45 years of „Paket aranžman” at Kaštel Pula on August 22 - Električni orgazam and Vlada Divljan's Nevladina organizacija

Forty-five years since „Paket aranžman”, the record that opened the Belgrade new wave, are marked on August 22 at Kaštel Pula in Croatia. Taking the stage are Električni orgazam and Nevladina organizacija, the band of Vlada Divljan, formerly of VIS Idoli. Doors at 21:00, and the ticket costs 30 euros, around 1,850 denars.

„Paket aranžman” came out on February 18, 1981 on Jugoton, and it gathered three Belgrade bands at once: Šarlo akrobata, Električni orgazam and Idoli. Eleven songs, recorded in 1980 at the Druga Maca studio in Belgrade, all of them new except Idoli's „Maljčiki”, a re-recording of their second single. It is rare for a single record to change the direction of an entire scene, but this one did exactly that - it marked the beginning of the Belgrade new wave and has stayed a cult record in every country that emerged after the break-up of Yugoslavia.

Of the three bands on the record, Električni orgazam is the only one that never fully stopped playing. Idoli broke up in 1984, and Vlada Divljan, the band's founder and chief songwriter, died in March 2015 in Vienna after a fight with a rare form of cancer. The group he led in his final years, Nevladina organizacija, continues with Zdenko Kolar, bassist from the original Idoli line-up. Which means Divljan's songs tonight are played by a man who played them when they were first recorded.

Kaštel Pula is a Venetian fortress on the hill above the city, an open-air stage looking over the bay of Pula. That is a setting that suits music which never wanted to be in a hall. The event continues on August 23, and tickets are via entrio.hr.