Zlatni Dečaci (trans. The Golden Boys) were a former Yugoslav rock band from Belgrade, notable as one of the pioneers of the former Yugoslav rock scene.

The band was formed in 1962 by high school friends: Slobodan "Boba" Stefanović (vocals), Velibor "Borko" Kacl (guitar), Predrag Lukić (keyboards), Dušan Banović (drums), and Vidoje "Vili" Brajević. Initially, the band was named The Tigers, but changed the name after a suggestion of journalist and chess master Nikola Karaklajić.

The band regularly performed at the dances held in club Euridika in Belgrade. During these evenings Stefanović performed both with Zlatni Dečaci and with Saša Radojčić's jazz trio. Moma Davidović and Tomi Sovilj performed with the band occasionally, but after some time, Stefanović remained the only vocalist.

Zlatni Dečaci wanted to break through to Yugoslav radio stations, which were at the time closed for beat music, so they started recording beat covers of classical music pieces. Karaklajić took those recordings to the Netherlands, where he participated in a chess tournament, managing to broadcast them on radio, so the editors of the label Fontana Records became interested in the band. The band, under the name Golden Boys, released the single "Swan Lake" (a theme from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's opera Swan Lake) and "Humoresque" (a verion of a humoresque by Antonín Dvořák) through the label, becoming the first Yugoslav rock band to release a record for the foreign market. A year later, those two recordings, alongside versions of the theme from Charles Gounod's opera Faust and the Ion Ivanovici's waltz "Waves of the Danube", were released on the EP Humoreska, released by Jugoton. With these compositions the band gained nationwide popularity and performed across Yugoslavia. Their next EP, released during the same year, featured the songs "Čudna devojka" ("Strange Girl", a cover of Marty Robbins' song "Devil Woman"), "Sadko" (a theme from Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's opera Sadko), "Napušteni dom" ("Deserted Home", a cover of The Four Pennies song "A Place Where No One Goes"), and "Foxtrot Oriental". The single was sold in more than 100,000 copies.

In April 1966, thanks to Karaklajić, they left to England. Karaklajić was invited to a chess tournament, and to acquire visas more easily, he represented the band members as young chess players. The band performed in Bognor Regis in front of some 1,500 people. They performed covers of rock hits, but their cover of Macedonian folk song "Jovano Jovanke" saw greatest success with the audience. Before returning home, the band also performed in the club Shoreline. During the same year, Brajević left the band, and was replaced by Gradimir Janković.

In 1967, the band released their third and the final EP with the songs "Sam" ("Alone", a cover of Bobby Vinton song "Mr. Lonely"), "Samo ti" ("Only You", a cover of The Who song "It's Not True"), "Pamtim taj dan" ("I Remember the Day", a cover of the song "Skokiaan" written by August Msarurgwa), and "Ne želim kraj" ("I Don't Want the End to Come", a cover of The Zombies song "Kind of Girl"). During the same year, after the performance on the Belgrade Spring Festival, Stefanović left the band. The rest of the band continued with the vocalist Moma Davidović, but soon ended their activity. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.