Denis & Denis - Ja Sam Lažljiva Album

While "Čuvaj se!" ("Take Care!") remains one of the finest debut albums of the Yugoslavian 80s pop era, Denis & Denis very quickly grew into a sensation which had a hard time putting up with standards they cut with the very album.

"Ja sam lažljiva" (meaning: "I Feel Mendacious"), didn't have time or space to breathe on its own - it was a rushed affair at the time as the duo were on a hiatus (Davor Tolja left for obligatory Army Service). While he was away, the duo's public image was kept alive with Edi Kraljić (originally their backing vocalist) taking Tolja's place and appearing in most of then-current videos (sexually explicit "Soba 23" ("Room 23") and charmigly naive "Ja sam lažljiva").

Tolja returned later on and for a time, Denis & Denis became a trio (keeping Edi Kraljić in their line-up) which can be seen in a symbolic duel-video for the song "Voli me još ovu noć" ("Love Me One More Night"). By the time this, officially presented mini-album was released, Denis & Denis as we knew them (the core of Marina Perazić and Davor Tolja) began to fade away.

The official mini-album release itself is a work-in-progress affair, lacking the completeness of their debut. While the song "Soba 23" could very easily have been considered an impressive leftover from "Čuvaj se!" sessions, new material is mainly helped with fillers (three boring instrumentals - two marked as "Versions", and one horrifyingly odyssey-ish, called "Himna Kompjutera" ("Hymn of the Computer"), two excellent early demos - "Gluhi telefoni" ("Deaf Telephones") and "Mala noćna zadovoljstva" ("Little Night Pleasures") - available only on the cassette version - and the song "Noć" ("The Night"), originally an exclusive, obscure b-side to the single "Program tvog kompjutera").

There were also markings of slowly heading towards standard mainstream pop-rock music - while "Voli me još ovu noć" still brings their songwriting skills to the fore in terms of another perfect ballad (featuring amazing but all too progresive guitar solo by Elvis Stanić), "Ja sam lažljiva" on the other hand, though charming, announces the duo's shift towards cliched pop-formula which most of their peers chose in order to survive in music business.

Strangely enough, there was also a stunning song at the time, called "Oaze snova" ("Dream Oasis"), which for some reason wasn't included on this mini-album (later CD pressings corrected this, eventual mistake).

In all, "Ja sam lažljiva" carries out barely two truly great new songs - "Soba 23" and "Voli me još ovu noć" - plus once-considered, exclusive non-album track called "Noć". As mentioned earlier on, this cassette version is a truly recommended find for it contains two of the duo's earlier demos - "Gluhi Telefoni" and "Mala noćna zadovoljstva" dating from 1983 - lost between the duo's fully completed debut and demonstration tape enthusiasm of the underground scene. These two demos were not included on the LP version of "Ja sam lažljiva", nor any of the later CD pressings (one made in 1995. and the other two only recently, in 2006 and in 2010).