Tips to a Quickie Tour of the German Music Scene

Pedestrian HQ > 30hrs > 200 pistachios > a Singapore airlines flight attendant asking if I am a Singapore Airlines flight attendant (I’m whiter/shorter than Hilary Duff, btw, so loved it) > Frankfurt > Hamburg > Reeperbahn Festival 2013. 

REEPERBAHN FESTIVAL 2013, HAMBURG 
The Reeperbahn is the mellow older sister to Sydney’s Kings Cross; she was a skanky piece of work back in the day, has cleaned up her act but books der babysitter for a blowout once a year. This red light port district in the heart of St Pauli – which boasts Hamburg’s hottest sauna and was the Beatles’ dabble ground in the nascent stages of their career (zero correlation) – entertains 28,000 punters over 3 days at Reeperbahn Festival each September. 

It’s a pulsing, con-fucking-fusing but welcoming pick-a-mix of genres and people, as international and local acts cram into the bars and clubs that line the Reeperbahn and Spielbudenplatz. No headliners here (unless you count James Blunt); this Schnapps fuelled street party is hugely attractive to Euro industry types and has a SXSW reputation for discovering green talent. 

 

 

Molotow is a red-tinged live music warren, the façade plastered with spray painted signs protesting “MUSS BLIEBEN” or “MUST REMAIN”, as the building’s foundations are rotting and the whole shebang will be imminently bulldozed at the sad drop of a hat. Beer is cheap and when the festival isn’t on, the music ranges from weird electro to psychedelic sixties and Russian Folklore. Hence, GO NOW.

Mozes and the Firstborn are Holland’s Black Lips, sweaty fringes and fake West Coast accents. Bass player Corto adopts the glare of an SVU crim and gyrates like he’s doing the worm standing up, and I like it. Crowd favourites from their debut self-titled album include ‘I Got Skills’ and ‘Peter Jr.’. 

 

Just the wurst:

Feldstraße 66, 20359 Hamburg 

Uebel & Gefährlich is a disguised club within the insanely intimidating concrete walls of a WWII bunker at Heiligengeistfeld. A bit like a reverse Kinder Surprise, the indestructible monster’s transformation to a house of fun is admirable, even if the cavernous, bare spaces are a bit bland and underwhelming. Most impressively, an unsuspecting rooftop balcony with a single palm tree laps up the city vista and the joint definitely inhabits a few ghosts of yonder that make it an unmissable experience. Iceland’s experimental hairyfaced longhairs Múm perform a whimsical set with random passionate (read: high) fits of epilepsy, however shoegazing isn’t really my stein of Becks so I bail with a few pals to Pooca Bar. 

Hamburger Berg 12, 20359 Hamburg
Grandpa’s whiffy couches line the footpath, toilet stalls are bolted shut (I learnt the shart way) and the brunette bar girls make my gooch tingle with fear at Pooca Bar. It’s the deep sea of dive bars, and within tonight’s precious treasure chest shines OUR Kirin J Callinan. 

Taking to the front of the room clad in a silk suit and sandals and debuting his album “Embracism” to a European audience, the title track instantly seduces, terrifies and humours the foreign crowd. I think tittilates is the apt word, but yuck. He’s flanked by two stony-faced dudes on keys and drums, and Callinan’s deep vocals, guitar loops and possessed eyes are a roller-coaster ride. One journalist from the UK’s Clash Magazine continually whispers “fuuuuck me” between sips of her bourbon while a silver BBC Radio host grins quietly in the corner, as he’s “been waiting months for this show”; witnessing what this festival’s all about is pretty wonderful. Particularly in a proverbial spew bucket like Pooca Bar. Cut to a few nights, twelve red wines and a smashed bar stool later and Kirin continued shining bright like the jewels of the sea when I run into him in the middle of Berlin. Never change.

Sixteen year old me would gag to sell glow sticks out front of/get into this three-story mega club. The relaxed crowd is a bit perplexing at what’s definitely the most popular spot on the strip; they politely wait at the bar, puff smokes and lounge around chatting on the dirty club floor between sets and I think ‘yep, I am in Europe’. 

No more so than when Austria-born-NYC-funboy Left Boy plays, all strobe and smoke and doof and shit. Everyone in the room but I knows each lyric – he is, after all, a “24 year old internet sensation” – until the below kicks in and I think ‘wait, am I in Europe?’. 

Hello, Bluejuice.

Um… HELLO, Michelle Branch.

A scrumptious lunch at hidden home-comfort restaurant Mooi introduced me to the promoters of Reeperbahn Festival (all of whom are obsessed with Nick Cave and Tim Rogers FYI) and German alt/pop singer-songwriter-smartarse-legend Bernd Begemann. With over 50 albums to his name and shows that can famously stretch 1-4hrs depending on his mood, I was tested on how many German artists I know that sing in their native language. For every Rammstein there’s one squillion Nenas, Kraftwerks, and Lou Begas (lol). To make cash anywhere but Central Europe, Begemann reports that English is mandatory. I can’t change that and he contently doesn’t give a shit, however his set at the festival that evening was epic and I encourage you to check out the eccentric Begemann and his contemporaries. 

 

Famous Germ Heidi Klum’s catchphrase “One day you’re in, the next day you’re out” may very well have jinxed the Berlin party scene. Just saying. 

Fashion is to New York (and Klum) what nightlife is to Berlin: VERY IMPORTANT. 1987-1988 saw the rise in electro and house parties in Berlin and when the wall came down in 1989, the floodgates opened and the groundbreaking, eventually fateful, electro dance music festival The Love Parade was born in West Berlin. Self operated unregulated clubs, parties in abandoned buildings and an exploration into new sounds and venues sprung up as the UK’s DJ culture spilled into East and West. The festival’s motto was Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen (aka Peace, Joy, Pancakes), fighting for arms control, music and fair food production. Dance music was a pivotal representation of the youth’s identity and politics. 

 

While the sentiment remains, reality’s a party pooper. I met with Clubcommision Berlin, a lobby of fifteen 1990s disco biscuits that the government pumps $23k a year through to keep the creative and commercial ideas of 120 Berlin clubs (no discotheques) kicking. Apparently, 20+ key 1990s clubs currently face gentrification in Prenzlauerberg, Kreuzberg, Friedrichshain & Mitte (the spawn ground of Rammstein), and combined with Berlin’s $63k Euro debt threatens the 35% youth tourism pull that nightlife provides the city. 

 

Sure, it sounds bleak, but the avid support and protection of freedom to create and the ability to innovate, to keep rent cheap for artists and the encouragement for locals to actually dwell in their nightlife quarters is inspiring. Berlin nightlife needs and wants you, touros, so stick it to Heidi and get amongst it. #makeitworkpeople

TURKISH MUSIC 

The rapid reinvention of German culture has seen a natural shift from the attitudes of a homogeneous state. Rather than squashing migrant traditions – in 1982 the government actively planned to halve the number of Turks living in Germany – multicultural integration has been embraced and Turkish folk beats have infiltrated dance floors and rock haunts.

Gayhane at SO36

Oranienstraße 190, 10999 Berlin 
This iconic Kreuzberg club, named after Berlin’s postcode ala 90210, is their CBGBs. Just another squat den for anarchists when it opened in 1978, the likes of Suicide, Iggy Pop, David Bowie and The Dead Kennedys graced their stage and gradually crammed the place with leather decked grubs. Bowie’s clear Turkish and Krautrock influences after his stint in West Berlin were just another push for S036’s expansion as they now serve up techno, queercore beats, and throw Gayhanea – a Turkish disco gay night – every final Saturday of the month. TURK IT OUT.

Admiralstr. 1-2, 10999 Berlin, Kreuzberg 
Keeping things FAB, try your luck stumbling across and throwing shade at a 1970s Turkish rock n roll night at this LGBT friendly café/bar/restaurant/club, or their regular drag contest to crown the Kotti Queen. Suggested drag names include Turkish Delight and kinda lengthy but worth it Ottoman, Ottoman, Ottoman, Otto Mighty Good Man.

A savage hangover > 30hrs > birthday cake in Changi Airport’s Sunflower Garden with the luggage handlers (don’t ask… I swear, I work for Singapore Airlines) > Sydney > Pedestrian HQ.