Emir HOT was born on February 23rd 1978 in Tuzla (Bosnia and Herzegovina) He showed his first interest in the guitar when he was 5. His first influences were Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton, records from the collection of his two older brothers. Even then, as young as he was, he tried to get familiar with the instrument and learn first rhythms and chords.
Босния и Герцеговина
His constant interest in music made him start thinking about enrolling in the Music School in Tuzla - Bosnia & Herzegovina. At the age of 10 he did so and was immediately admitted to the 3 rd year. When Emir was 12, he started listening to various heavy/rock bands and solo guitarists, instrumentalists and virtuosos. In 1989 he joined HATRED, a trash metal band from Tuzla.
A couple of years later, the war in Bosnia & Herzegovina started. Living under such circumstances could not distract him from music. On the contrary, he joined another trash metal band, RETARD, and played the first war concert in the legendary rock club Stelekt in Tuzla. He found the other members, and after a couple of personal changes the band finally stood up on its feet and got its official name NEON KNIGHTS, taken from the first track of the Black Sabbaths record Heaven and Hell. Soon, Neon Knights started writing their own material. First concerts were well accepted and the originality of the band was soon recognized.
In 1997 the band Neon Knights had the first chance, which might prove to have been the only one. A man showed up, who saw their concert in Tuzla, and he offered Neon Knights a record deal in Italy. The band accepted the idea wholeheartedly and soon they were on the road in Italy, where they played a small tour of 10 concerts in 10 different cities. In 1998, album Deserted Land was recorded and released. Numerous concerts all over Europe followed; the band had the opportunity to meet some of the worlds leading names in heavy rock music (namely Iron Maiden and Dream Theater, to name but a few). The album got positive reviews in many famous metal/rock magazines. But, after a couple of tours, the things started to get worse, and Emir Hot decided to leave the band.
At the beginning of 1999, Emir joined a band called SOUTHERN STORM that had just started with their work. New songs were recorded in the studio, the band found a manager and numerous concerts followed. The first major success was the first place on a HEINEKEN MUSIC FESTIVAL in Zenica (Bosnia) in August 2001, where performed 42 other bands from all over Bosnia & Herzegovina. A year after, in 2002, the first album entitled “1999” was released, which literally became the pride of the Bosnian metal scene, and according to many critics, the best ex-Yugoslavian metal record. The band also preformed in Croatia and Slovenia, participated in many TV shows and gave numerous interviews to magazines of different orientations.
Post-war political instability of the country, inability to travel outside of Bosnia, violating the copyright laws and many other things made Emir stop believing that the band can become a major success, and he stopped undertaking risks that would eventually, in all probability, become an investment that would never pay off. Emir decided to leave the country in a safe way, so he decided to enroll in a school abroad.
In January 2003 he auditioned for the most prestige music college in the world, the Berklee College of Music, Boston (USA), and he passed the audition. Since this is one of the most expensive colleges in the USA, Emir struggled to find the financial resources. In the meantime, he made arrangements for different types of music festivals, gave several guitar workshops, played countless club gigs, helped many bands as a studio musician, led his own private school of guitar and wrote music (soundtrack) for the first BiH post-war TV drama “Forgotten saying”.
In 2004, he recorded the first instrumental album, "Quarterworlds of Fantasia", in Split, Croatia, together with Dean Clea Brkic - singer of Croatian rock heroes "Osmi Putnik". The album has not been released yet, but it should be in the near future. He also received an offer to perform as a solo guitarist with the Sarajevo Philharmonic Orchestra, but he had to depart for the UK earlier where he enrolled THE LONDON GUITAR INSTITUTE. In May 2005, he won the big guitar competition GUITAR HERO UK 2005 and won equipment worth over £2000.
In June 2007, Emir graduated at THE GUITAR INSTITUTE and started recording “Sevdah Metal” – his first serous project as a solo artist. The material was written during the university time in London and luckily he got a chance to get some great musicians on the record – John West on Vocals and Mike Terrana on Drums. This album will be out early 2008 and numerous European shows should follow.