Release Party: Hello Incognito, Šimanský + T. Niesner

HELLO INCOGNITO
Hello Incognito, the Prague-based musician Oliver W. Quinn, presents his third studio album Prepare to die, cutie pie. Released on May 1st on a new label connected to the Brno cultural space Kafara, the album was created mostly in a Brno studio over three intensive weekends. The record features Antonín Mika (guitar), Julian Werl (drums, melodica, recording, mixing and mastering) and Vendula Pukyšová (bass).

While Hello Incognito's previous work was more acoustic, the new album builds on more straightforward arrangements and a rockier sound. The band started from original demos built only on vocals, guitar and omnichord, which individual members then freely developed - the result is a recording that sounds more mature but retains the project's characteristic playfulness.

Prepare to die, cutie pie remains an introspective album, this time more focused on themes of everyday functioning - social uncertainty, pressure, FOMO and finding balance between work and personal life, all with irony and humour that is essential to Hello Incognito. The album title references the gaming world, specifically a generic enemy line before battle, and works as a metaphor for songs that often thematize personal struggles with one's own fears. Gaming motifs appear throughout the album, either directly or in hints.

JAKUB ŠIMANSKÝ
Jakub Šimanský, in collaboration with the Brno cultural cooperative Kafara, releases a new solo album Bez Niesnera. It is set to come out on September 10th on CDs, cassettes and selected streaming platforms. The album contains nine musical stories that oscillate between Jakub's childhood, adolescence and the present, and compose a monument to the oddities of everyday life in a Czech context, where the good is often hidden - from legendary figures of santusák culture through grandmother's favourite pastry that almost no one knows anymore, to the immortal lines of wasted talents.

The music expresses joy and playfulness. New combinations of banjo, guitar, lap steel guitar and percussion have been added, including electronics and field recordings, and with them...