ANA POPOVIC "STILL MAKING HISTORY" Source: Big City Blues Magazine Date: 07/2007 Writer: n/a

            If you haven't heard of Miss Popovic your first thought on seeing the CD cover may be of another teen idol clone but for anyone who listens it's a world apart. This isn't a little girl but a woman with over a decade more experience then you'd think at first sight. And on first listen her voice and guitar make you take notice. Her story literally does start up a world away in the town of Belgrade in the former Yugoslavia. Daughter of a guitar player Ana picked up her father’s guitar at 15.  By her early twenty's she  had her first band, Hush and  her first album "Hometown". From there she release three other recordings on Germany's Ruf Records, appeared on a Jimi Hendrix tribute CD: ‘Blue Haze’, toured with Bernard Allison and  Solomon Burke and put out a live DVD. How do you follow that, try being the only European artist ever nominated as Best New Artist  for a WC Handy Award and the first European artist to perform at the WC Handy Award  Show.

            On this her first American CD the title is quite appropriate, she is “Still Making History” as the premier artist on Delta Groove new subsidiary of  Eclecto Groove.  Randy Chortkoff as always has come through with a great band for her featuring John Cleary on piano and Mike Finnigan (organ player on Jimi Hendrix's “Voodoo Child”) on B3. With this band and her years of experience in Europe she brings her blues in to the Groove.  Blues was born from oppression and she  picked it up and brings it back home. If your prepared just “Hold On” because she tells her story of growing up in Eastern Europe and her dream of getting out.   On most songs you don't notice her accent  but a trace can be found on  “Still Making History” and  “Between Our Worlds” and as the song says she is “building, bridges of compromise, every body deserves a chance”. Her playing and singing take on a jazzy lilt with “Doubt Everyone But Me” with Cleary's piano adding to it's elegance and Ana's guitar showing she ain't just another guitar slinger but a master player. She follows this with a hard rocking version of Big Mama Thornton's “You Don't Move Me No More” one of the few covers on this recording. The guitar playing picks you up, moves you along and you know that with Ana the looks are nice, the voice is strong but the playing is what this girl is all about,  the whole package pulls you in so the guitar can really knock you out. She alternates between a little jazz, blues and  some rock but that is what eclectic is about. “My Favorite Night” shows she can handle some slide as well and “How'd You Learn Too Shake It Like That?” takes her out in the alley to dust off those down and dirty blues. The title and the lyrics of  the “Sexist Man Alive” may put you off but when the organ, horns and guitar come screaming in they take it to a whole different place.  Probably the biggest jump in style is the first and last song, two versions of “U Complete Me” the first a straight rock song the other a blues version, the differences are as arresting as her her looks.  Like Ana when you first see  “Eclecto” you may mistake it for something else but it gives you more then the same old blues.  Ana Popovic is an artist of many moods and as the first artist on Eclecto Groove this makes it a perfect fit.