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Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

theguardian.com

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Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#71

Post by picadores »

codetrotter wrote: post #58
jamil7 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's still quite a lot of illegal/semi-legal free party scene type stuff going on, especially in summer. A lot of the scene has been pushed outside of the ring, though. Leipzig is lovely but tiny in comparision, you won't find even remotely as many clubs and parties.

> Leipzig is lovely but tiny in comparision, you won't find even remotely as many clubs and parties. That’s exactly what someone would say, to keep the tourists away :p “No, there are no underground raves around here, nor have there ever been, nor will there ever be. Please stay away from this town.”

You make two entrances - one is "backstage and delivery guys" - thats where the people you want get in- the other is for insta-noodles and hipster-replacement folk, who want to wait all night and then get rejected in some viral video..

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#72

Post by epups »

mrtksn wrote: post #56
mahmoudhossam wrote: post #5

Disclaimer: I live in Berlin currently but I've never been a techno person. From what I hear from people who are, the clubs have become basically tourist traps that are unaffordable to locals and some have even been priced out of their original locations so not sure if this decision will help much.

This is happening everywhere and with everything. IMHO its a result of the inflated "elite class", that is people who are well off enough to spend their days with consumption only or they were overpaid. As a result, these people go everywhere and do consumption and outcompete everyone who is not like them. Then everything gets adjusted to their pleasure and they consume all the resources(being housing, food, entertai…

You write as if there is a finite supply of "entertainment" which comes out of thin air. If someone is consuming, then someone is supplying. You mentioned yourself that the ones supplying are the locals. So, in your analogy the locals are getting jobs in night clubs, restaurants and construction to feed the needs of this "consumption class". In economies without tourism, this is done by producing export goods.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#73

Post by earthnail »

ehnto wrote: post #68
omnimus wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing even compares to Berlin. Prague has basically 2 clubs and they are working partly because it's cheap and only 4hour train from Berlin so it's fun destination for both Berliners and Berlin DJS. Athens is where lots of the techno scene (djs, producers) has been moving to but that's because property is cheap so they can run away from Berlin winter. It also has like 2 clubs. In Berlin there are so many venues it'…

Is this specifically techno/underground clubs you mean? My pokey city in Aus has like a dozen "EDM" clubs that spin a decent breadth of techno to house to dnb etc. Perhaps I should count myself lucky?

EDM isn't Techno. It's a bit like saying that hard rock is like metal (somewhat bad analogy, but I hope you get the point). I know you listed a range of genres but it's important to note that the Berlin techno scene would never consider itself part of EDM.

In Europe, most EDM is happening in Amsterdam.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#74

Post by omnimus »

ehnto wrote: post #68
omnimus wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing even compares to Berlin. Prague has basically 2 clubs and they are working partly because it's cheap and only 4hour train from Berlin so it's fun destination for both Berliners and Berlin DJS. Athens is where lots of the techno scene (djs, producers) has been moving to but that's because property is cheap so they can run away from Berlin winter. It also has like 2 clubs. In Berlin there are so many venues it'…

Is this specifically techno/underground clubs you mean? My pokey city in Aus has like a dozen "EDM" clubs that spin a decent breadth of techno to house to dnb etc. Perhaps I should count myself lucky?

I mean the kind of places the article is talking about ("the cultural heritage" lol). I would say it's opposite of "EDM". Places where they only play ambient or techno (or disco lol) and music is loud to your core but not deafening. Where people get Club-Mate instead of Red bull, Skinny bitch instead of Cuba Libre, ketamine... Places where it's really hard to see because it's pitch dark but everybody is trying their best to look really hot when they go there.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#75

Post by diggan »

padjo wrote: post #46
larodi wrote: post #4

According to many people, including record shop owners I’ve talked to, Berlin’s scene is actually not so underground and not so cool anymore as a result of tourism and immigration. Rich people nowadays buy property in Potsdam, and the scene is moving towards Leipzig. In a more general sense the old rave cities are making way, and have been making way, to other cities. A movement spanning more than 20 years now, thank…

At the point where UNESCO are recognizing it it’s probably fair to say it’s not underground at all anymore

It doesn't seem like "Berlin underground techno" is being recognized by Unesco, but rather just "Berlin Techno". So while the underground movement might be the grassroot for the mainstream, it would seem like they're recognizing techno in Berlin overall, not just the underground part.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#76

Post by earthnail »

vidarh wrote: post #63
L_226 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bigger than Paris? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_urban_areas_in_the_Eur...

Those are urban areas. If you instead count by city limits, Berlin is bigger by a large margin [1]. This is the perpetual problem with defining "biggest" - to some the urban area of Paris might still be "Paris" but the vast majority of it is outside the city limits. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_the_European...

But Berlin stops entirely at its city limits. There is almost nothing beyond it. That's just a consequence of its history with the east/west divide.

More people live in Munich's metropolitan area (i.e. where underground and overground take you) than Berlin. Still, Berlin feels like a proper city and Munich like a large village.

Berlin vs Munich is where your metric (people who live inside city boundaries) works to describe the metropolitan effect.

Paris, on the other hand, is on another level entirely. When you travel from Paris to Berlin, Berlin feels like a small town. And here, the metric of people who live inside city boundaries just doesn't describe the feeling of the cities at all.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#77

Post by dbspin »

walthamstow wrote: post #35
mahmoudhossam wrote: post #5

Disclaimer: I live in Berlin currently but I've never been a techno person. From what I hear from people who are, the clubs have become basically tourist traps that are unaffordable to locals and some have even been priced out of their original locations so not sure if this decision will help much.

Same thing happened in London a long time ago. The antidote is word-of-mouth raves in abandoned buildings, forests, farms, canal boats, wherever

Can't speak to London, but abandoned buildings are few and far between in today's Berlin. It's not the city it was even five or six years ago due to massive redevelopment. As regards forests, I guess there's the Grunwald, but good luck running a rave there, it's basically the backgarden for a whole bunch of old people's dachas.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#78

Post by ricksunny »

earthnail wrote: post #73
ehnto wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this specifically techno/underground clubs you mean? My pokey city in Aus has like a dozen "EDM" clubs that spin a decent breadth of techno to house to dnb etc. Perhaps I should count myself lucky?

EDM isn't Techno. It's a bit like saying that hard rock is like metal (somewhat bad analogy, but I hope you get the point). I know you listed a range of genres but it's important to note that the Berlin techno scene would never consider itself part of EDM. In Europe, most EDM is happening in Amsterdam.

Can you distinguish these two? In my head EDM & techno occupy the same space.

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#79

Post by aketchum »

ryukafalz wrote: post #57
jamil7 wrote: post #55

How exactly does the city and federal Government square this with their plan to build a huge (unwanted) freeway through the city and bulldoze multiple clubs and music venues?

I just looked this up because I was surprised to hear about this. Context for those unfamiliar: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-09-07/berlin-pl... This is the kind of mistake that we made in the US decades ago, and the results are plain to see today in any neighborhood bisected by a freeway.

atlanta is trying to fix this by building a park over the interstate in the city center. Only tangentially related but it blows me away how ambitious the project is. The stated goal is for reconnecting communities on either side

Re: Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list

#80

Post by earthnail »

piva00 wrote: post #16
larodi wrote: post #4

According to many people, including record shop owners I’ve talked to, Berlin’s scene is actually not so underground and not so cool anymore as a result of tourism and immigration. Rich people nowadays buy property in Potsdam, and the scene is moving towards Leipzig. In a more general sense the old rave cities are making way, and have been making way, to other cities. A movement spanning more than 20 years now, thank…

Leipzig seems to be the new underground place in Germany from what I've heard and experienced. I believe this is the usual cycle of cities going through: arts scene existing because it's a cheap place to live, artists congregate in places they can afford, create a cool scene, the cool scene brings some bars/cafés and slowly it erodes to gentrification since these places are cool and attract other crowds into it (high…

But Leipzig doesn't have the same growth opportunity as Berlin. Leipzig is 1/8th the size of Berlin and as such its upper bound on how large a scene can become is massively capped.

Add to that that Berlin has been a place for internationals for generations, whereas Leipzig is entirely German.

For the record, I love Leipzig, I think it's gorgeous.

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