Elton John's apprentices defended the bells of Visoki Decani Monastery

Writing for Kosovo Online: Muharem Bazdulj, writer and journalist

At the large rally of the Serbian Progressive Party "Serbia of Hope" on May 26 this year, the greatest media attention was unplanned (?) attracted by the Serbian political leader from Montenegro, Milan Knezevic. One of his lines spoken on stage is probably the most quoted message from the entire rally. This is how Kneževic spoke to the crowd, "Perhaps you are not fancy to someone because you don't listen to techno music and Elton John, but you keep the bells of Decani Monastery."

Everyone found it funny, and many were surprised, “Who is this politician who uses such bizarre rhymes?” Nevertheless, better connoisseurs of Knezevic's character and work have long been aware that he is also a poet who likes to engage in poetry. It's no secret that he already used rhymes to deal with the journalist Zeljko Ivanovic from the "Vijesti" newspaper, and it was like this, "Montenegro knows a lot/ Zeljko's deep throat (...) Everything a bit, Nothing to the end/ That is who our boss Zeljko is".

In the late spring of 2023, why did "techno music and Elton John" come to Knezevic as an example of "fancy things"? For years and years, techno music has not been the focus of the younger "fancy" world, while Elton John has been practically in informal retirement for a long time. Although he is still relatively young (he was born in 1980), Knezevic, when it comes to popular culture, is clearly trapped deep in the past.

The pushing of Elton John has already attracted the attention of some prominent authors and analysts. For example, Zoran Panovic recently recalled his guest appearances in Sarajevo and Belgrade during the eighties of the last century. But with Panovic, as with everyone else, it seems to me, the comment remained at the level of noting the bizarreness.

If, however, we go beyond the bizarreness as such, there is an essential problem in the quoted Knezevic assessment. It seems that for him "fancy things", "techno music" and Elton John are symbols of those notorious "Western values" that Branko Ruzic mentioned at that ill-fated first press conference after the crime in "Ribnikar". And if "Western values", according to Ruzic's thesis, are to blame for the tragedy, Knezevic wants to amnesty "his" audience here. Likewise, according to Knezevic, the bearers of Western values have nothing to do with the "Kosovo covenant", so he also needs that as a contrast.

However, both theses are problematic. Because neither so-called "Western values" can be blamed for the massacre in the elementary school, nor are fans of Western pop music and culture in general necessarily indifferent to national traditions.

For Knezevic, it seems, there is no greater contrast than that between Elton John and the bells of Decani Monastery. And that difference is not so drastic, as they say. And I don't mean that only in the sense of the thesis that all things in the universe are connected.

Elton John is seventy-six years old since he was born in March 1947. Among the younger singers who, in a way, are considered his heirs, one of the most prominent is James Blunt, born in 1974. (Interestingly, their birth years are “anagrammatically" complementary - 47 and 74, as the year of writing Orwell's most famous book and the year in which the story is set - 48 and 84).

In an interview he gave to the Canadian version of the famous "Elle" magazine, James Blunt admits that Elton John is his role model and that he often turned to him for advice. In that conversation, he calls him his intimate "musical hero" and states that he never ignored him when he asked for something. So James Blunt is fancy and likes Elton John.

However, the key biographical fact in James Blunt's life is the military part of his career. In his early and mid-twenties, he served in the British Army, and that period includes more than a year spent in Kosovo as a member of KFOR. In the time after the Serbian army and police withdrew from Kosovo, including from Decano, the "bells of Decani Monastery" were protected only by KFOR, and as part of it, James Blunt, Elton John's apprentice.

And there is actually something else. After centuries of occupation, the people of Decani were liberated by the Karadjordjevic family. The Karadjordjevic family is not so distantly related to the British royal family. In all likelihood, the next English king will be Prince William, the son of the current King Charles and Princess Diana Spencer. And the most beautiful and famous obituary song of Diana Spencer was written and sung by none other than - Elton John.

Therefore, you should be careful with rhyming jokes. Usually, they sound better than they are factually true. Elton John's singing followers defended the bells of Decani Monastery, literally, not purely symbolically. It is not necessary to be indifferent to the bells of Decani in order to be "fancy".