Cigarettes After Sex and a Story of Slovenian Cigarettes


Cigarettes After Sex released their self titled album earlier this year and I finally managed to give it a listen. It's a (bitter)sweet collection of relationship songs set to somber beats, which all unconditionally make you feel slightly dreamy (but of course not sleepy).
"Sweet opens with the line Watching the video that you sent me/The one where you’re showering with wet hair dripping, before turning into a song about longing to touch a loved one’s skin through a screen." - Pitchfork
But perhaps the biggest success of the band is that they managed to make even the most erotic lyrics elegant, instead of wandering into the crude teritorry. Just look at this example:
"Watching the video where you're lying
In your red lingerie ten times nightly
You know I think your skin's the perfect color
But it's always your eyes that pull me under" 

- Sweet, Cigarettes After Sex
 Truly this band embodies the well known Wilde's quote: "A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure." This reminds me of stories about Filter57, (formerly) Slovenian cigarettes, which I will now relate to you (if you get this reference keep on rocking).
"You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?" - Oscar Wilde
 Once upon a time (more preciselly in year 1957) tobacco factory Ljubljana bought machines for making filtered cigarettes, the first in this part of the Europe, and started (duh) producing them.

France Prešeren
Being first filtered cigarettes wasn't the only thing special about them thought, they were also first Yugoslavian cigarettes not named after some river (for example Drina, Morava, etc.) and they also have printed on their packs (which are today practically the same as back then, the only difference being that they now "proudly" hold EU-mandanted grisly pictures too) a verse from one Prešeren's poem - Od nekdaj lepe so Ljubljanke slovele, al' lepše od Urške bilo ni nobene (very rough translation: Since always the girls of Ljubljana were known for beauty, but none was more beautiful than Urška).
"Od nekdaj lepe so Ljubljanke slovele, al' lepše od Urške bilo ni nobene" - Povodni mož, France Prešeren
Opinions about Prešeren are mixed, on the one hand he is recognized as the Slovenian poet, kinda like Brits and Shakespeare, but on the other hand he was more than a bit of an alcoholic and a creep obsessed with girls half his age.

But let's return to the story. Well stories, since these 60 years weren't empty. People back then weren't accostumed to filtered cigarettes and did initially distrust filters, so they used to tear them off and smoke them filterless (also arguably they taste better that way).

There were also scandals - there was a rumour that tobacco mix included cannabis, and what is interesting here is that this was before the big weed boom caught this end of the world.

Filter57 are old cigarettes, they saw Yugoslavia fall and were in the end even "evicted" from their factory, they are now produced somewhere in Hungary if I remember correctly. Well, all things come to pass and sometime (preferably far in the future) a filter57 cigarette will burn out for the last time. Hopefully after sex.



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