CTM Berlin just come back from the Club Transmediale Festival (for Adventurous Music and Related Visual Arts) in Berlin which despite the long winded title is a really good event spread over 10 days in venues all over Berlin. Although the predominant genre is Techno it covers everything from the most out-there noise to the most in-there ambient and everything in between. The days have lectures, talks, discussions, workshops, exhibitions and demonstrations - and the nights have events in dark sweaty clubs (that people still smoke in) with top quality sound systems and a massive array of music from all corners of dance and electronica. The only names I knew were 4-tet and Joris Voorn but i guess you lot will know more but it's a great place to get to see bands and DJ's at the cutting edge who you would be unlikely to see elsewhere and especially up here. A special mention to the band with a lousy name - Holy Fuck from Canada - who were a rock solid and inventive drummer and powerful bass player teamed with a pair of bedroom geeks playing a pile of old lo-fi crappy keys/ effects pedals/ mics and machines which was accurately described in the catalogue as 'euphoric electronic noise full of anarchic spontaneity, 100% raw 100% handmade 100% energy' -- some of the best dance music I ever heard and totally unclassifiable If you think that dance music is a tired genre then try this festival next year. It will perk you up no end.
ha ha yes I went on my arse a couple of times. one of the venues was just off Alexanderplatz in an old DDR building - three floors- one about the size of Foundation, dark with big video screens, absolutely rammed with a wild variety of types of people, sweat dripping off the ventilation pipes, people smoking (don't know if it's banned in Germany?) really good German beer - another small room with more mainstream stuff and the top floor with the most interesting stuff (like a bloke playing stuff using 2 wii controllers and a mic inside his mouth) plus a place doing soup and sandwiches and a chill out space. They still had people queueing up to get in at 3.30am How crap are the venues here compared to that?
No I never came across him. I did go in a shop selling secondhand lederhosen. which is just about the most pervy place ever. all that leather all those zips.
