The nickname COOH is quite familiar to many people from the HMSU parties , but we do not know much about Balkansky. Actually behind the two nicknames we discover the same person – Ivan Shopov. At the age of 26 he has already have a lot of success in the drum’n’bass scene with 40 vinyls released by foreign labels and constant sets abroad. Lately he is making dubstep and ambient together with Ivo Hristov and the result is a great album – Kuker, in which we can hear the magical sound of Theodosii Spasov’s kaval as well. Beside this Ivan strenuously draws….  And do so many different things.

Tell us something more about the album?

The idea of the album came up when I met Ivo Hristov 4 years ago. He is the owner of the label Kuker Music and he offered me to do some remixes  of the albums he have previously released. The remixes were very good and we decided to make an album together. We were  working  very hard every day during the past two years. We had around 20-30 tracks and from them we selected the best 11. In this tracks you can also hear Theodosii Spasov, Penyo Peev, Vlada Tomova and Denitsa Serafimova.

Does the folklore have place in the modern music?

Yes, of course. It has always been part of me, after all I am a Bulgarian. It is my dream since I was a kid to combine my music with folklore. When I started to work with Thedosii Spasov and Ivo Hristov I realized that we are doing the same thing – Bulgarian music. And what we were doing became something unique.

What does the kukers symbolize in the conception of  your album?

The kukers used to wake people up, they chase away the evil with making noise. In the song “letter form America” for example in which  Vlada Tomova sings “ Wretched youth” in the streets of New York we made connection with the film Letter to America. In the film a girl is trying to wake up her best friend, who is beyond the ocean and went into coma, with her song. We decided to turn over the symbolism and the message and to send a message from America to Bulgaria and  try to awake people here who seemed to be into coma here.

Where can we find Kuker?

You can find the album in the Dukyan Meloman music store in Sofia and also buy it from me on my gigs.