Diskoton

Yugoslav record label Diskoton was formally established in 1972 in Sarajevo at the instigation of Asim Haverić, then an employee of Beograd Disk record label. He persuaded Jovo Beatović, manager of the city public utility company Park in Sarajevo, to organize a record production within his enterprise, which otherwise took care of city parks and green areas. Record production started in 1973 and Diskoton operated as a subsidiary of Park until 1977 when it became independent. Diskoton premises were located in Pionirska dolina, a popular city park and zoo maintained by Park company. The label acquired its name through a public call advertized by a popular magazine Ven, opting to pick a name suggested by young musician Brano Likić, later the founder and leader of the band Rezonansa. Diskoton’s first equipment were French-made automatic press machines Materiel Applications Plastiques (MAP) for 7” record manufacturing. In the earliest months of operation, due to unskilled staff, a large quantity of PVC was wasted because the machines turned out defected records, which were then trashed. Diskoton could manufacture only singles and EP records until the late 1975, when they acquired the equipment for manufacturing LP records as well as cassettes. Starting from 1980 Diskoton began occassionally using the service pressing of Jugoton pressing plant, while it became almost entirely dependent on the service pressing of PGP RTB pressing plant by the late 1980s. CD production started in 1990, shortly before the label and its facilities were destroyed during the war operations at the beginning of the Siege of Sarajevo in summer of 1992. Since 1984 Diskoton operated under the Yugoslav socialist labour law as a “work organization” (RO) (RO "Diskoton") within the “composite organization of associated labour” (SOUR) "Svjetlost" (SOUR "Svjetlost") publishing house in Sarajevo until 1991 when under the new market-oriented legal reform it was restructured as a joint-stock company (limited by shares) (d.d.). As of 1983 Diskoton produced about 200 releases annually, including programmes of folk, pop and film soundtrack music, often in co-production with RTV Sarajevo. Up until 1983 Diskoton achieved the most success through the licence agreement with Motown Record Corporation, thereby releasing selected titles of soul music (Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, the Jackson 5, the Commodores etc.) for the Yugoslav market. The most prominent A&R executives of Diskoton were Vajo Milošević and Slobodan Vujović, the latter being formerly the leader of the band Ambasadori.