Biography
Magic Bush are a Brit Rock/Power Pop band founded by Damjan Dašić (vocals, bass) and Marko Ćalić (lead guitar, vocals), one a dentist and the other a healthy food manufacturer, who have previously collaborated on many projects together - (Breeze, The Hammersmiths, The Rubber Soul Project and the early reunion line-up of Vampiri). In addition to this, they have performed with other musicians in their acclaimed Beatles tribute band, The Bestbeat since 2005.
Dašić was previously mainly active as a producer, sound engineer and drummer, most notably for e-Play, where he had stayed for roughly a decade, but not taking part in writing and composing their songs. The two musicians needed an outlet to release their original work. They were soon joined by their current and former The Bestbeat mates, Vitomir Milićević and Nikola Dunđerović and played as their own opening act (!) at The Bestbeat's traditional yearly concert, celebrating 50 years since the release of The Beatles' Rubber Soul. At this performance they were joined by the fourth member of the said tribute, Vladimir Banovčanin, on a couple of songs.
The band released a self-titled album on a CD-R in 2016, free of charge. They eventually signed for Metropolis Records, one of Serbia's Universal affiliate labels and the same record, now titled "First…" was re-released officially with cover art by David Vartabedijan and a lyric insert on June 29th, 2017. The album contains 12 songs with a variety of influences, written by all of the four band members at the time, with each of them stepping up to the microphone as well. Numerous guests on the album included Jamal Al-Kiswani (SVI NA POD!) and Branko Kosor. The album was well-received by the critics. It was produced by Dašić and Oliver Jovanović at Jovanović's "Studio O" in Belgrade.
Sometime in-between the album's unofficial and official release, Dunđerović and Milićević left due to their other commitments, Dašić switched from bass to rhythm/acoustic guitar and the new members became the classically trained bassist Ivan Stanković and drummer Vladimir Jevtić, formerly of Sinestezija. This new line-up of the band started recording the second album and played at the "First…@ album release party in November 2017. Later that month, the fifth member joined on keyboards - Darko Grujić, a veteran of Belgrade's music scene.
Two singles released off "First…" were "Everybody Needs a Good Time Now" (June 2016) and "Once in a Lifetime" (November 2017). Both songs were accompanied by music videos. Around the same time, the band participated in the "Influences" project, celebrating the impact of British music on Serbian performers, with a cover of The Who's "My Generation".
The band is noted for performing together with Srđan Gojković "Gile" of Električni orgazam as Gile & Magic Bush, as well as playing at tribute shows for deceased artists Vlada Divljan, Milan Delčić "Delča"). Jevtić's last show with the band was at the Belgrade Beer Fest 2018 and Milićević temporarily rejoined to support his friends until a permanent band member was found.
The second album, initially intended to be released as two separate records, one in Serbian and one in English, was preceded by early versions of the song "Dar" / "I Can See" and "Ja sam kosmos", Chris Bell cover. Eventually, it was decided for the whole album to be in Serbian and the band signed for PGP-RTS.
On April 17th at the second annual GODUM award show in Belgrade's Atelje 212, Magic Bush premiered what eventually became the new album's lead single, "Dani te kriju od mene (Gde si sada ti?)" . The single was officially released on YouTube on October 27th 2019, accompanied by a music video Dašić and Ćalić recorded in Liverpool during the 2019 Annual Beatles Week, where The Bestbeat were invited to perform for the second time.
A new song titled "Go i bos" was premiered at a low-key concert at Zemun's Fest club in June and several new songs were premiered at September's annual "Neko kao ti" benefit. Fragments of studio versions of the songs could be heard in a radio interview in November 2019.
The new album, produced by Dašić and Ćalić under the moniker "Buco i debeli", was initially scheduled to be released in February 2020, then postponed for April, then July, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The band played three songs, two of them for the first time, at the TV show "Tri boje zvuka" and revealed the 11-song album's name, "Put u Šangri-La". A further press release revealed Dušan Živanović "Džekac" known for his work with Orthodox Celts as the band's new permanent drummer.
During a radio performance in June 2020, Dašić revealed that the band had split their studio equipment and more or less recorded their third album during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and strict curfew. He and Ćalić teased the future release with an early version of a song named "Ja znam".
Later during the summer of 2020 the band were among the fourteen finalists of the second Milan Mladenović Trust award with the song "Sve je k'o pre". The actual second single off "Put u Šangri-La", a song titled "Svanuo je dan" was released, accompanied by a music video, on October 28th.
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