New Primitives
New Primitivism was an urban subcultural movement that originated in Sarajevo during early-to-mid 1980s. The movement was identified with Zabranjeno pušenje and Elvis J. Kurtović & His Meteors bands, whose members were the driving forces behind it. Its creators and most notable personalities include Elvis J. Kurtović, dr. Nele Karajlić, Rizo Petranović, mr. Sejo Sexon, Malkolm Muharem, Dražen Ričl, Branko "Đuro" Đurić, Boris Šiber, Zenit Đozić, and others from Sarajevo neighbourhood of Koševo. Some of the people from the above group also created the Top lista nadrealista sketch show that started on radio but eventually moved to TV, going on to become another staple of the movement.
Other bands that at one time or another identified with New Primitives include: Bombaj Štampa, Plavi orkestar, Dinar and Crvena jabuka, although they quickly moved on to more commercial and communicative forms of expression.
The movement expressed itself primarily in musical (Zabranjeno pušenje, Elvis J. Kurtović & His Meteors) and radio/TV (Top lista nadrealista) form. Film director Emir Kusturica was an associate and friend of the crew, and although his movies can not be directly associated with the movement, their spirit certainly shares some sentiment with New Primitivism.
New Primitives were actually more a group of neighborhood friends than a coherent movement. It is hard to identify many actual followers of the movement. However, the fresh spirit that the group left in the urban Sarajevo culture and a quite new way of expression, flooding directly from street subculture, attracted significant popularity.
The discourse of New Primitivism was primarily humorous, based on the spirit of Bosnian ordinary people from cultural underground. They introduced the jargon, rich in Turcisms, of Sarajevo mahalas (suburban neighborhoods) into the official musical and TV scene. Most of their songs and sketches involve stories about small people—coalmine workers, petty criminals, provincial girls etc. -- put in unusual or even absurd situations. There are comparisons between Monty Python's Flying Circus show and New Primitives methods, as they share the short sketch form and utilize absurdity as means to elicit laughs from the audience.