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ABOUT
Born in Sofia on 6.VI.1959. Driver and auto mechanic by profession. A musician at heart. Self-taught. Plays drums, harmonica, guitar. Author and singer of blues songs. In the 80s, he played drums in various pop-rock groups - Parallel 42, Start, and others. At the end of the communist regime, he created his own group - Poduene Blues Band. He wrote and performed songs that totalitarian censorship would not allow - "Bureaucrat," "Sunny Beach Blues," "Communism is Going Away," and so on. An enthusiastic supporter of Bulgaria's change from dictatorship to democracy, he participated with his guitar and PBB at all rallies, barricades, and other manifestations of the democratic opposition. In these memorable years for Bulgaria, Vasko The Patch wrote and performed songs that genuinely expressed the urge for freedom of entire generations, and this turned him into one of the symbols of change. At the same time, he paved his own style and "blues path" in Bulgaria as the creator of the first serious blues formation. He attracted good musicians and received an unusual mixture of sincerity, hippie non-puckism, sharp language, and serious arrangements and instrumental improvisations. Thus, PBB became the best Bulgarian blues-rock formation of the post-communist times.

Then came the fame and success of Vasko Krypkata and PBB and the endless tours around Bulgaria and abroad - in all possible and impossible places where they can and cannot play: from the Buhovo Prison to Hall 1 of the National Palace of Culture, from the roof of Garibaldi Square to the basement of the La Strada Theater, from the barricades in Dupnitsa to the concert welcoming Bill Clinton in Sofia, from acoustic concerts for sick children and orphanages to noisy rocker gatherings, from the small club Eddy's to the Super Blues Festival Bucharest '95 with headliner John Mayall, where PBB played 3 encores in front of 5,000 people, from the roof of a moving bus at the "Tarataykata Festival" in Plovdiv to Rothmans Blues Fest Burgas '99 with headliners The Blues Brothers Band, from Beerfest Sofia to the Heineken beer hall in Amsterdam, from the Diplomatic School in Bonn to the prison in Koln, from the Jazzgalerie Bonn to Jazz House Kansas City, from Poduensko basement to Buddy Guy's Legends Chicago... etc...

Unruly, swimming against the current, Vasko Krępkata has become one of the most controversial figures of New Bulgaria, you can read about him that he is a "symbol of democracy," and that he is a "simple imitator" or that he "broke the norms of the degraded inert Bulgarian song, paving the way for sincerity in the lyrics and the blues scheme, and that he is a "candidate for the stupidest lyrics," or that "the wise messages of the songs from the new PBB album give hope, strength for life and a desire for freedom" and that "the airwaves smelled of barbecue and beer from various urges of some dogs from the outer neighborhoods," or that "the awakening of generations of Bulgarians to the bold dream of New Bulgaria, which has taken the path of joining the Free World is unthinkable without the troubadour of democracy Vasko The Patch, and "...it is unacceptable a mother can go to bed peacefully and sleep knowing that her 12-year-old daughter is somewhere listening to the unbridled songs of Vasko The Patch..." etc...

There is no way, once something is done, it is always accompanied by assessments. The balance sheet for an author and musician is what has been created. Only the test of time can decide what needs to be decided. One thing is clear - Vasko The Patch breaks the norms and makes music for which the only judge are those who have heard it...
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