Pistolero Collective celebrates 20 years of underground activity with a massive four-floor event taking over AKC Medika in Zagreb on May 22.
Spanning the Medika courtyard, AKC Attack, Surogat and Mikro spaces, the event brings together an extensive international and regional lineup covering everything from breakbeat, drum & bass and electro to psytrance, dark progressive, techno, tekno and tribe.
Over the last two decades, Pistolero has established itself as one of Croatia’s most distinctive underground electronic music collectives, consistently operating outside mainstream club culture while building a strong identity rooted in psychedelic sound, rave energy and DIY spirit.
This anniversary event feels less like a standard party and more like a full-scale gathering of the wider underground community that has grown around the collective over the years.
One of the highlights of the night will be DŽENERATION 81, a live drum & bass band made up of Janko Novoselić, Theron Tourett and DJ Venom.
Novoselić is widely recognized as one of Croatia’s best drummers through projects such as Kozmodrum, TBF and the Croatian Radiotelevision Jazz Orchestra, while Theron Tourett is an essential part of ABOP. DJ Venom completes the trio with world-class turntablism and scratch skills, having previously reached the finals of the world DJ championships.
Together, DŽENERATION 81 delivers a powerful live drum & bass performance built around high energy, live improvisation and futuristic rave intensity.
The international side of the lineup is equally strong.
British psytrance producer ASIMILON arrives from the legendary Bom Shanka label and is also known as one half of the Psymmetrix project.
His sound combines groove-heavy psychedelic trance with high-impact dancefloor energy designed for large festival and club environments.
From Italy comes KALOO, a tekno and tribe producer known for improvisational live performances filled with raw energy, unpredictable transitions and heavy low-end pressure.
Swiss artist HERBA brings a darker psytechno and darkprog direction with hypnotic atmospheres and deep basslines, while Slovenian producer BLAAZNY delivers forest-influenced dark progressive psytrance layered with tribal percussion and acid details.
The local lineup also plays a major role throughout the event.
Artists including DMT, HAKTAL, LO PEAKS, PIPS, SVN, VAL VASHAR, WINPA, ZBVX and ZMAYO represent multiple generations of Croatia’s underground electronic scene through styles ranging from psytrance and techno to electro and bass music.
Visual production will further transform the Medika complex into a fully immersive rave environment.
VJ Ka, VJ Lysergej Balsamico, VJ Pola, VJ Wild Bronco and Andrija Santro are responsible for the event’s audiovisual experience across the different spaces.
In case of rain, the live concert portion of the program will move from the courtyard into AKC Attack.
Tickets are available for €10 in presale through CoreEvent and €15 at the entrance.
Twenty years later, Pistolero continues standing as one of Zagreb’s last truly uncompromising underground rave institutions — still loud, chaotic, psychedelic and deeply connected to the culture that built it.
