Sputnik Slovenia

Best Happy-Hour Troubadour (2007)
Jim Yelenick(aka Sputnik Slovenia)
Over the years, Jim Yelenick has fronted various outfits -- Jet Black Joy, Zillion Dollar Sadists, a Turbonegro cover band and, most recently, a band called Pitch Invasion. As a frenzied frontman, the guy's never been afraid to expose himself, if you know what we mean. And that punk energy spills over into his Friday-afternoon acoustic sets at the Larimer Lounge. A longtime Clash fan (he's even gotten drunk with Joe Strummer at the Lion's Lair), it's only fitting that that band's songs make up a majority of his happy-hour repertoire. When Yelenick's not rocking the casbah, though, he's performing his set staple -- an acoustic mash-up of the Dead Kennedys' "Holiday in Cambodia" with Madonna's "Holiday." By the end of happy hour, you can count on a few things: that Yelenick will be as snockered as everyone else, and that he'll be making up lyrics, leading a sing-along of Irish drinking songs and playing tunes by the likes of Steve Miller, the Boomtown Rats and Britney Spears.

Westword Magazine
Best of Denver 2007 - Westword Magazine-Denver

Best Happy-Hour Troubadour (2007)
Jim Yelenick(aka Sputnik Slovenia)
Over the years, Jim Yelenick has fronted various outfits -- Jet Black Joy, Zillion Dollar Sadists, a Turbonegro cover band and, most recently, a band called Pitch Invasion. As a frenzied frontman, the guy's never been afraid to expose himself, if you know what we mean. And that punk energy spills over into his Friday-afternoon acoustic sets at the Larimer Lounge. A longtime Clash fan (he's even gotten drunk with Joe Strummer at the Lion's Lair), it's only fitting that that band's songs make up a majority of his happy-hour repertoire. When Yelenick's not rocking the casbah, though, he's performing his set staple -- an acoustic mash-up of the Dead Kennedys' "Holiday in Cambodia" with Madonna's "Holiday." By the end of happy hour, you can count on a few things: that Yelenick will be as snockered as everyone else, and that he'll be making up lyrics, leading a sing-along of Irish drinking songs and playing tunes by the likes of Steve Miller, the Boomtown Rats and Britney Spears.

Westword Magazine
Best of Denver 2007 - Westword Magazine-Denver

Jim Yelenick is rock 'n' roll royalty. He's a punk from the old
days, and he's roadied and played all over the world.

He has counted Joe Strummer and the guys from Agent Orange among
his inner circle of friends - and influences. He's played with too
many bands to list, ranging from the sweat-soaked rock of Jet Black
Joy to the insane silliness of his Turbonegro cover band, Zillion
Dollar Sadists.

But Yelenick's most persistent musical project is Sputnik Slovenia,
an alter ego of sorts that is as much a fixture on the Colorado
music scene as Denver Joe. Slovenia still plays Friday-night happy
hours at the Larimer Lounge, and while sometimes the sets are
sparsely attended, others are elbow-

throwing singalongs worthy of Dublin's finest pubs.

Yelenick is working on three records, all for different bands -
including one Slovenia album made up of mostly originals. He took
time from the madness to talk with us about his humble beginnings,
old friends and future exploits.

Q: Why Sputnik Slovenia?

A: Well Sputnik means satellite, and Slovenia is where my
grandfather was from. It's like I'm a satellite of Slovenia.

Q: How and when did you first start playing?

A: I was roadie-ing for a band called Horace Pinker, an old
pop-punk band, and the lead singer got chicken pox in Tuscaloosa,
Alabama. (I eventually got them too.) They were doing an in-store,
and he couldn't do the show, and they asked me if I wanted to go up
there and play for 20 minutes.

Q: And so you did, but did you know how to play?

A: I knew a few chords from college, but no, not really. But I
still played, just making songs up off the top of my head, and the
crowd was dumbfounded and they were looking at me and like, "What
the (expletive)?"

Q: It went well, then.

A: Yeah, and then the band asked me, "Do you wanna go ahead and
open up our world tour?" I was like, "Yeah, why not." I also
toured half the U.S. with Agent Orange - just me and a guitar doing
Clash tribute songs. I played in New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii and
90 days in Europe, and the band got another roadie from their
label.

Q: So you were playing punk rock solo and acoustic?

A: Exactly. I'd be up there playing Stiff Little Fingers and Clash,
and they loved it so much. Nobody was doing that at the time,
acoustic punk tributes.

Q: And you're still playing a lot of those songs.

A: Yeah, but it can change from week to week, depending on how much
booze there is and depending on the time of year and what's going
on downtown that night. One week will be like playing tea at the
Brown Palace. And the next week, it's like mini-ramps and
skateboards and bikes and slam-

dancing to acoustic punk rock. It's likely why I've lasted so long
doing the happy hour.

Q: Give me the set list you'd throw down if you were playing right
now.

A: Britney's "Hit Me Baby One More Time;" Cheap Trick,
"Surrender;" Clash, "White Riot;" a traditional Irish drinking
song called "Wild Rover;" the TV theme to "Rawhide;" "Gin and
Juice" by Snoop Dogg; "Our Lips Are Sealed" by the Go-Gos;
Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop," which is one that people usually like,
and ... I don't know, "I Don't Like Mondays" by the Boomtown Rats.

Q: And all of this from somebody who knew Joe Strummer? Tell me how
you met the Clash frontman.

A: I met Strummer in 1989. I was living in Rome and going to school
over there, but at the time I was in Paris with a couple friends
doing a weekend trip, and we're getting on the train to go back to
Rome, whipping through the subway, and one of us sees a posted bill
that says, "Joe Strummer." ...

Joe is the nicest guy in the world. We're (backstage) having
drinks. I'm talking about Colorado. He talks about Red Rocks and
the hotel by Mile High Stadium. We ended up running around that
night, and as the years went by, we talked and e-mailed. When he
got to (Las) Vegas with Mescaleros, and I drove out there to see
him - and we also hung out when he was in Denver playing the Ogden
the next night.

The Denver show was great, packed house ... At the end of the show,
I went back to the dressing rooms. He wanted to go boozing, but it
was bar time. (Concert promoter/Lion's Lair owner) Doug Kaufman was
sitting in the corner, and I invited Doug over to meet one of my
friends. I introduced them and said, "We have a little place we
could go and have a nice afterhours and get to know some people,"
and so we took him over to the Lion's Lair and spent all night
there with Joe like an old grandfather up there telling stories.
Before we knew it we'd gone through a bottle of tequila.

Q: The Clash was pretty influential to you. This must have been
huge.

A: I wouldn't even be playing guitar if it wasn't f - The Denver Post

Jim Yelenick is rock 'n' roll royalty. He's a punk from the old
days, and he's roadied and played all over the world.

He has counted Joe Strummer and the guys from Agent Orange among
his inner circle of friends - and influences. He's played with too
many bands to list, ranging from the sweat-soaked rock of Jet Black
Joy to the insane silliness of his Turbonegro cover band, Zillion
Dollar Sadists.

But Yelenick's most persistent musical project is Sputnik Slovenia,
an alter ego of sorts that is as much a fixture on the Colorado
music scene as Denver Joe. Slovenia still plays Friday-night happy
hours at the Larimer Lounge, and while sometimes the sets are
sparsely attended, others are elbow-

throwing singalongs worthy of Dublin's finest pubs.

Yelenick is working on three records, all for different bands -
including one Slovenia album made up of mostly originals. He took
time from the madness to talk with us about his humble beginnings,
old friends and future exploits.

Q: Why Sputnik Slovenia?

A: Well Sputnik means satellite, and Slovenia is where my
grandfather was from. It's like I'm a satellite of Slovenia.

Q: How and when did you first start playing?

A: I was roadie-ing for a band called Horace Pinker, an old
pop-punk band, and the lead singer got chicken pox in Tuscaloosa,
Alabama. (I eventually got them too.) They were doing an in-store,
and he couldn't do the show, and they asked me if I wanted to go up
there and play for 20 minutes.

Q: And so you did, but did you know how to play?

A: I knew a few chords from college, but no, not really. But I
still played, just making songs up off the top of my head, and the
crowd was dumbfounded and they were looking at me and like, "What
the (expletive)?"

Q: It went well, then.

A: Yeah, and then the band asked me, "Do you wanna go ahead and
open up our world tour?" I was like, "Yeah, why not." I also
toured half the U.S. with Agent Orange - just me and a guitar doing
Clash tribute songs. I played in New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii and
90 days in Europe, and the band got another roadie from their
label.

Q: So you were playing punk rock solo and acoustic?

A: Exactly. I'd be up there playing Stiff Little Fingers and Clash,
and they loved it so much. Nobody was doing that at the time,
acoustic punk tributes.

Q: And you're still playing a lot of those songs.

A: Yeah, but it can change from week to week, depending on how much
booze there is and depending on the time of year and what's going
on downtown that night. One week will be like playing tea at the
Brown Palace. And the next week, it's like mini-ramps and
skateboards and bikes and slam-

dancing to acoustic punk rock. It's likely why I've lasted so long
doing the happy hour.

Q: Give me the set list you'd throw down if you were playing right
now.

A: Britney's "Hit Me Baby One More Time;" Cheap Trick,
"Surrender;" Clash, "White Riot;" a traditional Irish drinking
song called "Wild Rover;" the TV theme to "Rawhide;" "Gin and
Juice" by Snoop Dogg; "Our Lips Are Sealed" by the Go-Gos;
Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop," which is one that people usually like,
and ... I don't know, "I Don't Like Mondays" by the Boomtown Rats.

Q: And all of this from somebody who knew Joe Strummer? Tell me how
you met the Clash frontman.

A: I met Strummer in 1989. I was living in Rome and going to school
over there, but at the time I was in Paris with a couple friends
doing a weekend trip, and we're getting on the train to go back to
Rome, whipping through the subway, and one of us sees a posted bill
that says, "Joe Strummer." ...

Joe is the nicest guy in the world. We're (backstage) having
drinks. I'm talking about Colorado. He talks about Red Rocks and
the hotel by Mile High Stadium. We ended up running around that
night, and as the years went by, we talked and e-mailed. When he
got to (Las) Vegas with Mescaleros, and I drove out there to see
him - and we also hung out when he was in Denver playing the Ogden
the next night.

The Denver show was great, packed house ... At the end of the show,
I went back to the dressing rooms. He wanted to go boozing, but it
was bar time. (Concert promoter/Lion's Lair owner) Doug Kaufman was
sitting in the corner, and I invited Doug over to meet one of my
friends. I introduced them and said, "We have a little place we
could go and have a nice afterhours and get to know some people,"
and so we took him over to the Lion's Lair and spent all night
there with Joe like an old grandfather up there telling stories.
Before we knew it we'd gone through a bottle of tequila.

Q: The Clash was pretty influential to you. This must have been
huge.

A: I wouldn't even be playing guitar if it wasn't f - The Denver Post