The 8th EXIT festival featured about 150,000 music fans, 28 stages, and four wild nights in Novi Sad, a city 80km north of Belgrade. The event kicked off on July 12th, with more than 10,000 people on hand for opening day.

Performers this year included the Beastie Boys, Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant, The Prodigy, Lauren Hill, and Wu-Tang Clan. More than 50 other bands and DJs took part in the event.

EXIT 2007's theme was hip-hop music. The stars of the show were rappers Snoop Dogg, The Beastie Boys, and Wu-Tang Clan. Those on other musical wavelengths could enjoy performances by the British electronic band The Prodigy, which kicked off the festival, and by Plant.

Festival officials say this year's EXIT drew a record-breaking crowd from outside the country. As many as 40% were foreigners. Organisers set up a special camping area with room for 10,000 visitors from abroad.

"This year, for the first time, we have a sold-out festival," said EXIT spokesman Sagor Meskovic. "Half the audience is international -- some 5,000 from the former Yugoslavia, 10,000 from Britain, even Australians, Mexicans, Japanese. Technically we are also better, we have a bigger dance stage, an improved sound and light system. Everything is on a higher level, more spectacular."

Visitors had the opportunity to enjoy guided tours and parties. A ticket for the entire four days cost 80 euros, while each individual day was priced differently. Inside the fortress, tokens were used instead of currency -- a move that bothered some fans, forced people to wait in line to exchange their dinars.

Since its inception in 2000, EXIT has been about more than music. That was true this year as well. Just before the festival began, organisers and the MTV music channel launched the EXIT Movement, a set of concerts throughout the Balkans intended to promote tolerance. Activists, meanwhile, sought to draw attention to a Council of Europe-sponsored antidiscrimination campaign called Different but Equal.

For the second year in a row, EXIT also sent a strong message to the EU, asking for the visa regime to be relaxed for residents of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

"We are still continuing our visa abolition campaign, to get Serbia on the EU's Schengen White List," said Rajko Bozic of the EXIT organising committee.


The first EXIT was held in 2000, in opposition to the regime of then Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. The event quickly outgrew Serbia, and today, it is one of the top music festivals in Europe