catchiest of beats. Their show, built around the album MUSICK, sends chills down your spine. Slavoj Žižek calls it “overidentification.” His Slovenian compatriots Laibach employ totalitarian and fascist symbolism in such a hyperbolic manner that they expose the absurdity and sinister ideologies of these regimes. While they devoted the first 40 years of their career to criticising totalitarianism, their latest album, MUSICK, shifts its focus to the present day. Yet, in the band's eyes, very little has actually changed. On the album, they dissect the contemporary perception of music. They criticise how music is becoming a consumer product and losing its artistic value. The title track is full of meaningless, worn-out phrases: “Music, the key; music, the answer.” Music becomes hollow. It transforms into a simulacrum – referring only to itself. The lyrics also criticise the constant pressure to churn out more and more new songs. The “right songs.” All of this is wrapped in incredibly catchy synth-driven pop. The entire album borrows elements from contemporary popular music, ranging from electropop and country to Latin pop. Laibach use the enemy's own weapons to make their point. The result is extremely catchy, especially live. Laibach arrived at Fléda with three synthesisers, two dancers, and an enormous screen constantly glowing with neon lights and displaying robotic iconography or silly social-media reels. It's a full-on dance party. The very first song, Musick, builds for several minutes through infectious beats and the dance routines of the two performers. The dancers barely stop moving for a moment. During the suggestively titled Fluid Emancipation, which criticises the hedonism of club culture, they perform erotic movements that further emphasise the satirical nature of this addictive song. When the annoyingly catchy Allgorhythm arrives, the dancers teach the audience a few simple moves so that everyone is prepared when the chorus kicks in. When singer Milan Fras shouts “All go rhythm!”, it becomes impossible not to move. We are slaves to rhythm, just as we are slaves to algorithms, as Laibach repeatedly remind us throughout the concert. "Some people go kung fu fighting Some people go Bitcoin mining Some nations go dynamiting We like to do some crazy rhyming" — Allgorhythm The album is not merely a critique of music; that is only its overarching framework. Laibach also take aim at corporations, social media, consumerist pop culture, and artificial intelligence and its growing influence on art. They coat it all in a catchy, pink gloss, contrasting sharply with Milan Fras's deep, calm baritone. It is Fras who provides the strongest indication that something is seriously wrong. His presence onstage is intimidating and authoritative, reinforced by his pink military-style uniform. He never smiles during the concert. He does not acknowledge the applause. All this electropop brings him no joy. He is not here to have fun. He is here to warn us. #Neon Depression At the beginning of the concert, Laibach declare: “This is not entertainment.” At first, it sounds like a humorous exaggeration. But the moment the audience realises that Laibach are serious, a chill runs down the spine. Resistencia is a laid-back Latin American-style song, sung in Spanish. Yet throughout the performance, its translation is projected behind the band. Anyone who does not understand Spanish suddenly realises that the lyrics deliver a harsh warning about the rise of artificial intelligence – although resistance is futile. When Fras calmly sings the chorus with the repeated phrase “Guerra relámpago”, which can only be translated as “blitzkrieg”, the audience is left wondering whether the song is being sung from the perspective of a fascist regime, a technology corporation, or Skynet. Laibach see no distinction between them. In their view, we already live under totalitarianism, whether it is the totalitarianism of the hammer and sickle or that of the algorithm. A sense of hopelessness permeates the entire concert. Laibach ask whether, in fact, we might actually want all of this ourselves. We created AI. We feed the algorithm. We consume empty music that is becoming a copy of a copy. This point is illustrated most clearly by Singularity, whose chorus complains that every song is a cover version or a remake. Fras sings it against the backdrop of Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik. Meanwhile, the dancers perform Fortnite dance moves, partly dressed in traditional German costumes. Laibach's metaphors are not complicated. Quite the opposite. The point is to make their message understandable to everyone. Because the entire concert is about the message itself. That is why almost the entire setlist consists of material from MUSICK and its as-yet-unreleased successor, MUSICK: ENCORE. The purpose is not to play the hits. Those are given attention only during a fifteen-minute musical collage in the middle of the set. The purpose is to deliver a warning. And we certainly have been warned. At the end of the main set, during Das göttliche Kind, a contorted, alien-looking dancer slowly leaves the stage. She represents the artificial intelligence we have created. She moves slowly, the last to leave. The audience is left with nothing but despair. Fortunately, the encore restores a little hope. First, Laibach bring out their cover of Make Your Own Kind of Music. This slow, melancholic reinterpretation of a sentimental pop song takes on an entirely different meaning in the context of the concert. It now becomes an urgent appeal. The fact that music is turning into a consumer product and a simulacrum does not mean that we have to accept it. Laibach encourage us to create our own music. Not so that someone else will listen to it, but for the sake of our own artistic expression. The concert finally closes with the as-yet-unreleased Faith No More. In this song, Laibach summarise everything they have been trying to tell us over the preceding hour and a half, while also addressing the question on everyone's mind: “Is it already too late?” “No,” Laibach reply. "Switch off indifference and reshape your fate" — Faith No More

You guys are amazing

Laibach's history provides enough material for every new element of their stage presentation to be interpreted as a commentary on power, collectivism, and obedience. MUSICK transfers this vocabulary into an environment saturated with music, advertising, and AI-generated content. This was also the case on October 16 at Zagreb's Boogaloo venue (formerly Moša Pijade). On October 16, Laibach presented their latest album, MUSICK, at Zagreb's Boogaloo. With this release, the band returned, for the first time since 2014's Spectre, to music conceived as an independent work rather than as a soundtrack for a film, theatre production, or another project. Consequently, the concert on their current tour followed an inverted approach: a show was created around the music from the album and its follow-up, MUSICK: Encore, featuring remixes and new songs, which were also performed at Boogaloo. That album is scheduled for release on November 20. And this is where the past and future converged. The future is Encore, while the past is represented by a return to the scene of not one but two "crimes" committed in the early 1980s, when the venue was simply known as Moša and formed part of the Moša Pijade Workers' People's University. The performance Mi kujemo bodočnost (We Forge the Future), held on April 23, 1983, as part of the 12th Music Biennale Zagreb, was conceived as an all-night programme, running approximately from midnight until five in the morning. Alongside Laibach, the programme featured the British groups 23 Skidoo and Last Few Days. The scandal arose from the combination of images and sound. Laibach appeared in military uniforms bearing black crosses, accompanied by industrial music and multimedia projections. Twelve monitors and a projection screen displayed experimental video material, Milan Ljubić's 1971 documentary The Revolution Is Still Going On, and simultaneous pornographic imagery. During the performance, the militia and military police arrived. Laibach's members did not immediately leave the stage, continuing to play even after the main sound system had been switched off. The concert was soon brought to an end. It was precisely this juxtaposition that made the performance politically explosive: images of workers, factories, and state celebrations were placed alongside scenes that undermined the official, disciplined image of society. This is one interpretation of the performance, but it corresponds with the band's own explanation that they wanted to present an experimental programme at a contemporary music festival, without separating the music from its political and visual content. In fact, they were doing exactly what they do today, only in a different way. The concert became an important episode in a broader conflict and was soon followed by a ban on the band's activities under the name Laibach. Condemnations and a media witch-hunt followed. Laibach had already been involved in an incident at the same venue on December 11, 1982. On that occasion, the band performed at the YURM festival, dressed in military uniforms and using smoke bombs smuggled out of the army. One exploded prematurely, injuring an assistant and prompting the arrival of an ambulance and military officials. That concert was called Touch of Evil and marked the final performance of Laibach's first vocalist, Tomaž Hostnik, with the band. In the intervening years, Laibach have performed at Boogaloo at least three times, and among the approximately one thousand visitors at this concert were some who had attended those performances 43 and 44 years earlier.

Before the show, the audience was prepared for what was to come by a monotonous, repetitive industrial loop with a dance-oriented structure, accompanied by a neon-pink Laibach logo in the background. The concert opened with a synthetic voice greeting the audience, its words simultaneously appearing on the screen behind the stage. The voice then changed register, announcing: "This is an interface. Behaviour is being monitored, and the concert simulates authority and discipline. Participation is mandatory, enjoyment is optional." The voice instructed the audience to remain calm, explaining that their attention was being monitored, their reactions analysed, and that resistance was futile. In this way, the audience became an integral part of the performance. It was a brief instruction manual for interpreting the entire project: the visitors were not merely standing in front of the stage; they had already been incorporated into the spectacle itself. Such an introduction changes the significance of the pop music that follows. MUSICK employs choruses, electronic gloss, and rhythms that numb the discomfort just articulated on the screen. Laibach places that unease within a musical form that can appear light and appealing. This is precisely why the message about algorithms, surveillance, and behaviour does not remain confined to the album booklet: it becomes part of the very way the concert is performed. In fact, the screen at the back of the stage functions as an active performer. Between songs, fabricated reviews attributed to celebrities appear – the funniest being one supposedly from Bono Vox: "I don't understand what this is all about." There are also AI-generated conversations with young people praising Laibach, and advertisements for the band's merchandise presented in the style of intrusive TikTok content. The screen imitates precisely the endless stream of content that normally accompanies the audience in their pockets, except that here the exaggeration is impossible to ignore. This time, Donna Marina Mårtensson is absent from the live line-up, although she appears on the screen as a digital singer during one song, as does Mina Špiler, who previously performed live with Laibach. Nevertheless, the performance was not without a female presence. Patricija Crnkovič and Tjaša Bucik are striking dancers who occasionally also took on backing-vocal duties. They even taught the audience the moves they would later perform together during the hit "Allgorhythm". Other digital appearances featured guests from the album: Wiyaala on "Musick" and "Allgorhythm", Senidah on "Love Machine" (an excellent reference to Kraftwerk), and Manca Trampuš on "Keep It Reel" and "Modern Talking". Mina Špiler also appeared on screen during "Love on the Beat" and "Bossanova", as did Bojan Cvjetićanin, the singer of Joker Out, who performed the as-yet-unreleased song "Faith No More". The voice and image could be present, while the body remained somewhere else entirely. In a world where music is increasingly encountered through screens, this is no longer merely a technical solution but part of the concert's artistic presentation. On the other hand, during the performance of "Singularity", the band's technicians came onto the stage and danced alongside the musicians and dancers. At the end of the show, the screen displayed closing credits listing the people onstage and behind the scenes, a standard feature at the end of Laibach concerts. The system that had treated the audience as data throughout the evening finally paused to acknowledge the names of those who had created it. This was not a sentimental gesture but a reminder that the illusion of AI-driven dehumanisation still has human authors, performers, and technicians, even when they share their place in the performance with digital images. Laibach's history provides enough material for every new element of their stage presentation to be interpreted as a commentary on power, collectivism, and obedience. MUSICK transfers this vocabulary into an environment saturated with music, advertising, and generated content. A chorus may be infectious, a dance instruction may be amusing, and an advertisement sufficiently absurd, but the question remains: who shapes our attention, and at what point does the audience stop following the rhythm and start following orders? This tension lies at the heart of Laibach's performance. The audience is simultaneously spectator, participant, and subject of the scenes unfolding before it. When a synthetic voice demands discipline and the screen offers a new image every few moments, the concert does not need to explain algorithmic culture: it is enough to stage it in a space normally devoted to the collective experience of listening to music. In fact, Laibach's performance was worthy of a mass gymnastic rally in honour of Comrade Tito. All that was missing was the relay baton.

LAIBACH: THE INDUSTRIAL RHYTHM OF A DOCUMENTARY ABOUT A WORLD THAT HAS LOST ITS COMPASS Published: October 17, 2026, 13:04 Concert date:October 16, 2026 Venue: Boogaloo, Zagreb Laibach's concert was not merely a musical event, but an experience in which sound, imagery, movement, and provocation merged into an unusual, almost cinematic whole. Throughout the hour-and-a-half performance at Boogaloo, powerful electronic and industrial sounds alternated with striking audiovisual content and stage scenes that simultaneously captured the audience's attention and provoked thought. Laibach: The Industrial Rhythm of a Documentary About a World That Has Lost Its Compass Personally, I found the concert excellent and quite extraordinary, primarily because I felt as though I were watching an unusual documentary about the world we live in, while gently dancing along to its rhythm. The occasion for this concert was the album MUSICK, Laibach's first full-length studio release featuring new original material since *Spectre* in 2014. Released on May 1, 2026, through the British record label Mute, the album simultaneously plays with pop music and critically examines the contemporary era, shaped by artificial intelligence, distorted reality, and the increasingly blurred boundary between the authentic and the artificially produced. In doing so, Laibach does not abandon irony and provocation but incorporates them into music that combines the infectious appeal of pop with the band's distinctive industrial aesthetic. Sound itself was one of the concert's most striking elements. Powerful, loud, electronic, and industrial, it created an atmosphere that made it impossible for the performance to become mere background music. Everything seemed meticulously crafted, from the soundscape to the visual presentation, together creating the impression that we were witnessing not just a concert, but also a kind of commentary on reality. It was as though a documentary about the times we live in were unfolding before the audience, except that its narrative was conveyed not through narration and conventional storytelling, but through music, images, and movement. Within this overall production, the performance of the two dancers stood out in particular. Their presence was not merely a theatrical addition but a way of extending the story into the space in front of the stage. They engaged the audience, teaching them specific movements and introducing an unexpected sense of spontaneity into an otherwise meticulously structured and controlled performance. This combination of industrial coldness and playful audience participation gave the concert an additional dimension. With such powerful sound, it was possible to surrender to the rhythm while simultaneously observing everything happening onstage and around it. Provocation, of course, remained an important part of Laibach's identity. Here, however, it did not appear to be an end in itself, but rather part of a broader picture of the contemporary world, in which reality increasingly becomes a spectacle and the boundaries between the real, the artificial, and the simulated grow ever more indistinct. *MUSICK* addresses precisely this territory through pop music that simultaneously attracts and questions, entertains and provokes. Laibach does not need to explain every message to its audience; it is enough to create an atmosphere in which the music and stage imagery continue to resonate in the mind long after the concert has ended. The audience responded to the performance with great enthusiasm, and the ninety minutes unfolded in a combination of intense sound, visual spectacle, and occasional audience participation in the stage action. Yet what remained most important to me personally was not simply the volume, the industrial power, or the provocative nature of the performance, but the feeling that I was both a spectator and a participant. I was watching something resembling a documentary about a world that had become somewhat unreal, while at the same time, almost imperceptibly, surrendering to its rhythm. "And that is precisely what makes Laibach special." Their concert can be experienced as a musical spectacle, a theatrical performance, or a commentary on society, but it works best when all these dimensions come together. Onstage, *MUSICK* becomes more than a collection of songs: it transforms into an audiovisual experience that simultaneously stimulates thought and movement. And when, after ninety minutes, you leave with the feeling that you have watched an unusual documentary while also having a great time dancing, it is clear that you have experienced a concert that cannot easily be fitted into conventional categories.

Odlicni

A Pop Circus in Algorithmic Hell All of them are clearly having a great time – albeit, naturally, with characteristic Laibachian sarcasm – commenting on the perversions of politics, society and popular culture in which today's world is drowning. It is difficult to single out the funniest examples, but let's proceed in order. First, we are loosened up by the Daft Punk-like new-age funk romp Fluid Emancipation, before Resistencia thrusts us into a combative mood – a track we might describe as Bad Bunny's Super Bowl performance taking place in the hell of the post-industrial revolution. On both tracks, Luka Jamnik shines with vocals processed through a vocoder. There is also the striking single Love Machine, featuring Senidah, whom Laibach elevates to the throne of a soul diva, and the song flows naturally into #Us. Later, it is joined by Modern Talking and Yes Maybe No – tracks that use paraphrases of pop-cultural icons to comment on the (s)exploitation of the female body in popular culture and society. #MeToo, U2, B2, R2-D2, Winnetou: it is this enumeration that finally loosens up the bewildered Zagreb audience. And then there is Luigi Mangione – remember, the guy who killed the head of a private health insurance company – who, in Laibach's delta-blues interpretation, becomes the protagonist of a revolution, both far-left and far-right, spilling out of the algorithm and onto the streets. In a world where algorithms govern reality, it is hardly surprising that the central piece of this L-pop anti-fairy tale is Allgorhythm. It is preceded by a bizarre demonstration of the accompanying dance steps. Having witnessed it last night, we cannot emphasise enough what an opportunity Slovenia missed to stage an act of subversion at Eurovision. Its counterpart is Singularity, an audacious reworking of Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik into something resembling a children's birthday-party counting rhyme, complete with Kraftwerk-style visual stylisations of the musicians, who perform it on instruments of the kind babies get their hands on before they even reach kindergarten age. Catharsis Finally Arrives in the Encore At the beginning, the robotic female voice informed us that there would be neither resolution nor catharsis. Yet after spending an hour and a half vividly demonstrating that pop music has become so absurd that only Laibach's perverse intervention can keep it alive, a resolution – catharsis, call it what you will – finally arrives during the encore. It opens with Make Your Own Kind of Music, a timeless classic more than half a century old, originally by the New York trio The Will-O-Bees and best known in the version sung by Mama Cass Elliott of The Mamas & the Papas. Its warmth suddenly resets the previously sarcastic and oracular perspective on the state of civilisation, transporting us back to a time when pop music enriched the world around us. But the true catharsis comes with Faith No More, a ballad from the second, as-yet-unreleased instalment of the Musickalbum, vocally enriched by Slovenia's biggest young pop idol, Bojan Cvjetićanin of Joker Out. The chorus first evokes a future marked by noise and fear, before calling for an end to the vicious cycle and a return to individual choice: This is the future that we once began If you could change it, would you try again We're chasing shadows and we're drawing near Consumed by noise, overwhelmed by fear Let's break the cycle, let's raise our voice, reclaim the rhythm and unleash the choice, before we lose it all, before it's too late, switch off indifference and shape our faith. "What will remain after all this? Of music, probably the Rolling Stones. And perhaps Laibach too," one of the four wise men who make up Laibach's original quadrant – Eber–Saliger–Dachauer–Keller – told us in the aforementioned interview. But he did not tell us that it would be Laibach themselves who would save pop music. That was something we had to absorb for ourselves last night, as these humble pop musicians seduced us with melodies, answered all our questions without questioning our demands, and ultimately – saved our souls. The time of pop music may have run out, but Laibach exists beyond time. They are time.

They Once Drew Penises on Tito, but Last Night Laibach Saved Pop Music Bojan Stilin October 17, 2026, 1:00 PM tportal.hr The final concert of the current leg of the European tour by Slovenian avant-garde music giants Laibach, held at the less-than-full Boogaloo club, could hardly have pleased those who grew up with the band. Yet this audiovisual anti-fairy tale told us so much about the world around us and – accidentally or deliberately – saved pop music from itself. We are no ordinary type of group We are no humble pop musicians We don't seduce with melodies And we are not here to please you We have no answers to your questions Yet we can question your demands We don't intend to save your souls Suspense is our device We are time (Laibach, WAT, 2003) Twenty-three years – roughly half of their existence – have passed since Laibach, the musical wing of the Slovenian art collective Neue Slowenische Kunst, delivered these lines in their programmatic track WAT, words that still sound like a manifesto today. Twenty-three years later, that very same Laibach, an entity that has encompassed every imaginable and unimaginable perspective on popular culture over nearly half a century of activity, is literally trampling over its own manifesto and stepping into the shoes of the saviour of our souls – or, more precisely, the saviour of popular music from itself. For we have reached such apocalyptic times that, in the spectacularly staged two-hour performance we witnessed last night at Boogaloo, Laibach meticulously purifies pop music with filigree precision, reducing it to the level of a rough diamond. In a multi-genre spectacle combining comedy, tragedy and the farce of life in 2026, Laibach, dressed in highly stylised magenta suits and bathed in fluorescent lighting, becomes precisely that humble pop musician who seduces us with melodies and conceals within them the answers to all our questions. Because when you ask them – as we did in an interview a few months ago – why anyone, in an age dominated by algorithms that govern the entire world, including popular music, should become attached to the dystopian L-pop they have served up on their latest album, Musick, the answer is unmistakably Laibachian: "Because with us, pop is never just ordinary pop. There is always another layer, a little catch that opens up additional content, and sometimes even an additional atmosphere." It was precisely that little catch we grabbed hold of last night, pushed it, and opened the door to a world in which pop music – that artefact of the old world, the first to be swallowed by the AI revolution – still makes sense. The concert begins with twenty minutes of brutal techno pounding, intended to prepare us for the audiovisual pop terrorism that will test the limits of our tolerance over the following two hours. Then, in a font reminiscent of the ZX Spectrum, the text of an introductory speech appears, delivered by a robotic female narrator with the assimilating authority of the Borg. "It is OK to feel uncomfortable – we are Laibach." The message that it is acceptable to feel uneasy is supposed, after twenty minutes of military marching, to dispel the anguish of the militarised world that Laibach has been successfully mocking for nearly half a century. Then there is the discomfort caused by the seemingly shallow pop music, which the opening track Musick will immediately provoke among the old goths – those who saw Laibach in this very club back when images of Tito were still being mixed with pornography on the projection screen. Laibach swiftly transforms Shakespeare's idea from Twelfth Night of music as the food of love into a chorus about being sick of music, while Milan Fras, Laibach's charismatic figurehead whose face still defies the burden of passing years, concludes the song with a tortured grimace and a shout: "Music makes me sick – reeeeeal sick!" Listening to Musick, I became convinced that Laibach had spent a long time contemplating what to do with themselves and their music after covering everything from chamber classical music to brutal industrial over their 45-year career, before concluding that, above all, they had simply had enough – of their own music. The crowd from Zagreb's legendary Jabuka club, raised on the old Laibach, therefore had little reason to celebrate last night. In the best-of medley roughly halfway through the concert, they could recognise only fragments of Tanz mit Laibach, Whistleblowers, Leben Heisst Leben and Eine Weisung, while the only older track performed in full was Bossanova, from the 2014 album Spectre. Everything else was new material, occasionally interrupted by cover versions and incorporated into a video-game-inspired production whose principal performer was the projection screen itself. Across it paraded a carefully selected crème de la crème of Slovenian and international popular music. In front of it stood a band composed of some of Slovenia's finest session musicians, in a formation most reminiscent of Laibach's NATO era, while the pop circus was completed by the striking and playful dance choreography of Patricija Crnkovič and Tjaša Bucik. Thus, Laibach's current line-up carries not only a global dimension but also a strong local context: it showcases contemporary Slovenian talent on stages around the world.

Kad su Laibach crtali penise po Titu?!? Koja glupost glupa!

**Laibach Provoked Again in Brno, but This Time with a Pink Twist – HELLMAGAZINE** 15 October 2026, Fléda, Brno **LAIBACH – Musick Tour 2026** How many times have I seen Laibach? I’ve lost count, but this was the first concert I would unhesitatingly describe as completely different. Dancers with lights, masks and helmets, Milan Fras falling from a building, and even Winnetou made an appearance. That’s yesterday’s Brno stop in a nutshell. But let’s take a closer look. Laibach always perform alone, without support acts, so I’ll get straight to the point too. Both the setlist and the entire show took us on a thoroughly pink ride. The concert consisted mainly of songs from the new album. Musick, Love Machine, Keep It Reel, Algorhythm and Singularity occasionally gave way to proven favourites such as Love on the Beat. During Tanz mit Laibach, which was slightly shortened, an intriguing instrumental interlude led into the remainder of the song. The selection also included tracks such as Bossanova, where we had a chance to enjoy Miňa’s performance too - even if only on screen. For the most part, the female vocals now came solely from the projections, but the band were in excellent form, and there was even some serious warming up on stage… or should I say working out?! I did miss the old classics in the setlist, but perhaps it’s time for a change. I’m not sure whether the “old fans”, of whom there were quite a few in the audience, understood everything happening on stage. In fact, I’m not even sure I know what to make of it all myself. It was pure irony, occasionally humour, but above all a sharp critique of algorithmic living and being. The fact remains, however, that Laibach are becoming synonymous with a critical yet intensely artistic current within 21st-century pop culture - and you can take that to mean whatever suits you. The dramaturgy of the entire concert was meticulously worked out, down to the smallest detail. Today, Laibach are no longer simply one of the bands within a particular genre. Laibach are a genre unto themselves. They have built an enormous art-making machine around themselves - and the art it produces is thoroughly contemporary. They no longer merely criticise regimes or dictators, or provoke with uniforms. Today, they play with colours and wordplay, holding up a mirror to us all. Are we slaves to the times? Are we? Probably yes. Social media have become something more than just a channel of communication or a tool for sharing content - they have become almost a religion, something we seemingly cannot exist without. We submit to trends and algorithms without even realising it. Their new album Musick addresses this too. The entire show kept provoking us - after all, it would hardly be Laibach if it didn’t - but in a completely different way from before. And it’s wonderful that someone is still doing things differently without looking like a copy. And what was I yesterday? A metalhead at a disco? An industrial one, perhaps. Maybe a little, but who am I to pigeonhole anyone? At the end, a loud “bravo” rang out from the crowd - and what more could musicians wish for at the end of a performance? Another night to remember with Laibach!

**Dangerous Soldiers Dance Discofox: Laibach Plunges Huxleys into Fever Dreams** *The controversial Slovenian band invites Berliners to take part in a mass experiment combining the Eurovision Song Contest with totalitarian spectacle.* Patricia Hempel 14 October 2026 Acoustic torture uses sound and music deliberately to wear people down psychologically and physically. The Slovenian avant-garde collective Laibach simulates precisely this during the twenty minutes before its concert begins at Huxleys Neue Welt: you are trapped in an endless industrial loop reminiscent of soldiers marching in lockstep. Every three seconds, the cry “Laibach” rings out. It is unbearable, yet somehow you still want to dance to this recorded parade loop. Why, exactly? Everyone is on tenterhooks, ready for Laibach’s totalitarian takeover. The seasoned fan knows what the next ninety minutes ought to bring: musical proclamations from singer Milan Fras in his miner’s outfit, provocative Nazi metaphors, and the martial industrial sound that once inspired Rammstein and keeps dictatorship in check on the dance floor. But with the new album *Musick*, everything turns out differently. Coming twelve years after *Spectre*, following a near-hiatus, this is a long-awaited studio album of original songs. Its producers include Richard X, who has also worked with Goldfrapp, New Order and Sugababes. Those Laibach fans warming up outside the convenience store next door, listening to the old records on a boombox, will be especially likely to call it the worst concert ever. Or perhaps a fetishised fever-dream version of the Eurovision Song Contest — but certainly well below Laibach’s usual standard. **If you expect a concert, you have only yourself to blame** In its defence, one could say that the evening was not intended as a concert, but as a strobe-lit spectacle of carefully devised conceptual art. At the heart of the show is a screen in perpetual ventricular fibrillation, overloading the senses with images: old Nintendo and Atari aesthetics collide with the sexist MTV style of the 2000s and the overwhelming optimisation loop we constantly inhabit as we scroll through social media like zombies. In an ingenious solution, women involved in the *Musick* album also appear there: Ghanaian women’s rights activist and artist Wiyaala, Slovenian-Montenegrin singer Senidah, Manca Trampuš, and longstanding Laibach collaborator Donna Marina Mårtensson. It is as though they are joining remotely. At the same time, the uncompromising lyrics lay bare our present reality as brutally as possible. The opening title track, “Musick”, already packs a punch. It picks up the relentless barrage of sound from the beginning and transforms it into something tolerably danceable. “Music” means music itself; “sick” means illness. Music as addiction and oversupply. Something that, commercially speaking, stopped making us happy long ago and instead floods us with stimuli. And that is only one of the many underlying themes explored over the next hour. The album cover’s image of a heroin syringe above an arm tattooed with the Laibach name suddenly explains itself. The prerecorded AI voice at the beginning and end also makes clear that we are all slaves to algorithms shaped by the masses and by our own clicks, as the song “Allgorhythm” suggests. You are not supposed to feel comfortable at this “concert”: resistance is futile. Everything is recorded and tracked. In “Musick”, music is described as the key, salvation and the answer. But also as the actual battlefield. The place where mass control becomes almost inaudible, though impossible to overlook. Music is both power and a nightmare of mass hypnosis. “All-go-rhythm”: every sheep hears and believes what the next sheep hears and believes. Fittingly, the song “Luigi Mangione” addresses the media’s processing of the alleged gunman accused of shooting the CEO of a US health insurance company in 2024. Hero or villain? The song merely spits out keywords and names the villains of our age: TikTok, Facebook, Zoom, Teams, mobile phones, CCTV, demonstrators for and against, face masks and conspiracy cranks. Songs such as “Keep it Reel” likewise take aim at fake news and mass disinformation. Between songs, Milan Fras repeatedly leaves the stage, allowing the collective, the screen and the dancers to exert their effect. Dressed variously as nurses, as male-gaze dominatrices made flesh in bunny masks, or in Bavarian lederhosen, the dancers encourage the audience to join the dancing onstage. It is disconcerting, but it works. Ultimately, this is not about intimacy, but about what prevents us from experiencing it. **Behind the “concert” lies an experiment** Is Laibach interested in pushing genres into overdrive? Or is the band, which has spent decades dissecting authoritarian iconography down to its smallest details, now discovering pop music in order to use its catchiness as an instrument of seduction? What probably very few people in the audience realise is that the whole thing is a progressive experiment, and that they themselves, as attendees, become the most important element in its outcome. While the diehard fan is still annoyed at being trapped in this restless jumble of industrial, Eurodance, electronic pop, K-pop and J-pop, they have already become part of an experiment unfolding in real time. Because halfway through, the supposed concert simply stops. The dancers have the audience learn a dance to reconnect with themselves. At first, this does not work particularly well — certainly not in Berlin. But sure enough: the more people allow themselves to be drawn into the choreography, the more others join in. The proposition that anyone dancing in time is demonstrating obedience and has already capitulated ultimately proves correct. A fifteen-minute techno excursion, which sends the Eurovision Song Contest drifting into the confines of Berghain, likewise seeks to demonstrate how beats and bass directly synchronise our bodies and, with them, our consciousness. **But the evening’s anthem is “Singularity”** The evening’s anthem, right at the end, is “Singularity”. “It’s a world of echoes we can’t break,” the lyrics tell us. Laibach presents a world in which we no longer know whether we are hearing our own convictions or merely the echo of whatever we are supposed to have drilled into us according to plan. What makes this evening rewarding is that the Laibach collective, founded in 1980 in the mining town of Trbovlje, develops its established association with scandal further and chooses a contemporary form of storytelling. Scandals are no longer provoked quite so forcefully through the technique of overidentification. The exhausted Nazi metaphors, the band name Laibach itself, and Malevich’s black cross as the band’s emblem remain part of the show, but have long since ceased to be its actual purpose. Their scandalous concert in North Korea, the cancelled performance in Ukraine, the earlier provocation of juxtaposing Tito with pornographic images — all history. Laibach has not entirely abandoned its strategy of overidentification, however; it has merely changed its object. Where it once appropriated the aesthetics and rhetoric of totalitarian state apparatuses, today it absorbs the entertainment industry, complete with its techniques of mass hypnosis. The audience is still free to decide whether it is witnessing a glorification or a dismantling of power. Only now, if Laibach is to be believed, that power no longer arrives solely in jackbooted lockstep, but in the form of damn good beats.

In Berlin wir tanzen mit Kommunismus…

**Laibach: Pop is the greatest fraud, and we just want to be part of that winning machine** For more than four decades, Slovenian avant-garde collective Laibach have been provoking, deconstructing and holding a mirror up to society. Their latest move has managed to confuse even those who thought they had seen absolutely everything from them. With their new album MUSICK, Laibach have plunged into the European pop mainstream. They have added neon colours, dance rhythms and collaborations with acclaimed British pop producer Richard X and regional star Senidah to their trademark industrial rumble and military aesthetic. But if you think the Slovenian provocateurs have softened, you are sorely mistaken. For Laibach, pop is simply the latest, most successful form of mass mobilisation and the ultimate industrial machine to be assimilated. Ahead of their concert at Zagreb’s Boogaloo on 16 October, where they promise to get the audience “dancing without losing their dignity”, we spoke to the band about Eurovision as the ultimate geopolitical battleground, the mechanisms of modern totalitarianism - which now wears trainers and T-shirts - and why artificial intelligence is actually an ideal, if currently rather busy, member of Laibach. **What is the idea behind the new pop album? A sincere desire to enter the European pop mainstream, or are things never quite what they seem at first glance?** Laibach have always been a pop group; the audience just hasn’t always noticed. With MUSICK, we decided to clear up the last remaining misunderstandings. Pop is the most successful form of mass mobilisation today, and we simply want to be part of the winning machine. If we cannot beat it, we can assimilate it. **What was it like working with Richard X? Was he knowingly involved in deconstructing his own genre, or did you use him a little more “deceptively” while working on the material?** Richard X understands pop perfectly as a system for manufacturing desire. We understand systems too, so the collaboration was natural and productive. We did not have to deceive him at all. After all, pop is already a big enough fraud in itself. **What is your real fascination with Eurovision? Do you see it as the pinnacle of European pop kitsch, or as something more, perhaps even on a geopolitical level?** Eurovision is the European Union at its most honest: national flags, geopolitical interests, collective emotions, the illusion of democracy and compulsory choreography. It is absolutely not just a music competition, but an annual dress rehearsal for European unity and disunity. To understand Eurovision is to understand the European Union. **How did the collaboration with Senidah on “Love Machine” come about? What sparked your interest in an artist who dominates a subculture obsessed with materialism and consumerism?** Senidah is an extraordinary artist who perfectly embodies contemporary pop aesthetics, their contradictions and their power. Materialism and consumerism are not obstacles to working with Laibach, but almost ideal qualifications, since we are, after all, longstanding and consistent followers of dialectical materialism and analysts of consumerism. And love, after all, is today’s most successful consumer product. **Some older fans have expressed dismay at the album’s neon phase. How difficult is it today to surprise an audience that expects the unexpected?** Our audience is extremely conservative in its expectations of our radicalism. Some would prefer us to remain trapped in 1983 forever. But industry has changed. It once produced steel; today it produces dopamine. Laibach simply follows the production process. In that sense, our new album is an absolutely pure industrial product. Perhaps even our purest yet. **Critics are praising the album as an accomplished dance record. Is there a danger that club audiences will start taking you seriously and overlook the underlying story?** That would be our greatest success. Ideology is most effective when nobody notices it any more. If people dance to Laibach without thinking about why, the experiment has succeeded. The body is always more obedient than the mind. **What changes have you observed in the mechanisms of totalitarianism over the years? Have they become more insidious, or do things remain the same?** Totalitarianism once demanded obedience. Today it demands participation. It once had a leader; today it has an algorithm. Once, the secret police watched you; today you publish your location, your thoughts and what you had to eat yourself. The progress is impressive. **How do you view artificial intelligence? Do you consider it a threat to creativity, and do you see potential for using it in Laibach?** Artificial intelligence will not destroy the music industry. It will simply bring it to logical perfection: the endless production of music that nobody needs but everybody consumes. AI is therefore an ideal member of Laibach: it has no ego, demands no fee and never questions orders. The only problem is that it already works for almost every other band. **Following “Singularity” and “Metaverse”, have you replaced your critique of classical political philosophy with a transhumanist one, identifying the technology giants as the new targets of your analysis?** We have not replaced anything. Only the outfits have changed. Power was once represented by generals, party secretaries and industrial magnates in immaculate uniforms of power. Today, it is represented by technology billionaires in T-shirts and trainers. The ideology is the same; only the user interface is more pleasant. **Do you expect the audience at Zagreb’s Boogaloo on 16 October to finally dance, rather than watch your spectacle standing at military attention?** Absolutely. We have prepared a special choreographic programme for the Zagreb audience that allows them to dance without losing their dignity. After all, standing at attention in formation - just like military marching - is simply one of the oldest forms of organised dance. This time, however, we expect a little more flexibility in the hips.

This new album has reminded me that even though I sing Opus Dei in the shower, I am still a brother to the lady singing Madonna or Gaga. And on this latest tour, we stand together under the lights of pink and purple, embracing the commonality in all its absurdity, one people, many sounds. Hvala, bratje in sestre!

I also agree, that you cannot reach today's audience so much with collective national phrases, that's why I shift to Individual lackings, Void-Signs, which effects on large audiencees remains to be proven

www.tiktok.com/@knil463/video/7685434787401616662

Anyone who is tired of Laibach is tired of life By Siri Bjoner // 13 October 2026 Musick absolutely does not disappoint live. It becomes magnificent in its minimalist maximalism. We received ample doses of dark, heavy, apocalyptic social commentary this evening. Laibach / Rockefeller / 9 October 2026 You never know what you’re going to get with Laibach. “Musick” came out in May and is probably the strangest record they have released, even surpassing “Love Is Still Alive (EP)” (2023). “Alamut” (2025) is the only record of theirs I have never really managed to get into, however hard I have tried. With “Musick”, they have gone in the opposite direction to Ministry, who started as a synthpop band in 1981 before moving towards the heaviest thrash-industrial sound. Laibach began playing together in 1980, released their first live records in 1984 and their debut album, “Laibach”, in 1985. It is heavy. It is brutally hard. It is definitely not for those afraid of the dark or the thin-skinned. “I’m sick of Musick,” sings Milan Fras, while among the merchandise hangs a T-shirt bearing the words “I’m sick of Laibach”. Slightly worrying. I don’t think I have attended a Laibach concert this millennium with so few people in the audience, and I suspect the latest record scared many of them off. Still, that means more room for those who are there, which is a considerable advantage. This year, guest vocalists appear on the big screen behind the band. Not that the stage is devoid of women: dancers Patricija Crnkovič and Tjaša Bučik have been tasked with being the feminine counterpart to Fras. Keyboardist Luka Jamnik also sings more than usual, and he has an impressively good voice. Laibach are always extremely well dressed, and this year’s incarnation is no exception. The colours this year form a gradient from “Musick” pink to charcoal grey, and I must admit I am slightly envious of Fras’s outfit. Laibach have always played with contrasts, and his austere persona combined with a beautiful skirt is always a delight. His movements and voice are always measured, always carefully planned, always almost a little mechanical and robotic—and then along come these fantastic dancers with their dazzling choreography, costume changes, gadgets and a touch of uninhibited madness. Laibach have always been an intensely audiovisual band, and this evening is no exception. The video playing on the screen behind them is entertaining, commanding, hallucinatory and every bit as important a part of the experience. Musick absolutely does not disappoint live. It becomes magnificent in its minimalist maximalism. As raw and brutal as anything else they have delivered, but with a softness supplied by the dancers, who do a fantastic job. They even gave the audience dance lessons—and sure enough, most people had a go at the “moves”. Impressive! The performance culminated with Laibach’s entire crew dancing onstage in more or less complete chaos. I was particularly struck by how thoroughly impressed everyone I spoke to—or overheard—after the concert was, from the techno king to the Finnish punk. Almost two hours in this mad musickal universe made for a pretty perfect evening. We received ample doses of dark, heavy, apocalyptic social commentary. “I’m tired of Laibach”? Never! Like every other concert I have seen them play, this was absolutely perfect. When unpredictability is the only predictable thing, all you can do is look forward to the next chapter. And hope there will be many more chapters. To paraphrase wildly and affectionately: “Anyone who is tired of Laibach is tired of life.”

Did I mention how much I love the new album? It’s amaaaaazing.

Nee,moja najljubša glasbena skupina❤️

I saw them a few years back. The rerelease of Opus Dei. They were phenomenal.

Laibach is a serial caterpillar, prone to undergoing metamorphiosis in response to subtle changes in its cultural and political enviroment. I am always curious to see Laibach live, what has changed, what remains the same. This curernt morph of Laibach is one of the more fun ones. I especially appreciate the addition of the dancers, who made sure that we in the audience indeed did all go rythm. TLDR: Good concert 🙂

Anyone sick of Laibach is sick of life! Very true from pretty much the beginning 😉

Lifebach

Hé is good always Laibach

So obviously I‘m tired of Live🥴…No, just kidding, of course I‘m Not tired of Laibach, I‘m only very disappointed of Musick and the Live Show…

we're all gonna die

I'm tired of waiting for them to american’s tour 🙂

Next T-shirt: Sick and Tired of Laibach.