Eastern European Rave Capital Goes Silent

We travelled to the abandoned capital of the Eastern European rave in Crimea.

"It would be great if Kazantip returned," says one old woman, sitting at a wooden desk, allegedly having a minute of rest after work.

"Drug addicts would come here and they'd bring drugs," the second woman contradicts her. "Thank you Putin for good pensions," she adds later.

Read More: Human Rights Watch Rare Visit to Annexed Crimea, Explained

This is a conversation between two elderly women from the village of Popovka in Crimea, where the 'Kazantip' music festival used to take place. It was one of the most famous rave festivals in the post-soviet space dating back to the 1990s.

The festival has been a steady source of tourist revenues for locals.
"When Kazantip first began, the locals would complain. The music was loud. It's mainly elderly people that live here. But then people realised that they could make money from it and then they came around. Now they complain that there aren't any parties here anymore," says one local man.

In 2016, two years after Russia annexed Crimea, the festival was banned by the local authorities. Hromadske travelled to the village of Popovka in annexed Crimea, where the major electronic music festival 'Kazantip' used to take place. The report shows what the place once considered to be the Eastern European capital of rave music looks like now.