German the informational portal Correctiv extensively reports on what appears to be the "biggest concert in Europe": the performance Marko Perkovic "Thompson" in Zagreb next Saturday. The journalist of that portal, Jean Peters, explains to the German audience that he is "one of the most controversial musicians" in the post-Yugoslav area. Thompson became famous in the 1990s with the song "Bojna Čavoglava", which begins with the Ustasha salute - and the author reminds the German audience of the crimes of that Quisling regime in Croatia during the Second World War. writes DW.
As a rule, his concerts turn into manifestations of the extreme right, writes Korektiv: "Thompson's concerts - like the mega-event announced for July 5, 2025, for which more than 500.000 tickets have allegedly been sold - are mass gatherings that can also be interpreted as identity rituals. 'There are only a few companies that can organize such a mega-event,' an internal source who wants to stay told Korektiv anonymous. The production requires a huge technical infrastructure: about 700 speakers, more than 2.000 square meters of LED-surface, 30 equipment trucks, construction scaffolding, 2.000 security personnel and more."
"Reckoning" with journalists and media
As the German portal writes, the German company Mojo Rental is in charge of that task: "According to the court register, about three quarters of that company belongs to Evago Holding, headquartered in Bavaria. Evago also has German and Croatian branches called Mojo Rental. None of those German companies, nor their directors - Goran Marinčić (Evago Holding) and Patrik Bauer (Mojo Rental GmbH) - have responded to Korektive's inquiries regarding that engagement."
The author of the article assesses that the intolerance towards the media in the circle around Thompson is not a surprise. He reminds: "According to media reports, the singer's manager is a former member of the secret service and former director of the Police Academy in Croatia, Zdravko Barišić. When in 2014 Thompson's concert in Berlin's Columbiahalle was canceled due to protests, he accused the journalists and publicly threatened them with the words that 'the fight against them is not over yet'."
And while Zagreb is preparing for the mega-manifestation, the portal also reminds the German audience of the very long list of banned Thompson concerts throughout Europe: "Thompson's concert in 2022, despite protests, was still held in Beblingen (Baden-Württemberg, about 20 kilometers southwest of Stuttgart). Other concerts were repeatedly canceled - for example in Amsterdam, Lucerne or Maribor - although, after being banned from performing in Switzerland in 2009, he was allowed again performance. In September 2016, one of his concerts in Switzerland was suddenly canceled. The city administration then justified the decision by claiming that "public order and security cannot be guaranteed at such an event."
The trend of the extreme right in Europe
The caution of the German services can easily be explained by Thompson's probable connections with neo-Nazis in Germany, well-known to the police, according to the author of the article and states: "In 2021, Marko Perković was filmed with lawyer Davorin Karačić and Markus Frntić - a key figure of the neo-Nazi scene in Baden-Württemberg. 'What makes Thompson dangerous is not only his music - but the fact that it normalizes hatred and violence as a patriotic feeling,' says Zoran Pusić. (…) 'By accepting Thompson and his songs, the crimes of the Ustasha gradually become socially and politically acceptable - racism, anti-Semitism, hatred towards Roma and Serbs.' According to Pusić, the president of the Anti-Fascist League of Croatia, this fits into the wider European trend of normalization of the radical right - from Italy to the Alternative for Germany."
The German portal therefore asks the question, how the current mayor of Zagreb, Tomislav Tomašević, allowed the concert to take place in the first place and quotes his answer to the Croatian media: "Thompson is not my choice when it comes to music, nor when it comes to politics. But I am not a supporter of banning concerts and I think that it is counterproductive. Anyone who sings Ustasha songs and wears such symbols is unacceptable and that is a matter for the police," quotes the Zagreb mayor's Corrective.
