Turbo-folk is a subgenre of contemporary South Slavic pop music that initially developed in Serbia during the 1990s as a fusion of techno and folk.
The term was an invention of the Montenegrin singer Rambo Amadeus, who jokingly described the aggressive, satirical style of music as "turbo folk".
Reports of turbo-folk from 2023 describe the music used for diasporic youth in these areas to "socialise and live out the culture of their country of origin" according to Dr Müller-Suleymanova of ZHAW.
[8] This liberal section of Serbian and Croatian society explicitly viewed this music as vulgar, almost pornographic kitsch, glorifying crime, moral corruption and nationalist xenophobia.
In addition to making a connection between turbofolk and "war profiteering, crime & weapons cult, rule of force and violence", in her book Smrtonosni sjaj (Deadly Splendor) Belgrade media theorist Ivana Kronja refers to its look as "aggressive, sadistic and pornographically eroticised iconography".