Jinx

Jinx are a pop band from Zagreb, formed in 1993 around singer Yaya and guitarist and songwriter Coco Mosquito. They started out as High Jinx, a name taken from a concert at the Zagreb club Saloon, and dropped the "High" in 1995 because their fans called them simply Jinx. Their songs blend pop with funk, soul and a brass section, and Coco Mosquito has said that the band is pop in structure but thinks of itself as a rock band.

The first album, Sextasy (1995), was sung in English. During his military service in 1996 Coco Mosquito started writing songs in Croatian, and the same year drummer Berko Muratović joined. In 1997 Jinx signed with Aquarius Records and released Second Hand, followed by Pompei – Ljetna ploča katastrofe in 1999 and Avantura počinje in 2001. Radio France Internationale named them best new artist in Bucharest in 1998, and in 2002 they won the Porin for hit of the year. Songs such as "Tamo gdje je sve po mom", whose video was directed by Dalibor Matanić, "Smijem se", "Bye bye baby bye", "Koliko suza za malo sna" and "Ljeto" made them one of the best-loved Croatian pop bands of the time.

Jinx split up in 2002 and returned in 2007 with Na zapadu, now on Dallas Records; the same year Aquarius released the compilation Retro Plus. Their next album, Diksilend (2010), won the Porin for best pop album in 2011. In 2014 the band marked its twentieth anniversary with concerts in Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and in 2017 came Pogrebi i pomiriši, with "Maradona" featuring Davor Gobac of Psihomodo Pop.

Yaya and Coco Mosquito have always been the two faces of Jinx: he writes the music and has the final word, she sings. The band has changed bass players several times over the years, and trumpet player Igor Pavlica has long been part of its brass section. This playlist is the Retro Plus collection, with the band's best-known songs of the 1990s and early 2000s.