DJ T. tour blog: Week 11

DJ T. tour blog: Week 11

25 September, 2009 | 5.31AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: dj charts, dj t, dj t blog, get physical

Berlin has a new industry gathering for the electronic music world. The first edition of BerMuDa (Berlin Music Days) took place last week, and here in his weekly blog Berliner DJ T. from Get Physical explains why he’s particularly excited about the event and its future, and he provides some insight into the politics behind the scenes.

His thoughts come to us straight from the long road of his world tour, which this week, included club stops at Electrosanne Festival in Lausanne, Zurich’s Hive club, and Watergate in Berlin.

And with the summer now sadly drifting into darkness, DJ T. wraps up the warmer months with a ‘2009 Summer Has Gone’ DJ chart. 

BerMuDa: Just like the notorious triangle, it was hard to escape this clubby construct (full marks for the genius abbreviation, by the way) during the last few weeks in Berlin.

Nevertheless, the average party animal knew little more than the term’s linguistic heritage: Berlin Music Days. Well, I guess four solid nights of partying and spreading the name to the unwashed masses are nothing to be scoffed at on this maiden voyage.

After all, it took the short notice cancellation of Popkomm, the world’s largest music trade fair, to give the spiritual fathers behind the BerMuDa project that decisive kick up the butt to finally put their idea into practice – a vague concept that had been dangling above their collective heads like a tantalising, overripe fruit for ages.

A mere three months earlier, the unexpected premature demise of the German music industry’s trademark gathering had caused a stir on the net and forced Hack and Wormbacher into a rush of spontaneous improvisation. Makeshift DIY versus careful planning? A prime example of Berlin’s unique charm and what sets the city apart from the rest …

Here, spontaneity, authenticity and genuine fun tend to take precedence over business plans and marketing strategies. And the result speaks for itself: the trial run was a success, the name is starting to spread beyond the city and country limits, curiosity has been piqued … a great foundation for taking it all a lot further next year, for thinking big and filling the name with meaning and content.

So, what are BerMuDa’s goals and ideals? Aim high seems to be the prime objective: BerMuDa’s initiators, Watergate masterminds Steffen Hack aka Stoffel and Ulrich Wombacher aka DJ Metro want nothing more than to give Berlin THE music event for the next decade, something the city richly deserves.

A blend of festival, presentation forum and meet & greet for all business segments relevant to the realm of electronic music.

But check it out for yourselves, e. g. in the Fresh Milk TV interview with my colleagues M.A.N.D.Y. (German only): it’s high time to create a counterbalance to the perennial dual reign of WMC/Miami and Sonar/Barcelona – the genre’s two undisputed major international festivals and trade fairs– with a spicy, spiky and freshly-scented alternative.

While the list of great reasons for such a commitment is already exhaustive, it seems almost self-evident that a city of Berlin’s club culture standing should cement its position even further with such a high-calibre event.

The shift sent tremors through the music industry. No surprise there – after all, with Popkomm the majors lost their main presentation platform. With the public and highly publicised cancellation of Popkomm, Dieter Gorny, a well-known and well-worn alpha male of the German pop circus, had exerted blatant pressure on the Berlin senate to come to the music industry’s rescue.

Once again, Gorny blamed the cancellation on monetary losses from Internet piracy. According to him, most of the large labels simply could not afford their Popkomm attendance due to illegal download-related revenue deficits.

Watching this collective wallowing in self-pity and blatant courtship for government handouts by the old guard was pretty cringe-worthy and pathetic. Meanwhile, it looks like the insiders behind the scenes had already put their machinations in motion because the very same press release also announced the trade fair’s imminent relaunch.

Now, I have to confess ignorance as to how this new! improved! event might miraculously ease the financial burden of the individual participants, but then again I guess I don’t have to understand everything … It goes without saying that none of the majors displayed even a hint of insight that they themselves might have missed out on breathing new life into Popkomm and thus might be the ones to blame for the fair’s slow and sneaking loss of prestige, image and reputation.

Or that – for years on end – they had simply backed the wrong horses and thus helped to dig their own boring graves.

The Berlin senate responded with unusual alacrity. On September 16, it published the press release “The Place To Be For Music: Berlin Music Week starts 2010” featuring a. o. the following gems: “Senate unites stakeholders of the Berlin music business under one umbrella brand” or “every year in mid-September, the Berlin Music Week will integrate stakeholders from all genres and bring together all of Berlin’s activities and events from the realm of music.”

Further down, Harald Wolf – senator for Economics, Technology and Women’s Affairs – is quoted as follows: “We aim to integrate initiatives like All2gethernow, with its bar camp and conference, or the electronic music festival BerMuDa. As a strategic partner, Popkomm will be involved in the early planning stages.”

While this might sound okay, it does make me wonder if they are trying just that little bit too hard to join in a union what isn’t meant to be together. The two BerMuDa founders, for example, couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw themselves roped into this cause, without prior notice or giving consent.

So, it remains to be seen if next year will bring a peaceful co-existence between the Berlin Music Days and Berlin Music Week or if we are in for a destructive pissing contest – the BerMuDa team will certainly not surrender its independence. Will there be competing events in the same week or will Hack and Wombacher bring their own forward?

If it was up to me, I would probably stage BerMuDa two to three weeks prior to the Berlin Music Week – not least of all to make the most of the city’s open air locations. I guess we will find out next year! Whatever happens, it will definitely stir things up a bit.

Naturally, the entire Get Physical crew is 100% behind the BerMuDa concept, so we decided to bring out the heavy guns for the opening party to the four BerMuDa nights.

Doubling up as a celebration of our ‘7 Year Anniversary’ compilation, we slapped together a delectable line-up including M.A.N.D.Y., Thomas Schumacher, Heidi, Italoboyz, Catz N ´Dogz, Einzelkind, Siopis, Glimpse, Gavin Herlihy and yours truly – a total of nine label ambassadors that whipped up a storm across the venue’s two floors.

What an amazing party – those are the nights that remind you just why you have worked your arse off all year! We can’t wait to get physical again at BerMuDa 2010 …

Okay, that’s enough Berlin-based triangulation – let’s move on to my weekend in the land of fromage. Somehow, I had never quite warmed to Switzerland – sure, I’ve had some amazing times during the 1990s, driving to Streetparade or one of Leila Bennaissa’s A Vision open airs, which usually culminated in a spaced out astral journey to the odd glacier and beyond … yeah, those days left an indelible mark on my raver’s heart.

On the other hand, I’ve never really gelled with the place as a DJ – or the country with me. But more recently, the aforementioned Leila – grand dame of the Swiss techno scene – has been hard at work to change all this.

Over the last year or two, my bookings have stepped up quite a bit. Nevertheless, last weekend was a first: my first complete feelgood weekend and my very first Swiss gig outside of Zurich, at the Electrosanne Festival in Lausanne followed by a stint at Zurich’s Hive Club.

I had been looking forward to Lausanne, this most western (geographically speaking) of Switzerland’s major cities, almost straddling the French border at Lake Geneva.

Well, you probably guessed it already – as usual, I saw nothing of the place, no picturesque embankment promenade, no towering castles, cathedrals or Old Town marvels; as usual, I opted for the sanctity of a few precious hours of sleep and restoration instead … pretty tragic, this life of a DJ on the road – somehow, you’re right in the middle of it, but never actually there.

I was welcomed with open arms by my supersweet and extremely courteous, but completely uninformed artist relations contact.

No big surprise – she usually works as a photographer and took time off from her day job to be my guide for the night. She took great care of me and – a lot later on in the early morning hours, after a lengthy, alcohol-fuelled night (it was pretty much raining Jaegermeister) - she made sure that I got back to the hotel in one piece.

The festival itself encompassed seven different clubs and one large open air location, all within easy walking distance. Note to self: at least I managed to check out some of the other venues before my set … does this count as sightseeing?

By the way – one of the most remarkable things about this three-night festival was that it managed to do without huge crowd-pullers but worked extremely well nonetheless.

Bukkador & Fishbeck, whose slot preceded mine, did a more than competent job, but the crowd seemed pretty indifferent. Fortunately, this changed towards the end of my set – with the stragglers from other venues streaming in for one last dance – and the final showdown, in the bright glare of the house lights, was absolutely fantastic.

The following afternoon I took the train to Zurich and enjoyed a compensatory dose of first-rate sightseeing. As some of you might remember from an earlier blog entry, I love train travel, so this journey across verdant meadows and Alpine reaches really set my heart on fire.

Hint to promoters: please book me for gigs in beautiful countries, throw in an hour or two on the train and you’ll have me wrapped around your little finger … and if this wasn’t enough already, Anatol Gwschind and Adrian Flavour – the Hive Club’s promoter duo – are eminently lovable and run one of the best dance clubs in Switzerland, so the evening was saved before it had even started.

For an added extra, the dinner brought another pleasant surprise: they had booked one of my favourite newcomer producers, André aka &ME, to play the same floor.

Back in Berlin, we are almost neighbours, but somehow had never bumped into each other. At the dinner, I followed Anatol’s recommendation and ordered the Belgian speciality ‘Moules et Frites’, a super-simple dish of mussles and fries, but complex delight of mingling flavours.

Together with the freely flowing wine, grappa and espresso it put me into a pleasant, slightly psychoactive mood that set the theme for the entire night. Great music, (Andre’s set was excellent), happy faces on the dancefloor, buckets of Jaegermeister and – to round off the night – a few drunken table football matches with Adrian. Let’s have a rematch next year!

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