When was the band founded?
Nikola's Cage, in its current lineup, exists since 2018. It was actually founded in 2014. in Split by our vocalist, but it didn't work out so she decided to start all over again in her hometown Zadar. That was the best decision ever because now the band functions as a true rock'n'roll family. Our members all come from different musical backgrounds and that's what makes our music a bit different. What was your first public appearance/the first concert? We saw you at GoatHell Metal Fest 2019. Tell us about that experience.
The GoatHell Metal Fest in 2019. was exactly what brought us all together. It's kind of a funny story. Andrea (the vocalist) was thinking about bringing Nikola's Cage back to life when an invitation arrived. It was an invitation to play at the GoatHell festival. She and Luka (guitar/back vocals) were already on board, so they asked Šime Zubović (the drummer from Luka's band Stonetribe, now our ex-drummer) to join as well, which he did. Then the three of us went on an impossible mission: to find a bass player. We knew Dino, so we asked him ''Hey dude, you wanna play in our band Nikola's Cage? We only have two songs from 2014 and an upcoming gig in few months so we will need to make some songs, it will be a pretty wild ride." - He was up to it and we went in full-time creator mode. We had rehearsals almost every day in the middle of the summer with no air conditioning. It was awesome. (Photo from the rehearsal: https://www.instagram.com/p/BzYrmdeBk9t/) Then we got an invitation to play at our first gig - the last ever Alternative Night at Q-Bar, where we had the best time and the audience just went WILD! ( https://youtu.be/MViMvjOnXeY ) It really gave us the confidence and motivation to keep going, and to practice even harder for the upcoming GoatHell festival. A few months passed and we were as ready as we can be. We rented a van and went to Pula. We were a bit nervous because all the other bands sounded much heavier than us, but it all went well. After the show, quite a few people approached us to tell us that they loved our odd mix of musical genres. The whole experience was so much more positive than we expected and really made us want to work even harder and create new material.
Have you been working on any new materials and will you play live anytime soon?
Oh, yes. I think we have enough material for two albums, haha. The whole pandemic situation made us all go crazy so we made a lot of new songs and even worked on some surprises for future concerts. Our new songs are still an odd mix of everyone's music taste in the band and we can't quite label our genre (we'll leave that to professionals after we publish our albums). We're hoping to publish it all in near future, at least as a demo for starters. We will play soon if everything goes as planned. Last year we played at the ST-art demo band festival in Split, won our qualifying night and went to the finals. Unfortunately, the whole pandemic situation delayed the whole festival so the final night hasn't happened yet. We can't yet say when we are playing, but once the date is set we will publish it on our social media pages. How was 2020 for you?
2020. was like a glitch in the Matrix. We're not even sure it happened! It started awesomely, we played at Bojanka in Zadar and the future seemed so bright. Our then drummer Šime had a baby and decided to leave the band so we went on a hunt and found Bruno. He has a totally different drumming style, which we loved, so we changed our songs a little bit and started practising hard and creating new material. Then, the lockdowns happened. We were on and off with rehearsals, but still tenacious to play. In October we played at the above-mentioned St-art festival, and after that, we kind of stopped thinking about the gigs until we see what will happen with all the lockdowns and restrictions. The lack of gigs is the true reason why we made so many songs, we just kept on going and creating and brainstorming... So I guess 2020 wasn't that bad.
5. What is a long term plan for your band? What should we expect in 2022 and later on?
Well, first of all, we are hoping for a lot of new gigs. Now that we have so much new material, we are eager to show it to the crowds. We are currently recording all of our songs and would love to publish them all by the end of 2022. Having a long term plan never goes by the plan, so we decided to just go with the flow and stay as productive as we can be. :)
Do you have any other thoughts you want to share?
We would like to thank the DIP article for giving us an opportunity to introduce ourselves to your readers. Also, we'd like to thank readers who've come this far and read it all (you're awesome).
If our story spiked some interest in you, come check us out on our Facebook or Instagram, and if you want us to play in your town, you can send us an email at nikolascagezd@gmail.com.
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Band members: Andrea Dugandžić - vocals Luka Baranović - electric guitar/back vocals Dino Mužanović - bass guitar/back vocals Bruno Biloglav - drums/back vocals Photos: Boris Vincenzo Dallmatino