electronic music

Radiohouse

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Funkhaus stands for a broadcasting station in German, and is also one of my favourite venue in Berlin. Not surprisingly, this building is a former GDR radio broadcast centre built in the 50s. It’s located far East of the city, overlooking River Spree and it’s already quite a challenge to get in there, especially if you do it for the first time. In 2017, it was a venue for events like TOA, Loop and various concerts labeled as Funkhaus Sessions, such as Francesco Tristano’s, Jan Jelinek’s & Kaithlyn Aurelia Smith’s or Lamb’s 20th anniversary tour.

Since music is one of the primary reasons why I’ve been living in Berlin for over 3 years, both in my professional and in my private life, no wonder I spend a good chunk of my time off at gigs. I’m no longer keen to put long hours in partying, I focus mostly on the concerts these days.

And Funkhaus is one of my top-notch venue for large-scale electronic and experimental music events, live performances and installations. It’s also a house for MONOM, an experimental performance and spatial sound studio, equipped with a high-spec 4DSOUND system, a spatial instrument that enables a physical and interactive sound environment.

What I love the most about concerts at Funkhaus, is the great fusion of 50s architecture taste, great sound acoustics and a special, intimate bond between the artists on stage and the audience.

I am already looking forward to some of the Funkhaus Sessions in 2018, as the line up looks equally exciting as in the past couple of years.

In the summer, especially when the events such as Tech Open Air take place, one can reach Funkhaus by a boat, in the winter, it often means a long ride in the darkness by a tram 21 and a long walk by the misty banks of Spree. The feeling of arriving in the cosy, stylish and wooden House of the Radio Sound is one of it’s kind though.

So even if today I’ll miss Nils Frahm’s concert I was waiting for a long time (sold out 6 months in advance or so), simply because a January flu knocked me off my feet this week, I hope others that can participate in this event, will enjoy it on my behalf!

 

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Kosmische Klänge

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Exactly 3 years ago I started off writing this blog with a very ambitious plan to describe the most remarkable happenings in my life, starring the city of Berlin as a main hero(ine). Since then my life took various twists, turns and I focused on different things. You could read about the clubbing peculiarities, concerts and music performances, contemporary art and dance, and last but not least: about my getaways within Germany and more distant corners of the planet Earth.

These days I am running behind my backlog of the events, socializing and trying to balance it out with getting away from Berlin at least once per month. To remain ever-changing fresh perspective, look for inspirations and discover the unknown. At the same time, I get older and enjoy living healthy, sleeping a lot and binge reading good books.

 

And there are still places I have not yet discovered! This month’s spotlight goes onto the Planetarium (Zeiss-Grossplanetarium in Prenzlauer Berg). Ever since I saw it’s colourful, illuminated copula I was curious about the events happening inside the eye for the cosmos. Still, I had no expectations, like with most of the new places I visit.

 

For my initial visit, I picked an event which involved not only spatial views, but also cosmic sounds labeled as ‘Contentious Constant‘ by M.E.S.H., Sapphire Slows & Moonwheel.

 

The blend of music, sound and space was breathtaking: I teleported myself on another orbit, and found it difficult to come back. Especially that I developed some light motion sickness while travelling without moving in planetarium.

 

The Zeiss-Gross Planetarium is celebrating over 30 years of existence and offers various events: from typically scientific presentations to concerts and classical music. A mixture of drone music in space was probably the most amazing choice to combine my own tastes.

 

To finalize the food for thought for this month’s highlight I realized that my expectations from art and events have risen greatly for the past couple of years. There are spaces in Berlin which almost always guarantee truly high-quality art experience, and there are some good surprises from the new places too. However, in the jungle of art and music scene events that this city lives and breathes, sometimes it’s difficult to differentiate the truly amazing gems from mediocre stuff. Since I made a conscious decision to only dedicate time to good things in life, art is no exception.

März Musik

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März – in German ‘March’ is the long month of transition in this part of the world. In between the neverending winter and the long-awaited summer, the darkness and the light, the Berlinale and the Freiluftkino season, the CTM and the Atonal. I actually love the feeling when the first, more intense rays of the morning sun burn my face on my way to work… on my bike \o/ (I love my bike, but I am not one of these Berliners riding their bikes even when temperatures drop to a negative scale!).

Two years ago, high on discovering all the new places in the city, I participated for the first time in the event organized by Berliner Festspiele in my beloved music cathedral aka Kraftwerk called ‘The Long Now’. The concept of it is to bring a super ambitious line up of electronic musicians for a 29 hours long event of the Daylight Saving Time overnight switch, allowing the participants to indulge into the darkness, even allowing some sleeping spots at the venue.

A year ago, alongside with the event, there were corresponding installations in the neighbouring Radialsystem V and Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien which were pretty amazing. ‘Extended Compositions’ showed e.g. the works of weapons transformed into instruments, shooting the music, not war ❤

In Radialsystem V, the Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota together with alif created a musical installation’Split in the wall’ with music as a concept of blood running through the veins – instruments.

The dreamy Long Now event will happen again this year from 25th March 18:59 till 26th March 23:59. Emerge in the lucid dreaming while in Kraftwerk, before the spring will take over the city.

And it all makes me feel how long was my winter sleep and how great is to face spring again. Simple, but happiness is free when this feeling hits!

29th Nov

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29th Nov is a special day in Berlin, which could probably be added as an extra day off (there are very few Public Holidays in this city anyway!). What happened on that day I have no idea, apart from what I’ve googled now. Apparently Godzilla received its star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but I’m not sure this could be a trigger for creating some of the craziest, quirkiest and most creative label for techno videos.

Last year I was lucky to celebrate 9 years of 29th Nov films on the already legendary Boiler Room party and looking forward to its 10th anniversary.

Maybe it is a coincidence, but it seems there is some strange tradition of throwing 29 hour long parties in this beautiful city. Apart from celebrating 29th Nov, almost each year The Long Now is celebrating the seasons change with a 29 hour show in Kraftwerk.

Since November is the month when the days are getting unbelievably dark, cold and gloomy, having started my 3rd year in Berlin, I fall back into living out of the amazing offer that this city has for music aficionados like me: be it jazz concerts, contemporary dance classes or amazing line ups every week(end).

Or binge-watching Youtube videos, since GEMA has finally allowed most of the content that was out of reach for German IPs for years, due to its famous lawsuit. I can totally recommend randomly choosing 29th Nov videos, and you will not be disappointed. I have consciously chosen some of my favourite ones below, although I could easily start a campaign of posting one video every day for the rest of the month.

Till then, the will be enough reasons this month to celebrate. Commemorating the freedom that brought the fall of the Wall, first snow in the city (apparently next Tuesday already) or Prince Charles (the club, it is) anniversary with some amazing DJs coming up like Theo Parrish or Moodymann. Plus hopefully Donald Trump losing the elections very soon. In any case, happy 29th Nov everyone!

Sound Sculpture in Szczecin

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Last month for me was exceptionally full of events in Berlin during the work week, and shorter or longer getaways during the weekends. Similarly like last year around springtime, I felt tempted to explore not only Berlin and Brandenburg, but also the coastline.

Triggered by the concert of one of my favourite Polish electronic music producers in the newly built Philharmonic Hall in Szczecin, together with my friend, we decided to spend a weekend in Szczecin, the biggest Polish city situated next to the North-Eastern frontier.

Typically people would go there on the way to some other locations: like for instance Polish seaside towns or even more popular summer festivals, like Plötzlich am Meer. The train ride to Szczecin would take us less than 2 hours and cost… less than 6 EUR, if you manage to find your ‘Berlin-Brandenburg-Ticket’ group, which is almost a ritual part of this route. Otherwise, if you don’t feel like socializing, you can stick to a special fare, individual ticket for 10 EUR.

On this weekend, there were also anti-abortion law protests all over Poland
Very crude symbol of abortion, used to show support for women in access to legal and not penalized abortion
Typical Szczecin water pump you will see in many places around Old Town

Szczecin itself has its specific charm. On one hand, it’s probably one of the most spacious cities in terms of territory: situated by the bay, river and countless lakes, it is indeed huge. Given its difficult, war, post-war and heavily industrialised history, it also seems derelict or unproportionally uncrowded comparing to its size. This has a lot to do with the migrations to other bigger cities or neighbouring Germany. So obviously there are places one shouldn’t visit after the sun goes down.

However, there are some sparkles of creativity in reconstructing the city, and bringing more cultural events. The area surrounding the castle and the promenade is full of interesting street art and the city tries to attract different people by hosting cultural events such as Kontrapunkt, or at least inviting unusual artists like Skalpel for the electronic music showcases in the extraordinary set up in the Philharmonic, which is worth visiting itself.

I enjoyed this visit greatly, given that I was pointed many recommendations by my friends originating from Szczecin and the concert exceeded my expectations.

If you like history, scratching beyond the surface, and discovering the beauty in the atypically interesting architecture, yet you’re bold enough – visiting Szczecin sounds good in combining it with one of its cultural events.