As with last year, this month’s trip to Montenegro was combined with a visit to the quaint little city of Novi Sad, Serbia for the massive annual 4-day event that is the EXIT Festival. This year was the 10th anniversary of the music festival, initially organized by local students as a protest against the repressive government of Slobodan Milosevic. As per tradition, the event was held in the giant Petrovaradin fortress, which lies across the bridge from the city on the shore of the Danube River.
Petrovaradin is the 2nd largest structure of its kind still standing in Europe. According to the always-reliable Wikipedia, there has been continuous settlement at Petrovaradin since 15000 B.C. There was already a fortress at the site in 3000 B.C. Construction on the current structure began in 1692, about five years after the Austrians had recaptured the territory from the Turks.
EXIT, voted the best music festival in Europe in 2007, brings together about 20,000 music lovers to see literally hundreds of performers on 20 stages. The crowd at this year's event seemed a lot more Serbian to me than last year, probably a result of the recession as fewer people traveled from the UK and elsewhere in Europe. However, the Brit contingent was still rather large.
Highlights of Day 1 (Thursday, July 9) included main stage performances by British chanteuse Lily Allen, with whom I was very impressed, and indie rockers the Arctic Monkeys, whom I found somewhat disappointing. After that, it was down to the dance arena for Steve Lawler vs Lee Burridge and Sasha v John Digweed. In honor of the 10th anniversary, they booked pairs of DJs and had them play back-to-back. It was a great idea and worked out well as both sets were great. Unfortunately, I got really cold in just my t-shirt by early morning so I had to leave just as James Zabiela and Nic Fanciulli came on.
Day 2 featured main stage performances by Manic Street Preachers and Korn, both of whom I found to be much better than I expected and rather enjoyable. I took a break up at the Reggae stage in between the two sets and nearly got trampled in a stampede to get into one of the fortress's tunnels when the rains began. Heidi vs Justin Martin were in the dance arena later and were decent, but the highlight of the evening was Ritchie Hawtin vs Dubfire - all the techno drumbeats you can muster, as you'd expect from them. But then the rains began again, so I gave up and went back to the hotel.
On Day 3, I met up with a couple of friends and arrived just in time to see the last few songs of punk legend Patti Smith's set. A bit disappointed that I missed part of her show as she’s still got voice and energy to spare, but I was subsequently comforted by an absolutely amazing show by electronic music legends Kraftwerk. Wow. And then Moby came on and absolutely rocked the place. It was a great night of live music, followed by my longest stay in the dance arena — basically until closing time at 8am. Etienne de Crecy did his “live”music-and-lights show, which I'd seen in Moscow a couple of weeks earlier and which I totally enjoyed. Sebastian Ingrosso v Steve Angello and Eric Prydz v Adam Beyer ably provided the soundtrack for the rest of the night, although Angello still needs to learn to never touch a microphone (why MC your own DJ set!?).
Sunday, Day 4, began with a visit to a small stage at the highest point in the fortress, where a friend had won himself a turn on the DJ decks by sending in a mix to the organizers. He did great, especially since he was given horribly faulty equipment to work with, although the location meant there were only a handful of people around to hear it. Afterward, we raced down to the main stage to catch a song or two at the end of Madness's set. Prodigy was on next but, as I've seen them live a couple of times, I went back uphill to the Fusion stage for the legendary punk band, the Buzzcocks. Then it was down to the dance arena for top Serbian DJ Marco Nastic (along with Valentino Kazyani), who usually closes out the festival but not this year. I suffered through Japanese Popstars (or maybe wandered off for a bit… can't quite remember) and then caught the beginning of Sander Kleinenberg v Darren Emerson, and at that point realized that my tired old legs couldn't take any more.
All around the festival, the people of Novi Sad exhibit the wonders of capitalism, whether it be renting out their own apartments, increasing hotel rates, or selling everything from cans of beer to corn on the cob along the streets and sidewalks approaching the fortress. This is their annual cash cow, and I don’t begrudge them that (it’s still a very inexpensive city). The best piece of marketing I saw was the Serbian co-owner of a Chinese restaurant, who parked his car, full of thermal containers of stir-fries and rice, under a big homemade sign that said “F**king Good Chinese Food”. He got my attention… I bought food from him twice.
In closing, I'll just say that EXIT is as mad and fun an event as you'll find anywhere, especially if you love all kinds of popular music. I really hope to be back next year.
