“Hey mate!” a cyclist called to us in an Australian accent as he pedaled by on the rocky dirt road that serves as the main street of the village of Theth deep in Albania’s Dinaric Alps. Along with my friend and travel companion, Dave, I had not seen another bikepacker in four days.
In Kosovo, Techno Is a Symbol of Resilience
17.08.2024 - 09:34 / cntraveler.com
This is part of Global Sounds, a collection of stories spotlighting the music trends forging connections in 2024.
In 2004, four years before Kosovo declared independence from Serbia, 16-year-old Patrik Ukiq decided to throw a party. Born and raised in the capital of Pristina, he had recently discovered house and electronic music after an older cousin, who had been immersed in the UK rave scene, brought back a couple of CDs. Those led him to online forums, where techno heads from all over the world were swapping notes on new releases and foreign DJs, and eventually, to a harebrained idea: Ukiq would fly Felipe, a well known DJ, over from Vienna to perform in Kosovo—a rare thing to happen due to post-war red tape at the border; even more so for a teenager to be the one orchestrating it. “I wasn’t even old enough for the club that I had booked him at. When I met this guy at the airport he didn’t want anything to do with me,” says Ukiq, who hadn’t revealed his age when booking the DJ. “But [I got into the club] and he ended up playing into the early hours of the morning. I was so happy. That’s when I thought, ‘this is my sound.’”
It’s a stifling June night in Pristina when I meet up with Ukiq, now 36 and a certified charmer, outside his bar Servis Fantazia. It’s a low-lit spot with a purple neon glow and the DJ booth is packed with vinyl. Just down the street, giant screens blasting the Euro soccer championships dominate Mother Teresa Boulevard—a leafy pedestrianized avenue lined with cafes that cuts through the center of town—and all around us young Kosovars are gathering in groups with anticipation for the night ahead, sipping on cold bottles of cheap Peja beer and leaning in close to light each other’s cigarettes. The trance-y, heavy thud of techno pounds out of the Servis soundsystem. Just a few days before, the city had marked 25 years since the end of the Kosovo War—and there is a sense of possibility in the air.
It’s been a landmark year for Kosovo. In addition to honoring the 25th anniversary, 2024 saw the 16-year-old nation join Europe’s Schengen Zone (after years of false starts), a generation-defining moment that means Kosovar passport holders can now travel freely around the European Union without a visa—effectively changing the lives of a generation who have not been able to move around their own continent with ease. At the Pristina airport, there are just as many Kosovars getting ready to travel out of the country as there are welcoming others in, a sight that would have been almost unimaginable just nine months ago. “A lot of people have never traveled beyond Macedonia before. Everyone is excited. In January, we all had our flights booked,” says Ukiq. “We’ve been very isolated.”
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