Belgrade-based country rock band Backsprint is stepping further into its unusual musical identity with “Black Silence,” a new release shaped by the meeting point between Serbian grit and classic American roots music.
The band’s story starts in a place where you might not expect to find the foundations of a country rock group. Growing up in a Serbian apartment, Uroš Jojić was surrounded by American country records played by his father, including music from Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash. At the time, there was no explanation for why those records mattered. The music simply became part of his world.
Years later, Jojić moved to Saginaw, Michigan, where he completed high school and encountered the music he had grown up hearing in the environment where it originated. The experience gave a different perspective to the sounds that had already become familiar to him, but the emotional connection to the music remained.
Returning to Belgrade, Jojić began building Backsprint around that unlikely cultural connection. The result is a band that does not attempt to choose between its Serbian background and its American musical influences. Instead, the two worlds become part of the same sound.
Jojić is joined in the lineup by Ognjen Ninković on guitar, Nemanja Cvijović on bass, Stanislav Stojkanović on drums, and Kaća Vidović on backing vocals. Together, they form the core of a project that approaches country rock from an unconventional starting point.
“Black Silence” arrives as part of that ongoing musical journey. Rather than trying to reproduce a Nashville formula, Backsprint is developing its own interpretation of country rock, informed by the records that first inspired Jojić and the experiences that followed.
The band’s debut was recorded in Belgrade with producer Oliver Jovanović, keeping the production firmly connected to the group’s home environment. There are no Nashville session players or attempts to manufacture an American identity. Backsprint’s approach comes from having experienced both sides of the cultural divide.
That is what makes the band’s story particularly interesting. Country music may have originated thousands of kilometres away from Belgrade, but music does not always stay where it begins. Records can cross borders, influence people in unexpected places and eventually return in completely new forms.
With “Black Silence,” Backsprint continues developing a sound that sits between worlds while belonging completely to the musicians creating it. The band is also maintaining an ambitious release schedule, with new singles arriving every three weeks as it continues to introduce listeners to its distinctive take on country rock.
