Siddharta

Siddharta is a rock group from Slovenia.

Their first album ID (cf. Freud) was released in 1999. It was a huge success, only surpassed by their next album Nord two years later. It went straight to number one of the album-selling charts, breaking all known sales records. An incredibly successful tour followed and lasted until summer 2002. (A remix album Silikon Delta was released during that time as well, where Siddharta's songs were remixed/remade by the likes of Laibach, DJ Umek and many others.

After that the band retreated from public life, taking a short vacation and started working on their third album Rh-, which was released in the summer of 2003. A special-edition (english version) of the album, packed in a bloodbag, was also released and sold out (literally) immediately.

The tour-opening concert took place in an overcrowded football stadium in Ljubljana, the capital city of Siddharta's homeland, Slovenia in September 2003. People from all over Slovenia plus foreigners gathered to see Siddharta, who was accompanied by the RTV Slovenia's Symphony Orchestra and 60 dancers, perform in front of a crowd of over 30,000 people and a few thousands who could not get in as the concert had been sold out weeks in advance.

In March 2005 Siddharta released an international version of their best-selling album Rh- in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Poland, Croatia and Slovenia. With Europe opening up, the journey for Siddharta has only just begun and by receiving MTV's EMA 2005 (Europe Music Award) the band was apt to win wider recognition on the music scene of Europe.

After writing and recording for almost 6 months, on June 4th 2006 Siddharta released Petrolea in Slovenia. Their 4th studio album entered the charts at #1 position, stayed there for weeks and got the platinum status in march 2007.

At the end of 2006 they went on a tour throughout Slovenia with 20 concerts to promote the album. Around 50.000 visitors saw Siddharta. The tour ended in front of 15.000 people at an open-air show in the capital of Slovenia (Ljubljana). It was also recorded by national TV and Radio and aired in January.

A successful 2007 ends with 2 new albums. The first one is a DVD/CD combination of the acoustic radio show on Val 202 called Izštekani. The release is available with 6 different covers; each with one band member. The second album is a live record of their Maraton concert event, which was held in Hala Tivoli in Ljubljana were they played their whole discography in more than 5 hours. It includes 4 CDs with 56 songs and an additional documentary DVD.

Months of planning and preparation resulted in a project, entitled Siddharta Saga. It started on November 5, 2008, with the first visit to the studio recording of the the first three songs for the new album and then span over the whole following year. During this time the band will not only record the album but will record it under the strict supervision of their fans, who can monitor the progress of the journey any time over a special website dedicated to the project. It will in time offer much more than just studio reports. To see what more is to come, do visit the Saga website.

The result of this one-year process is a new record Saga, which was produced by Ross Robinson in his home-studio in Los Angeles. Saga is due to hit the stores on November 21, 2009.