Dražen Žerić
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Dražen Žerić Žera is a Bosnian singer and one of the founders and the leading vocal of a famous Bosnian band, Crvena jabuka (The Red Apple).
Noted for his spiky hair and a specific texture of his voice, he remains one of the most recognizable vocals of the entire area of Former Yugoslavia.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Early years
Žera was born on the 20th of July 1964, to a Bosniak mother and father in town of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina (then Yugoslavia). Both of his parents were teachers by profession. Žera has one brother, Damir, who lives in Geneva, Switzerland.
Žera grew up in Sarajevo were he attended music school for piano. In the early 1984 he formed the band with his high school mate, Dražen Ričl. That was the beginning of Crvena jabuka. Crvena jabuka quickly became one of the most successful bands in Yugoslavia topping charts years after year, from 1985 to 1990. At the same time, Žera was recognized as one of the biggest teenage idols along with Momčilo Bajagić Bajaga and Boris Novković. The band's so called Yugoslav years ended in 1990 by winning the prestige Mesam music award in Belgrade which crowned their most successful album Tamo gdje ljubav počinje (Right there, where love begins).
[edit] War and post-war
In 1992 as the Yugoslav War advanced into Sarajevo, the entire Yugoslavian music scene toppled. Žera spent two years under the Serbian siege in Sarajevo doing humanitarian work and charity concerts along with singers Kemal Monteno, Mladen Vojičić Tifa and Zlatan Fazlic-Fazla.
By the end of 1994 Žera moved to Zagreb, Croatia. He was quickly granted Croatian citizenship and in the early 1995 he signed the contract with a Croatian music label Tutico, reuniting Crvena Jabuka along with their original drummer, Sarajevo native, Darko Jelicic-Cunja.
A comeback album U tvojim očima was released in the spring of 1996 and it was a huge success. Since then, the band released four studio albums and one concert album selling more than 500 thousand copies worldwide which made them the best selling band of all times from former Yugoslavia, ahead of the most famous Yugoslav band ever, Bijelo dugme.
Constant touring took toll on Žera's health. His extensive drinking habits had been reported many times. In 1998 he was pulled over by the Croatian police on the Croatian-Slovenian border and later detained reportedly for not appearing at the Municipal Court in Zagreb where he was due for the trial in the court case in which he was accused for driving under the influence of alcohol. The case was later dismissed and Žera was given probation.
On January 2008, Žera was caught with a ballerina dress and a parakeet on the streets of Kraljevo singing the American tune "Twinkle Twinkle" in Turkish. News reporters surrounded him and everyone was appaulled by his behavior. It was later revieled that he was hallucinating on african millipedes and he is in a better state now.
Žera lives in Makarska, Croatia. In private life, he stays single.
