Surrounded by a collection of exotic instruments and drawing freely from Balkan, Mediterranean, Central European, African, Latin American, and reggae traditions, the sessions prioritised exchange, spontaneity, and atmosphere over structure.
On paper, it’s an exciting premise. In practice, Ruke is a record of contrasts — moments of genuine beauty and emotional resonance scattered across an album that often struggles to justify its stylistic breadth.
Ista Slika opens the album in restrained fashion, unfolding like a slow-burning jazz piece with vocals. It’s subtle and atmospheric, rooted in world-music textures with hints of jazz and Eastern melodic phrasing. Nothing here is overtly gripping, but it establishes a mood that suggests Ruke is meant to be experienced as a full, immersive work. The track is warm, soothing, and peaceful, encapsulating a Mediterranean spirit.
Kuba follows, unsurprisingly leaning into theatrical Cuban rhythms. While pleasant on the surface, it feels oddly shallow — too accessible, too comfortable, and lacking the layered complexity that Rundek usually brings to cross-cultural experimentation. The rhythms are well-worn, and Rundek’s vocals, though melodic, feel slightly mismatched with the arrangement.
Things improve significantly with Makedo, where the album finally finds a pulse. The vocals are full of energy and soul, the instrumentation feels alive, and there’s a melancholic undertone that gives the track emotional depth. It’s playful and expressive without feeling trivial — a reminder of Rundek’s ability to channel folk traditions into something deeply personal and affecting.
The title track, Ruke, continues this upward trajectory. Delicate, tense, and quietly melancholic, it’s built around gentle guitar lines and poetic, understated vocals. The arrangement feels purposeful, allowing space and restraint to do the emotional heavy lifting. Pop-rock in spirit, it’s accessible, catchy, and light. The gentle guitar intertwines beautifully with Rundek’s soft delivery, while brass and synths wrap the song in a delicately melancholic haze. It’s easily the best track on the record, and not far from the emotional clarity and craftsmanship found on Haustor’s strongest ’80s material.
Elsewhere, the album becomes less convincing again. Sjaj Što Izdaje flirts with a dark cabaret aesthetic, vaguely recalling Tom Waits, but without the grit, eccentricity, or vocal commitment needed to make the style compelling. Sanjam is layered and atmospheric, but the idea doesn’t quite land — the electric violin clashes with the surrounding instrumentation. The band appears to be aiming for a psychedelic twist on traditional sounds, but the execution feels unfocused, marking the beginning of the album’s downward trajectory.
The album’s weakest moments come when stylistic shifts feel arbitrary rather than integrated. Compared with the revolutionary blend of reggae, hip hop, and new wave on Haustor’s records, Tigidigi Rege is a detour into pop-reggae territory that feels flattened and disconnected from the rest of the album, both tonally and conceptually. Similarly, Stojim i Gledam Se Kako Postojim moves from spoken word into Dalmatian folk, but the transition feels generic rather than transformative, offering little beyond familiar regional gestures.
This lack of cohesion and reluctance to push ideas further is ultimately Ruke’s central problem. Jazz, Balkan folk, Dalmatian traditions, reggae, Cuban rhythms, and European art music are all present, but rarely engage in meaningful dialogue with one another, and rarely are they expanded beyond a surface level already explored decades ago. Instead of forming a clear narrative or aesthetic arc, the album often feels like a sequence of loosely connected pop-oriented tracks. In this context, Haustor’s masterful discography inevitably casts a long shadow — one that perhaps makes disappointment unavoidable.
Ruke is not without merit — its highs are genuinely affecting — but as a complete work, it feels underdeveloped and conceptually unfocused. Coming from an artist capable of the inventive world-building found on Bolero, this scattershot approach is frustrating. Where Rundek once reshaped global influences into something singular and forward-thinking, Ruke too often settles for safe, surface-level genre exploration.
