Don’t EXIT

The EXIT music festival happens every year in the city of Novi Sad on the first weekend of July for three days. This year, you can expect notable names in the music industry like Boris Brejcha and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, the biggest music festival in Serbia and one of the biggest in all Balkans.

This year EXIT is nominated for the BEST MUSIC FESTIVAL in the world by the NME (New Music Express) Awards, one of the most recognized media covers in the music, film, and culture industry. They have already won 2x "The Best Major European Festival" by the EU Festival Awards and the "Best Overseas Festival" at UK Festival Awards. The recommendations got for the world's best events from huge newspapers like CNN, BBC, and The New York Times.

In 2021, they made history of being the first major European festival to happen since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic with more than 18.000 people attending in the four days of the festival, something that Billboard considered historic when almost all the celebrations were postponed, they say "Yes, we are going to make it," Dusan Kovacevic, founder CEO of Exit, in an interview to Pollstar he can't understand why in some countries they allowed sports events but music isn't, in kind of joke Dusan say's "The virus likes music, but don't like sports" to say that for him they are the same thing. Everyone that wants to attend the festival needs to prove they are COVID-free, recover, or vaccinated prior to getting the wristbands to participate in the festival. To make things easier, they provide free rapid tests to the locals that want to attend the festival, and the foreigners could use the negative test they take to enter the country (only for the 4-day ticket). They have huge names, without disappointing the fans, like David Guetta, Amelie Lens, Charlotte de Witte, and Robin Schulz, even with last-minute cancelations.

David, from Spain, last year’s participant at the festival, says that at the beginning, he and his friends felt a little strange knowing they would go to the festival after a long time. In the middle of a pandemic, something that was “forgotten” due to the hype of the trip and the strict control, they pass to enter the country. At the festival venue, they were given a feeling of safeness, and proof of that was, a few months later, he went again to another music festival. This festival is a mustgo if you are into Electronic Music more in Techno style.

The location (Petrovaradin Fortress) gives a unique vibe to the festival, with aa lot of stages to choose from that you can enjoy for 12h straight if you can handle that. If not, you have rest areas that are calmer with less noise so that you can recover. A plus point to this festival is the staff that is very helpful and ready to solve any problem that you have quickly.

We can say that the realization of the festival was a kind of throwback to her primordial editions, that was a kind of a protest to government policies. This festival arouses interest in Macedonia, where many young people go to Novi Sad every year. Agencies organize tours, but individual trips are also popular. David from Spain, who was in Macedonia last year, took the opportunity and “jumped” to Vojvodina for a couple of days.

José Rodrigues

Sources:

EXIT Festival: About us

Billboard: EXIT Festival Serbia, Dance Recap Pollstar: Video interview with exit CEO duan kovaevi

Festicket: EXIT Festival welcomes 180,000 fans as first major european festival to take place this summer

Q&A with David Valero

Flaticon: Freepick