Miladin Šobić

Miladin Šobić is a Montenegrin poet, singer and songwriter, born on 7 January 1956 in Nikšić. His songs are carried by the acoustic guitar and are mostly about love and melancholy, and in the late 1970s and early 1980s they made him popular right across Yugoslavia.

He began writing lyrics and composing in high school in Nikšić, and then moved to Dubrovnik to study at the College of Tourism. It was as a student that he wrote some of his best-known songs. In 1975 he released his first single, "To sam ja" / "Zazvoni zvono"; "To sam ja" became an unofficial student anthem in Dubrovnik that year. He sang "Zazvoni zvono" at the Hit parada in Belgrade and appeared at the Omladina festival in Subotica, where in 1976 "Daj nam neba" took second prize from the expert jury.

More festivals followed: "Priče s planine" in Zagreb in 1977, and in 1978 "Žana" won the free forms and chanson evening in Opatija, while "Bolesno ljeto" won the best lyrics award at the Belgrade Spring festival. Working with the keyboard player Gabor Lenđel and studio musicians, he released two albums on Diskoton, Ožiljak (1981) and Umjesto gluposti (1982), and the second reached platinum sales. A third album, Barutana ljubavi, was recorded but never released: after the death of his sister, Šobić left music and withdrew from public life.

He went back to live in Nikšić and, despite constant rumours of a comeback, never returned to performing. Đorđe Balašević is quoted as saying that once Šobić stopped, he had no real rival. In early 2013 Šobić suffered a brain haemorrhage and was operated on at the Clinical Centre of Montenegro; in 2014 his albums were reissued on CD, with the proceeds going to a fund for his treatment.

Honours followed. A citizens' initiative named after his song "Od druga do druga" collected signatures in 2016 to nominate him for the 13 July Award, Montenegro's highest state honour, and he received it for lifetime achievement that year. His other songs include "Bio sam jednom novembar", "Đon", "Kako da ti kažem to" / "Bez tebe", "Kišobran", "Sutomore" and "Džemper za vinograd". The singer Vanja Radovanović, who represented Montenegro at Eurovision 2018, is his nephew.