Last updated on April 1, 2026

The Turnback by Dirty Hairy & Zdenko Ivanušić, is my collaboration with Matt Davies aka. Dirty Hairy. During the past twenty years we have played together a couple of times as sidemen in other projects. But we never did a project of our own. This one was initiated by Matt, and I hope it won’t be the last one. Matt did the song form and rhythm section layout, and I filled in with saxophone and flute parts. Here is the quote from Matt’s announcement of the project on social media.

🎷✨ FULL CIRCLE MOMENT ✨🎷
One of the first jazz musicians I met when I arrived in Croatia was the incredible Zdenko Ivanušić.
Sax, flute… beautiful tone, deep compositions… and also very talented at drinking beer 🍺😄
Despite the occasional language barrier, Zdenko ended up putting together a band to play at my wedding.
Now if you’re from the Balkans… imagine a jazz wedding 😂
He kept asking me:
“Are you sure, man? Are you sure?”
We were sure.
Since meeting back in 2007, we’ve stayed friends, shared stages, and always said we need to make something together.
So we finally did.
No samples. No shortcuts. Just musicians playing, feeling it out somewhere between jazz and hip-hop, the organic way 🎶
I’m really happy to share this one with you.

Matt Davies aka. Dirty Hairy

The Turnback by Dirty Hairy & Zdenko Ivanušić is available on all streaming platforms.

Matt Davies – electric piano, drums, bass
Zdenko Ivanušić – flute, tenor saxophone

released by Village Live Records, March 30, 2026
cover art designed by Matt Davies
Zdenko Ivanušić – Official Artist Channel @ YouTube