Kabloonak

About the artist

Yes, Kabloonak (Jonas Narbutas) is a singer-songwriter who usually strums a classical guitar and sings in a voice sometimes resembling young Cohen. Kabloonak - an Inuit word for foreigner (literally meaning 'a white man', since white men were the first foreigners to visit those frozen lands) was a nickname given to Jonas by his father when he was a kid. All of his songs resemble short movies, exerpts from the life of a city he's living in, stories from romantic relationships that happened or could have happened anywhere, bars, roofs, sidewalks, bedrooms. There is some sense of nakedness when you listen to those short movies. Though they are beautifully instrumentally adorned by Kabloonak and their scripts are sung in twirling and memorable melodies, it feels as you're listening to a softly whispered story by a friend in some empty bar late in the night. Usually these are sad stories, but sad in a good way, sad in a sense of healing from sadness by reliving memories of past moments, loves and beautiful moments lost. It's a sad and beautiful world as Kabloonak sings inspired by a Jim Jarmuschs' movie "Down by Law". All the beauty has a speck of sadness in it, for all that is sad was something good inevitably taken away by time. Everytime you travel with Kabloonak through his songs you're also a kabloonak, a foreigner in a land of memory and though it evokes an unsatiable feeling of nostalgia it also feels very warm inside.