decoded_ Something for your mind… Something for your mind…

July 28, 2007

Holiday memories…

Filed under: Travel — decoded_ @ 7:46 pm

Some of the other things we got up to on our holiday, places we went, things we did, sights we saw… I’ll set up a Flickr account soon and start posting up some photo’s. More things to be added, trying to remember it all…

Barcelona (Spain)
Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família
Parc Güell & Casa-Museu Gaudí
La Ramblas
Mercat de Sant Josep o la Boquería
Girona (Catalonia, Spain)
Figueres (Girona)
Teatre-Museu Dalí (Figueres)
Mies Van Der Rohe German Pavilion
La Pedrera by Antoni Gaudí
Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona
Forum Building/Area

Frankfurt-Am-Main (Germany)
Hammering Man Statue
Roemerberg
Zum Gemalten Haus
Schnittstelle Mastering & Vinylschnitt
Zeilgalerie
Galeria Kaufhof
Karstadt
Oceans 13 (Film)
Diehard 4.0 (Film)
Delirium Records
Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof
ICE
RMV
River Main

Cologne (Köln Germany)
Kolner Dom
Museum Ludwig
Kompakt Records
Schokoladenmuseum Köln (Lindt Chocolate Museum)
River Rhine

Paris (France)
Thalys
Metropolian
Musée de l’Orangerie
Musée Marmottan
Musée d’Orsay
Centre Pompidou
Arc de Triomphe
Tour Eiffel
Champs-Élysées
La Défense Grande Arche
Exposition 1940-1990 Histories D’Informatique
Giverny (Paris France)
Monet’s Water Garden, Gardens & Home (Giverny)
Musée d’Art Américain (Giverny)
Auvers-sur-Oise (Paris France)
The Church at Auvers
The Town Hall at Auvers
Auberge Ravoux dite Maison de Van Gogh (Auvers)
Grave of Vincent (& Theodore) Van Gogh (Auvers)
River Seine

Amsterdam (Netherlands)
Spaarnwoude (Netherlands)
Awakenings ‘Awakefest’ Festival 2007

Berlin (Germany)
Fernsehturm – TV Tower
Reichstag
Brandenburg Gate
Mies Van Der Rohe Neue Nationalgalerie
19th Century French Masterpieces from Metropolitan Museum Of Art NY Exhibiton
Oberbaumbrücke
Unter-den-Linden
Kreuzberg
Friedrichshain
Ampelmann
River Spree
Le Corbusier’s Unité d’Habitation of Berlin-Charlottenburg
Terry Brewer Walking Tour
Spandau
Spandau Zitadelle
Mitte
Rosa-Luxumburg-Platz
Olympic Stadium
Olympic Stadium – Bell Tower
Berlin 1939-1945 (Allied Forces) War Cemetry
WWII & Cold War bunkers tour
Frank Gehry DZ Bank Berlin
Berlin Hauptbahnhof
Pergamon Museum
Museum Island
Potsdamer Platz
Sony Centre Potsdamer Platz

Ka De We
Rotation Records
Hardwaz Records
Berlin Zoo Knut
Absinth Depot
Musikinstrumenten Museum
Berlin Wall – East Side Gallery
Friedrichstraße
Gräfenhainichen (Germany)
Radis (Germany)
Ferropolis
BVG U-Bahn

Portsmouth (Hampshire UK)
Southsea (Portsmouth)
Spinnaker Tower
Gunwharf Quays
Historic Dockyard – HMS Victory, HMS Warrior, Mary Rose

Bath (Somerset UK)
The Pump Room
Jane Austin Centre

Windsor (Berkshire UK)
Windsor Castle
St George’s Chapel

London (England UK)
Tate Modern
Dali & Film Exhibition
Millenium Bridge
London Underground ‘The Tube’

Singapore
Singapore Changi Airport Shopping City

July 27, 2007

Close to the edit…

Filed under: General — decoded_ @ 5:39 pm

Hello, I’ve been doing some edits to previous posts, adding more text, images, links etc. Have a look…

We’re still yet to sort through all our 1000s of digital photos…

Cheers Dave

July 26, 2007

The final scores are in…

Filed under: Clubbing & Gigs,Travel — decoded_ @ 5:46 pm


Narod Niki @ Sonar 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roB428CECXI

The final scores are in…

Here are all the techno/minimal DJs and live acts my girlfriend and I saw during our travels in Europe/UK, on our fantastic 6 week holiday during June/July 2007.

Some of these people we saw for hours, others we only saw for minutes. We often found many of the people we wanted to see were all on at the same time in different rooms/areas. This isn’t the full line-ups of these parties/events/club nights, I’m just listing the people who we saw play.

Sonar Festival 2007 – Day 1 – Barcelona : Thu 14 June 2007
James Holden

Raum Player 2007 Music Festival – Barcelona : Thu 14 Jun 2007
Matt John, Audiojack, Ryan Crosson/Berg Nixon, Glimpse [live]
Herve AK, Ripperton

Sonar Festival 2007 – Night 1 – Barcelona : Thu 14 June 2007
Narod Niki [live] (laptops based live band featuring… Ricardo Villalobos, Richie Hawtin, Mark Ernestus
Moritz Von Oswald, Dandy Jack, Zip, Luciano, Thomas Melchoir)

Plantage 13 Night @ Moog Club – Barcelona : Fri 15 Jun 2007
Goldfish Und Der Dulz [live], Oliver Huntemann, Stephan Bodzin [live]

Intergroove Party @ Club Fellini – Barcelona : Fri 15 Jun 2007
Robert Babicz [live], Ripperton, Matthias Tanzmann, DJ T. (Replaced no-show Thomas Schumacher)

Sonar Festival 2007 – Day 3 – Barcelona : Sat 16 June 2007
Claro Intelecto [live]

Sonar Festival 2007 – Night 3 – Barcelona : Sat 16 June 2007
Devo [live], Cristian Vogel [live]
JPLS [live], Tractile [live], Tadeo Vs Damien Schwartz [live]
Dixon (Innervisions), Mathew Dear’s Big Hands (live band) [live]

Poker Flat Night @ Razzmatazz/The Loft – Barcelona : Sat 16 June 2007
Patrick Chardronnet [live], Guido Schneider, Agoria Vs Oxia

Minus Night @ City Hall – Barcelona : Sun 17 June 2007
Magda, Rebekah Auf

Cocoon – Offenbach (Frankfurt-Am-Main) : Fri 22 Jun 2007
Sven Väth, Sleeparchive (w/ DJ Pete) [live]

Robert Johnson – Offenbach (Frankfurt-Am-Main) : Sat 23 Jun 2007
Max Mohr [live], Optimo

Awakenings ‘Awakefest’ Festival 2007 – Festivalterrein Spaarnwoude (Amsterdam) : Sat 30 Jun 2007
Martin Buttrich [live], Joris Voorn [live], Anja Schneider, Polder [live]
Mathias Kaden, Loco Dice, Richie Hawtin, Marc Houle [live]
Magda, Marek Hemmann [live], Agoria, Wighnomy Brothers
Bart Skills & 2000 & One, Pig & Dan, British Murder Boys [live], Green Velvet
Cari Lekebusch, Adam Beyer, Steve Rachmad, The Advent [live]
Dave Clarke, Joey Beltram, Robert Hood, Jay Denham

Love Family Park 2007 Festival – Hanau (Frankfurt-Am-Main) : Sun 1 Jul 2007
Sven Väth, Richie Hawtin Vs Ricardo Villalobos, Luciano

LFP 2007 After Party @ Cocoon – Offenbach (Frankfurt-Am-Main) : Sun 1 Jul 2007
Andre Galluzzi, Karotte Vs Dominik Eulberg Vs Andre Galluzzi

Hafen 2 – Offenbach (Frankfurt-Am-Main) : Wed 4 Jul 2007
Omar S

Minus Night @ Week12End – Berlin : Fri 6 Jul 2007
Paco Osuna, Marco Carola, Marc Houle [live], Troy Pierce
Ambivalent [live]

Perlonized @ Panorama Bar (Berghain) – Berlin : Fri 6 Jul 2007
Fumiya Tanaka, Zip

Poker Flat Night @ Water-Gate – Berlin : Sat 7 Jul 2007
Argy, Steve Bug, Phonique, Martin Landsky
Martini Bros [live], Patrick Gräser, Guido Schneider

Electronic Waves #2 @ Spindler & Klatt – Berlin : Sun 8 Jul 2007
Matt John, The Dose [live], Daniel Dreier, Marcel Dettman

Melt Festival 2007 (Day 1) @ Ferropolis – Gräfenhainichen (Germany) : Fri 13 Jul 2007
Onur Ozer Vs Mathias Kaden, Alex Smoke [live], Magda
Marc Houle [live], Troy Pierce, Richie Hawtin, Autechre [live]
DJ Koze, Tiefschwarz, Abe Duque

Tresor – Berlin : Sat 14 Jul 2007
Daniel Bell, Stewart Walker [live], Suzi Wong, Liquid, Dry

Club Maria – Berlin : Sat 14 Jul 2007
Dan Curtin, Jeremy P. Caulfield

Panorama Bar (Berghain) – Berlin : Sat 14 Jul 2007
Jesse Rose

Berghain – Berlin : Sat 14 Jul 2007
Ben Klock [live], Len Faki Vs Ben Klock, Paul Brtschitsch [live]

Fabric – London : Sat 21 Jul 2007
British Murder Boys [live], Vex’d [live], Digital Mystikz, Monolake [live]
Craig Richards, Ricardo Villalobos, Omar S

Yep, a lot of great music there!

July 24, 2007

London – Fabric and back Home…

Filed under: Clubbing & Gigs,Travel — decoded_ @ 6:51 am

We’re back home safe in Sydney, all is well.

Love your comment Paul! I have to say… Heathrow Airport Terminal 3 was a shocker! We’ll never depart from that airport ever again, warning… rant coming up!

We only just made our plane, due to depart at 12.30pm and we arrived at the airport at 7am! We processed our tax refunds, checked in our baggage, and then it took hours to get through all the security screening/x-ray areas. The new security measures in place at Heathrow are extreme. Some people got screened/x-rayed 3 times! It’s all random depending on what queue you chose to line-up in. So many people, so many queues!

What most annoyed us is now you’re only allowed to carry one piece of cabin baggage if you depart from Heathrow. No other airport has this limitation.

Joanne and I both had very full back-packs plus I had a record bag, and Joanne had another bag (sack) full of Europe’s finest chocolates. Our multiple bags didn’t agree with the one piece of cabin baggage policy. The solution (as advised by staff)… stick them together in a large plastic bag, and carry it as if it’s a single item until you’re through the security screening/x-ray areas. Stupid huh! How much fun do you think carrying a full back-pack and record bag together in a plastic bag in your arms is, for the hours it took to get through security?!?! Not very much! My arms were killing me!

Once we got through all of that drama we then only had about 10 minutes to look around the food, shops, and duty free area (with the other 1000s of people) until our flight was due to board.

However… the actual gate our plane was departing from had not been advised, and then was only indicated 10 minutes before the flight was actually due to depart! and it instantly showed ‘Flight Closing’! Panic! Oh, and how convenient that the gate we needed to get to was right over the other side of the terminal! We did the mad dash, then hit another queue, as every other passanger for our flight did the same mad dash. Then… another security check at the gate/lounge. But wait that’s not all… Now we’re going to cram you all into a bus to take you to the actual plane, which is… over the other side of the airport! Arghhh!

Once we were borded, we were further delighted at being delayed for 50 minutes before the plane could taxi and take-off. Arghhh!

You can imagine our mood after all that. Dark, very dark. Oh, I forgot to mention, to add to this… we also had had no sleep prior, having gone stright from Fabric (club), via a confusing early morning drive out of central London in the pouring rain, to quickly freshen up/shower up, pack up at Sandra & Mall’s place back in Lee/Greenwich, then had to drive to the airport car hire return, return the hire car, then onto the airport terminal via a shuttle bus, which was delayed by a road accident.

I sound like a whinging pom hum!

Anyway, all good now, we know for next time… avoid Heaththrow! Deep breath… rant over.

Fabric

Beta, if you’re reading, I now know why you dislike Fabric so much. The club is awesome, great spaces, excellent sound and lighting, but the crowd… is horrible. The push/shove on the dance-floor was even worse than what we had had to deal with across Europe at many clubs. Fabric has a very ethnic/mixed crowd too. B.M.B were great, very punishing, with relentless beats, a different sound to their Awakenings set, which had more broken beats, and changes of intensity, they played 4am-6.30am. Heard a little of Ricardo Villalobos on the way out, but the main room was way too packed, so packed I don’t know how people actually dance in there! He didn’t start till 5.30am! At one point we bumped into Jamie from Infusion there, which was a laugh. We heard many of the other people playing around the club for the couple of hours before B.M.B started up, didn’t like much of what we heard… nasty drum’n’bass, funky house, and grime. Dinner and drinks prior with… AC & DWC 🙂 was very nice, a fun night, lovelly to meet and chat to their guests/friends too, shouts to Rony and Maggot! It was really nice to have been invited out and to meet them. Whilst on the way out from dinner and drinks we bumped into Marc Houle and had a nice chat too.

July 21, 2007

The music…

Filed under: Clubbing & Gigs,Music,Travel — decoded_ @ 9:19 pm

Thanks to Sandra & Mal’s laptop I’ve had a chance to finally catch up on some Internet music stuff, iTunes, Juno, Beatport etc. Confirming some track ID’s, finding some of the music we’ve been hearing on our travels. Nice to grab some new tracks, podcasts, and mixes for my entertainment on the flight/s home.

Some of the new minimal/techno tracks we’ve been hearing out during our travels, that we’ve been loving, confirmed…

*EDIT* : Found a bunch more since getting back, added them to the list

Simon Baker - Plastik [Playhouse]

Argy – Unreliable Virgin [Cocoon]
Sascha Dive – Down Edit (Argy Mix) [Raum…Musik]
Blackstrobe – I’m A Man (Audion Donation Mix) [Playlouder Recordings]
Rejected – Lost [Rejected]
Simon Baker – Plastik [Playhouse]
Einzelkind – Spam Bot [Playhouse]
Jesse Rose – Itchy Dog [Dub Sided]
Troy Pierce – Lost On The Way To DC10 (Berlin Version) [Minus]
Mountain People – Mountain003 [Mountain People]
Curtiss Lee – 3 Fingers [Dumb Unit]
Joris Voorn – Decay [Green]
Pele – Childhood’s End [Connaisseur Superior]
Tadeo – Eclipse [Apnea]
Anja Schneider – Belize [Mobilee]
Phonique – Bang [Dessous]
T.G – Cave The Speakers (Konrad Black Remix) [Four:Twenty]
False – Fed On Youth [Minus]
Bart Skills & Anton Pieete – The Running Man [100% Pure]
Holger Zilske – Enduro Disco / Aura [Leena]
Dominik Eulberg – Grunschenkel (2000 & One Remix) [Traum]
Marcin Czubala – Consigliere [Mobilee]
Dennis Ferrer – Son Of Raw (Loco Dice Remix) [Objektivity]
Martinez – Land-Crab/Angvault [Re:Connected]
Vinyl – The Weasel [RebelOne]
Robag Wruhme & Rolf Oksen – Dopamin [Freude-Am-Tanzen]
Petre Inspirescu – Sakadat [VinylClub]
Samin – Heater [Get Physical Music]
Paul Ritch – Messene [Get Physical Music]
Skoozbot – Next To Monchhichi [Plus 8]
Simon Baker – The Fly (MyMy Remix) [Connaisseur Superior]
Italoboyz – Viktor Casanova [Mothership]
Shlomi Aber – Freakside [Ovum]

Ahhh, nice to be back in touch with the music.

Destino…

Filed under: Art,Clubbing & Gigs,Travel — decoded_ @ 8:31 pm

Destino

Mornin’ It’s our last full day in London today. We fly back to Sydney tomorrow around noon, sad our holiday is over, it’s been fantastic.

We ventured into the chaos that is central London yesterday, travelling on the train from Lee, near Greenwich, where we’re staying. We took a double-decker bus ride, not really having a plan of where to go/what to see, and wanting to escape the insane amount of people in Victoria Station and ended up near the Tate Modern art gallery/museum. We were delighted to find that a Salvidor Dali exhibition ‘Dali & Film’ is currently showing.

‘Dali & Film’ was an excellent exhibition, fantastic to finally see many of his most well known surrealism pieces, like the “Persistence Of Memory” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Persistence_of_Memory the one with the melting clocks. It was really small though, it’s only about 30cm across. I love how the closer you get to his works, the more things you see, so detailed! Many of these works were not at his museum in Figueres Spain at the time we visited, although that museum was amazing regardless. The exhibition at the Tate Modern also had a number of films that Salvidor Dali was involved with, like the dream sequence in Hitchcock’s ‘Spellbound’. We saw the most amazing short animated film, called “Destino” a creation by Dali & Walt Disney animator John Hench, made in 1946. The project was abandoned as it was too controversial at the time, and has only recently been digitally brought to life. It was like a living Salvidor Dali painting, very surreal, amazing! There are some YouTube clips of it if you hunt around. We’ve seen some amazing art on our travels.

We had a fantastic time last night, catching up with a big group of old and new friends at an excellent Tapas restaurant in Islington. A really fun night! Much love to you all, was fantastic to see you all.

We also had a few journeys on the tube, packed in like sardines, sweating it up. Heavy rains and flooding caused chaos on the tube lines yesterday. I think we might try check out the Portabello Road Market, or have a look around Covent Garden/Soho, and Oxford Street today.

We’re off to see British Murder Boys [live] at Fabric tonight. We’ve been invited out prior to dinner with… 🙂 as well, excited. Also playing are… Ricardo Villalobos, Craig Richards, Omar S, Monolake [live], Vex’d [live] and more… across 3 rooms.

Much love and huge thanks to our hosts during our travels… Andreas & Iris, Gino & Carmen, Bec & Greg, Sandra & Mal. Also sending out much love to all our friends around Europe and UK. We’ll see all you Aussie friends down under very soon…

Love D & J

July 19, 2007

Great Britian

Filed under: Travel — decoded_ @ 9:05 pm

British Flag

Hello from Windsor UK.

We stayed with Bec & Greg last night in their beautiful home in Windsor, wonderful to catch up with them, and Bec made us a lovelly dinner, thanks and much love to you both. I’m currently using Bec’s little MacBook. We’ve had an exciting morning already with Greg taking us for a quick spin in his Porsche 911 Carrera 4, phwoaaar! We pushed him into it Bec he wasn’t showing off. We’re off to have a look around Windsor, Windsor Castle and Eton shortly.

We’ve got a hire car whilst we’re in the UK this week, the last week of our holiday. Hertz gave us a very sexy black Audi A4, as Borat would say… Very Niiiice! We travelled from Southsea Portsmouth via Bath to Windsor yesterday. It’s so green and lush over here, we’ve driven through some beautiful scenery, and lovelly old towns, unfortuntaley there’s never anywhere to pull over to take photos. We didn’t spend long in Bath, we have both been there before. It’s a beautiful place. We had high tea in the Pump Room, so Joanne was very happy.

We actually arrived in the UK on Monday, flying from Berlin. We spent a couple of days catching up with Joanne’s second cousins in Southsea Portsmouth, which was wonderful, very friendly welcoming people. We loved the cooked full English breakfasts. We had a look around the new Portsmouth Gunwharf Quays shopping area, and visited the top of the new Spinnaker Tower. I had a look around the historic dockyard, and saw the old HMS Victory, HMS Warrior, and Mary Rose. These dockyards are where all the convicts bound for Australia left from, part of our heritage.

This evening we’re off to Greenwich to stay with Sandra & Mal, and we’ll have a few days in London to see some sights. Marshall’s brother Stu works at Phonica Records now, so we’ll be popping in to say hello. It will be fantastic to meet up with all our ex-Aussie mates living in London. More clubbing? Yes! We’re off to Fabric on Saturday night, to see British Murder Boys and Ricardo Villalobos. We’re not looking forward to flying home for 20+ hours direct from clubbing… We’ll be back in Sydney on Monday. This has been an awesome holiday. Have spent way too much $, as you do…

Much love D & J

July 16, 2007

Melt, Tresor and more…

Filed under: Clubbing & Gigs,Travel — decoded_ @ 8:53 am

Sorry this will be quick, only got 20 mins Internet time.

Melt Festival

Melt Festival 2007… OMG! What an amazing location for a rave/dance party, out in the middle of nowhere, amongst a heap of gigantic, massive, old, rusting, industrial, mining, digging, steal processing machines, all lit up with fantastic lighting, excellent sound and lighting everywhere, market stalls, diverse music line-up, lots of food and snacks, and cheap drinks. We stayed in a nice little German country hotel, and managed to get our own personal taxi driver Frank to take us to/from Melt, and to/from the hotel, and train station, he spoke no English, and we only know about 20 words of German, but he gave us his mobile number, and we managed to organise pick up and drop off times. The area where people camp for the Melt Festival must be at least a 6km walk away from the event, 1000s of tents! We passed it by on the way to the entrance.

Check out the location for Melt!

Ferropolis

http://www.ferropolis-online.de/ferropolis.html

Awesome music from Onur Ozer Vs Mathias Kadan, Troy Pierce, Alex Smoke [live] (I had a nice chat with him before he played, great guy!), Tiefschwarz, and Richie Hawtin as the sun came up. Autechre [live] were very abstract, and very drum and bass, and played in the dark, requesting all the lighting off, sorry couldn’t get any photos of them. Magda was all throbby bass and bleeps, not very interesting sounds. It was a very cool event, so much better than Awakenings, and we thought that was fantastic.

Worst DJ set award of our travels so far goes to… DJ Koze at Melt, who in the 15 mins we watched him… made a mess of each mix, took the needle off the wrong (playing) record twice, attempted to cover it with bad skipping needle/record scratching, and track flow was all over the place, quite dull sounds sorry to say.

Tresor logo

Anyway… We decided to only do day 1 of Melt, and came back to Berlin yesterday to go to the new Tresor, where we saw Suzi Wong, Stewart Walker [live], and… Daniel Bell on the Batterieraum Floor, as well as Liquid and Dry in the damp bunker/underground Tresor floor.

New Tresor club inside this building

Tresor is inside that huge industrial building, but with the renovations/fit out they have done, it feels like they’re using only about an 1/8th of it. Really dissapointed with the sound there. Crowd was very mixed, ethnic, lots of young excited kids who looked like they were hearing techno for the first time, we felt like we were in Sydney’s Gas or Home clubs. Enjoyed the music though. Berghain is a much better venue for that huge industrial building vibe. The new Tresor would have been so much better if they didn’t do anything to the building! How it was originally…

Original inside of buidling Tresor club is now in

How it looks now…

Batterieraum Floor – Pics
Tresor Floor – Pics

Around 4am, we went to a club called Maria, and saw Dan Curtin playing… to about 30 people (this club got raided by Police the weekend before, so maybe that’s why it was empty). We stayed for an hour and a bit, and got to meet and chat with… Jeremy P. Caulfield, we were dissapointed he had alraedy played, but… he’s coming to play Sydney later this year, woo! Great sounds from Dan Curtin, nice tough minimal and techno, great mixing and track flow.

Around 5.30am, we went to Berghain/Panorama Bar for the last time of our Holiday and saw… Ben Klock, Paul Brtschitsch [live], and then Len Faki Vs Ben Klock playing in Berghain, and upstairs in Panorama Bar… Jesse Rose. Such a fantastic vibe in this place, awesome venue, the sound systems are amazing. Lots of man love in that place, we’ve been warned, don’t venture into the dark corners/rooms you may see some very strange err…acts. The boys in Berghain banged it out with some hard techno sounds, and cleared the floor in no time at all. Upstairs in Panorama Bar Jesse Rose had a packed room jumping to his electro-house/minimal-tech-house sounds, a bit too cheesy for us at times.

Knut

Arghh, Internet time is running out… We went to the Zoo today and saw Knut, such a cute playful little polar bear. Berlin Zoo is awesome, very green, lots of shade, and you can get a lot closer to the animals than any other Zoo I’ve been to. Heaps of baby animals too! Cute!

Well… we’re off to UK tomorrow to catch up with family and friends… Hope everyone is well, thanks for reading and all your comments. Can’t believe this is the last week of our holiday.

Oh and sorry for complaining about the wet and cold, it was actually a hot 35-37 degrees in Berlin our last 2 days there.

July 13, 2007

Ubercoolische!

Filed under: Travel — decoded_ @ 5:55 am

Adidas - 35th Anniversary I Love Berlin Superstars

Wow, there are so many awesome clothes and shoes shops in Berlin… OMG!! So much cool stuff.

http://www.cafepress.com/ubercoolische.20260022

July 11, 2007

Berlin

Filed under: General — decoded_ @ 2:43 am

Berghain/Panorama Bar - Berlin
Berghain/Panorama Bar – Berlin
Inside Berghain… http://www.funktion-one.com/Berghain_Germany_Mondo.htm

Hello from Berlin! We’re currently using the Internet terminals in a big shopping arcade called Arkaden, in Potsdamer Platz, just around the corner from the massive Sony Centre. We’re loving it here in Berlin, we’re well and all is going well. We’ve seen lots of sights, too many to mention! Have had a few tours, visited some WWII, and Cold War bunkers, and spent a day with Berlin walking tour guru Terry Brewer, visiting some different Berlin sights; the Olympic Stadium and Bell Tower, the Allied Forces War Memoral Cemetery (20 years old average age on the grave stones!), and a trip to Spandau (oldest area of Berlin) and visiting the Zitadelle castle/fort. And we’ve done a lot of clubbing!

The weather has been annoying, with rain just about every day at some point here, as with all of our holiday, apart from Barcelona, it’s been quite cold at times too, summer in Europe?

Techno friends, don’t hate us… Here’s where we’ve been and who we’ve seen since arriving in Berlin last Thursday… Minus Night @ Week12End (the 12th, 15th floors and roof top terrace of an office building) – Paco Osuna, Marco Carola, Marc Houle [live], Ambivalent [live], and Troy Pierce. We didn’t have a chance to see Magda, Rebekah Aff, or Richie Hawtin. We could hear Richie playing on the terrace (outside roof top) at Week12End from our hostel apartment’s balcony in Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz in Mitte, a couple of blocks away. He started around 8am! We knew it was Richie as it was all the same tracks he played at Awakenings. This Minus party was cool, but difficult to enjoy, as it was really hot and completely packed, rammed full, lots of messy people, call them ‘hype followers’. I bet 5% of the crowd actually know/buy any Minus music. Sorry to say I actually found Marco Carola quite boring, bland minimal loops, I was really looking forward to finally getting to hear him play too, he started at 5am! Troy Pierce was excellent though, lots of great tracks, interesting/different sounds, not the typical Minus sound. Paco Osuna played quite pumping techno, maximal not minimal. Infact a lot of the music we heard was more maximal than minimal.

We left sometime after 6.30am to go to Perlonized @ Panorama Bar (Berghain), which had Fumiya Tanaka… We got to hear an hour of him, and he played awesome deep-techno, some quite abstract stuff, very deep and spacious sounds. I finally got to hear Ame – ‘Enoi’ out too! He’s pretty rough on the mix though. Perlon’s Zip followed with some excellent ‘Perlon’ style minimal sounds, had we stayed until much later into the morning/day we would have also seen Sammy D. Panorama Bar was awesome, fantastic crowd, very friendly vibe, music lovers, space to move, amazing sound system, the best I’ve heard/felt, and such a unique venue, being an old power station, very industrial feeling. Felt very comfortable there, really had a nice time, made me forget how tired I was. Actually I feel very comfortable in Berlin full stop, all the guys have messy/long-ish hair, and facial hair is very popular here. Lots of 30+ year old people clubbing here. Lots of party animals! They party well into the next day, mind you, they don’t get to clubs until 4-5am, the time most of the clubs in Sydney are fininishing up!

The next night we went to the Poker Flat Night @ Water-Gate, another amazing venue, right on the river, over-looking the most amazing old bridge. We watched the sun come up, the sky starts to get blue/light at 3.30am! The top floor of Water-Gate has a fantastic light show, a matrix of multi-coloured, individually controlled LEDs in the ceiling, making for lots of cool patterns and effects across the rows of LEDs, check it… http://www.roomdivision.com/2006/02/10/club-watergate-berlin

We got to see Argy, Steve Bug, Guido Schneider, Martini Bros [live], Phonique, Martin Landsky, and Patrick Graser. Awesome music all night in both floors/rooms. Argy did a fantastic DJ set to warm things up, got a few track IDs from him too, nice guy. Steve Bug was awesome too! So much good music, and it’s all fresh/new to me! I really had to hold myself back from asking for Track IDs almost every track.

The track of the moment seems to be Simon Baker – ‘Plastik’ on Playhouse, we’ve heard just about every DJ play it, and it always gets a big reaction. Other new stuff getting many plays, the new Mountain People, new Rejected (Joris Voorn), new Jesse Rose – ‘Itchy Dog’ on Dubsided, and the Argy mix of the new Sascha Dive on Raum Musik. I’m missing Beatport and Juno to chase up track IDs. Have visited Hard Wax, Records In Mitte and Rotation record stores here.

On Sunday afternoon until just into Monday morning we went to this cool little party called Electronic Waves #2 @ Spindler & Klatt, outside, under sails on a dock by the river, later moved inside due to noise complaints and a police visit. Check out how stylish this place is! http://www.spindlerklatt.com very cool venue. We got to see Matt John, The Dose [live], Daniel Dreier and Marcel Dettman. Matt John is a bit of a party animal, he was also out on Friday at Minus, and later at Panorama Bar on Saturday morning. Joanne said g’day and got a photo, and a track ID from him at this party, she was very happy with that. Matt John played some cool minimal sounds. Daniel played a great set of minimal/techno, my fave so far, got quite a few track ID’s from him, hearing many of the popular tracks of the moment, and he was a nice guy to chat to afterwards. Lots of friendly people at this party, cool vibes, a fun day/night, great music. Was great to catch up with ex Sydey now London based friends Marshall and Lucy there too, who are holidaying here at the moment.

Ahh, before I forget… Love Family Park 2007 in Hanau (Frankfurt)… Richie Hawtin Vs Ricardo Villalobos… umm, kinda boring actually, lots of deep-house sounds, nothing that exciting, not much minimal/tech at all, nothing really memorable. We watched them for 2 hours. The ‘messy’ crowd was going nuts to really bland music, and really simple changes during tracks. They didn’t live up to the hype for me sorry to say, too ubercoolische? Luciano who played prior, was great, played some nice Cadenza label, latin flavoured minimal house stuff, and got quiet tough and techy as well, we enjoyed that more. Sven Vath was larger than life on his own stage, in the main area, great performer, good tracks, great vibes towards the end of his set, with friends watching the fireworks together. When LFP finished up around midnight we went to the LFP After Party @ Cocoon, and heard a fantastic set of deep, clubby techno from Andre Galluzzi, then Karotte Vs Dominik Eulberg Vs Andre Galluzzi, great sounds, Cocoon still one of my fave clubs. Thanks for all your help Andreas with LFP, much appreciated. Huge thanks to Iris for letting us stay in her apartment whilst we were in Frankfurt, much love.

One more thing… the night before we left Frankfurt, a Wednesday night, Iris took us along to a club called Hafen 2, to see surprise guest… Omar S from Detroit, he played lots of chunky, soulful, Detroit/Chicago style house/techno stuff, some old acid-house stuff, his mixing was pretty dodgy though. It was cool, but I wasn’t up for a late night, so we only stayed an hour.

Is that enough techno/minimal names yet?

Coming up we’re going to the Melt Festival 2007 on Friday, with Autechre, Onur Ozer Vs Matthias Kaden, Alex Smoke [live] and many of the Minus crew again… Magda, Richie Hawtin, Troy Pierce, and Marc Houle [live]… We’re thinking of only doing Friday at Melt now, as the Saturday line-up isn’t that good for us, and then we can then come back to Berlin to see… Daniel Bell @ Tresor! A good excuse to go check out Tresor! We’re also going to try see Dan Curtin, and Jeremy P Caulfield at a club called Maria the same night, and then end up at Berghain/Panorama Bar int he morning to see… Paul Brtschitsch [live], Ben Klock, Len Faki and Jesse Rose

OK, I’ll shut up now, sorry for upsetting you all 🙂 This place is awesome! Having much fun.

Cheers D & J

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