About
Also known as: Black Cat White Cat, Black Cat White Cat Orchestra, Emir Kusturica and The No Smoking Orchestra, The No Smoking Orchestra
Few bands can claim their frontman has won the Palme d'Or twice at Cannes, but Emir Kusturica & The No Smoking Orchestra are not your average act. The Belgrade band, originally known as No Smoking Orchestra, supplied the feverish Balkan brass and gypsy energy that powered Kusturica's film Black Cat, White Cat, and their sound became inseparable from his cinema. Kusturica then stepped fully into the band as a guitarist, and in 2001 he directed Super 8 Stories, a documentary road and concert film that followed the group on tour and captured their wild live show. Rooted in Sarajevo but long based in Serbia, the group blends punk, Romani folk, ska and brass band chaos into something that feels like a village wedding that got slightly out of hand. Their concerts are notoriously unhinged affairs, and the music carries that same spirit on record. Whether you come to them through Kusturica's films or stumble on them fresh, the No Smoking Orchestra are one of those acts that are genuinely hard to categorise and even harder to forget.