The first official “photomonography” of the No Smoking Orchestra was made by Zeko, the photograph who was with the band during all their concerts since 1999. After having worked for the lights at the theatre or concert places, he was embedded with the No Smoking Orchestra to be their “visual memory”.

We had already seen on the official site of the band some of his photos, but what we didn't know is that he had kept the most beautiful, the funniest, the most intimate, or the most delirious for this book. The result is something big ! First, by its size, the book is beautifully made, and has large pages, on nice quality paper. Of course, inside, you'll find many pictures (182), without real order, but carefully annotated and often linked to funny anecdotes. Chosen extracts :

• ”…We look more like an excursion of a couple of happy high school kids, than midnight shift workers, but all that under a condition that you are on the 13th floor of the hotel, beside the pool or in it. Why not, when we just finished the most successful concert of the tour through South America, the concer in Luna Park. This is the same place where Yugoslav national team won the world championship. We also got a winning feeling.”
• Drale recorded : Two female tourists aked where I was from and who I was. They laughed when I said : “Bosnian Serb who likes the group Clash…”
• ”Before every concert, there is an obsessive excitement in the dressing room. Dejan fights it by making jokes. The professor¹⁾ talks politics and world injustice. Nele warms up jumping in the hole with a cigarette in his mouth and Zoki usually lies down. Ivica wards off fear by eating sweets, Glava cools off, and Ceda and Stribor twiddle their thumbs, to warm up their joints. Drale is always first to get dressed, stands at the door and talks about good old times. Pop usually deep in jokes and just when you hear Neso pacticing his saxophone ; you realize there is 5 minutes until show time…”

As an introduction, the book starts with the story of the band, from the Zabranjeno Pušenje times, told by “Jagoda Jamakosmanović, retired ethno-musicologist”²⁾.

The book can be ordered online on www.thenosmokingorchestra.com.