Kongres

Kongres was a rock band from Sarajevo, formed in the spring of 1982 and active until 1985, one of the bands of the city's new wave and post-punk scene of the early 1980s. Its name pointed to the 1982 congresses of the League of Communists and the League of Socialist Youth, which had announced changes in Yugoslav society. At its core were guitarist and singer Mahir Purivatra and drummer Adam Subašić, who had played together before in a cover band called Jablan, with Aljoša Buha on bass. Subašić wrote the lyrics, Purivatra the music, and the arrangements were made together.

The band played its first concert on 29 November 1982 at the Sloga club in Sarajevo, on the same bill as Disciplina Kičme, Zabranjeno Pušenje and Elvis J. Kurtović & His Meteors. In 1983 Kongres played the Sarajevo clubs and gave concerts in Zagreb, Belgrade, Novi Sad, Niš, Skopje, Banja Luka and Zenica, and it reached the final ten of the YURM festival in Zagreb. Jadranko "Dado" Džihan was briefly part of the band before he moved on to Zabranjeno Pušenje.

Diskoton first turned down the band's demos in early 1984 and changed its mind after the journalist Petar Pece Popović recommended them. Two songs appeared that year on the label's compilation Nove snage, nove nade, and the debut album Zarjavele trobente was recorded in the summer of 1984 in the studio of Radio Sarajevo and released in December 1984, in a first pressing of 2,000 copies. Most of the lyrics were in Serbo-Croatian, some in Slovene, and Zoran Predin of Lačni Franz sang as a guest on "Zabava" and on the title track.

After the album Buha left. He joined Crvena Jabuka and was killed in a car accident in September 1986 together with that band's singer Dražen Ričl. Kongres went on with players such as Igor Ivanović, Emir Cerić, Edo Gradinčić and trumpeter Zoran Erkman. In 1985 Purivatra left, bassist Nedžib "Neno" Jeleč came in, and the band recorded eight songs in two days at Brano Likić's BLAP studio for a second album, Samo da se obogatim, which was not released. The last concert was in November 1985 at the Obala open stage in Sarajevo, shortly before Subašić left for his military service, and the band ended that year. Subašić later published children's books, novels and poetry.

"Zarjavele trobente" became the band's best-known song. Predin recorded a new version on his 1992 album Gate na glavo, Crvena Jabuka covered it on Oprosti što je ljubavna in 2005, and in December 2020 Dubioza Kolektiv and Predin released their version as a single. The song was heard in the 2019 film Koncentriši se, baba and is included in Josip Dujmović's anthology 100 vječnih ex-YU rock i pop pjesama. In 2025, forty years after it was recorded, Samo da se obogatim was finally released on streaming platforms.