Some of you poor people may have read my wee `What I did on my Holidays’ bit awhile back. Well you’re in for a treat today! Its instalment 2 – “The Music Bit”.

Lets us Hark back to the Halcyon days of the northern summer in Berlin…. Close ya eyes and travel with me…. Actually ya better keep ya eyes open cos I’m not reading this for ya.

Wed July 2nd  Bonnie Prince Billie – some theatre place far from everywhere, Berlin

First night in on tour, ably assisted by Mick (BMP hero) who got me tix for this telling me I will really like it.

I did!

We showed up a touch on the late side and missed out on our seats, but we did get some seats in the end, which went lovely with our very warm beers…., sigh.

I struggled for the first 45mins as he was getting a bit deep and moody and it didn’t resonate with me too much, sorta like a shit Mazzy Star, but luckily I was able to focus my attention on the violinist, who was supremely well endowed!  Soon enough my brain figured it out and I was away laughing.  I can’t recall the song names, I’m not like that, but once he pitched up proceedings it was all good. 

Twas a nice way to start me trip to Berlin, the techno capital of the world, with country music.

Thurs July 3rd  De:Bug @ Berghain

The very next night was the one I had been looking forward to, Ricardo Villalobos and Richie Hawtin + others.  I have become quite the Ric fan over the last few years, especially of his djing style, which is best described as `jackin’ but not all like that arse that is coming out of Chicago for the last decade…. but that’s a whole nother post.  Anyhoo, our posse was deep for this un, Kiwis a plenty and basically the entire auckland techno glitterati!! Mick, The Sting, Matt Drake, Justin & Silke all were present.  I would like to trump Mick’s post here quickly as he said he got in via a De:bug guest list….. meh, we were on Hawtin’s one baby! Name-dropping rules! Especially when ya don’t even know the dude!

Soo we get there in time for Alva Noto who is testing out the funktion 6.1 soundsystem to its fullness with a techno/dubstep hybrid that sounded out of this world.  Ric came on and I had me happy face on, he started off super deep and I was even happier! There came a point about 20mins in where he sorta remembered he was on for only a short set and suddenly jacked it up a heap, this in no way upset me and from there he played everything from house to techno and back again, new and old and all sorts, I was in hog heaven!  

The only downside to this night was that it was hot as Hades in there, the day had been in the mid thirties and Berghain had been baking in it all day, so when it was suddenly rammed full of bouncy berliners it just got stupid hot.  As I was planning my big night for the satdee I was keen to cancel proceedings early so as to save a lil energy for `ron’.

Satdee  July 5th  Berghain/Panorama Bar

So this was the big night I had been planning for 2yrs after getting sick in Berlin last time and missing out on Berghain!! Boy howdy I was a tingle!!!  We again had a heap of people coming along and I was looking forward to a late afternoon finish the next day!

It’s about now that the wheels started to fall off… Most of the posse had somewhat over indulged on the thurs and were no longer keen.  So a compromise of a 4am start was settled on with still most people keen to get amongst it.  So 4am comes and I leap out of bed and into the shower ready to go!! The Sting and Drake to there credit were in on it as well, Mick the Kid however could not be risen at this ungodly hour..

But he at least had good grounds for it, as his stories of Amsterdam were solid and I was impressed he was still alive at this point.  Our numbers dwindled further when Matt Drake texted from the train to tell us he was going home due to illness, a valiant effort in the least. This left Sting and meself standing in the queue at 4am.

We managed to get in and I was greeted on arrival in the main room with Deep Burnt – Pepe Braddock being played by Rolando.  Rolando was absolutely brilliant!

House, techno and everything in-between put together impeccably!! twas super fine!  But as the legendary Panorama bar hadn’t been open on the thurs I was dead keen to get in there and have a looksee, Conrad Black was playing and he was on fire! jackin berlin house/techno stuff, wikkid! I now had a major problem… who to dance too? I chose both and ran up and down the stairs for a good couple of hours thinking I had struck gold here!! 

Alas, it wasn’t to last.  Cobblestone Jazz played live after Conrad Black finished and were bloody awful. I was fully looking forward to this, as both Mick and Benny had raved about them in Detroit. I didn’t hear it that’s fer sher. It sounded like they were a group of individuals who had never met, playing music they had never heard before.  No vibe, no groove, no fun. So I sodded off downstairs to catch Len Faki. I have been enjoying some Faki live mixes at work for several months and was again well up for him, he didn’t let me down! Lots of deep tracky house played on a supreme soundsystem, grande. But after about 6hrs of this he seemed to be getting staler by the second. Whether this had anything to do with my my lack of a `state’ we shall never know.

I pootled around between Cobblestone Jazz and Len Faki for what seemed like hours, constantly texting young Mick in the hope he would finally show up, which to his credit he did! At the rather more gentlemanly hour of 9am. Which meant he would be in time to catch The Mole, Cassy and Moritz Von Oswald.

Mick had told me he was all about the Mole so being as I was already dying for Cobblestone Jazz to finish up when he came on I was ready for it!

As Mick says, he can’t have been that bad is he played Moodymann – Dem Young Sconies, but I disagree.  1 track out of what seemed like a 10hr set does not a good time make, he actually seemed to get worse as the set progressed which shocked the shit outta me.

By this stage I was getting rather impatient about seeing the people I had paid me cash for, the sublime deep house stylings of Cassy and the historically significant and awesome Moritz Von Oswald and Tikiman. 

It was around this stage that The Sting woke up from a sofa out back to tell me that they mite be playing outside in the garden bar area, blinder! It was a beautiful day outside and Berghain was some what minging inside by now.

Eventually, and I mean eventually!! It seemed like forever!! They opened up outside and we all mooched on out there to listen to Cassy play in the sunshine.  By this stage I was more than a lil fatigued so I couldn’t find the energy to get meself up and dance in the blazing sunshine, so Mick and I sat and gas bagged about the world whilst listening to a perfect set of deep house from my fave dj.  Eventually she was done and it was time for the deep to happen.  Moritz and Tiki started up the show at around 2pm with swirling soundscapes of reverb and delay, perfect for the way people were feeling/looking at this stage.  Mick and I managed a solid hour or so of this before it was decided that we were flat as hell and ready for more beddy byes, well I was anyway.

Time For Ibiza.

Sun July 27th  Space : We Love & Louie Vega feat Barbara Tucker @ El Divino

We had been in Ibiza for a night by this stage, no sleep as the rowdy kids in the hotel were making animals noises all night for us.  Ta!

The next day we went off for a wander around Playa Den Bossa to find a nice bit of beach to lie in the on and by accident found Space.  Now Space had not been on our agenda due to the line up being absolute pants.  But it was Sunday and it is Space…..

So we thought, fuck it, were here we may as well do the show.   After standing in line for awhile, not too long but long enough as it was 40degrees outside and we were in direct sunlight for the entire time,  we got in! It musta been about 5pm and it the terrace was packed out to the awful sounds of electro house…. Woooo! Shit.

So we went walk about and marvelled at the enormous (mostly empty) club till we settled in the Chibuku room with Dom Chung and others who were playing a real nice smattering of the more `modern’ house I have been enjoying for the last year of so.  This did us nice for almost the remainder of the time spent there.  We wandered out rather non-plussed at 11ish as we had Louie Vega and Barbara Tucker playing over at El Divino a bit later on.

So lets make it later on!

We get to El Divino to find it also dead empty and a cover charge of 50 euros each, this is up somewhat from the flyer price of 25.  The look of horror on our faces got it back down to 25 real fast tho, go kiwi!

By this stage the wife was feeling a bit worse for wear so she vacated the joint for a warm bed leaving me to make me own fun.

By the time I had returned to the club it had packed out and Mr Vega was playing.  He played a big set of classics for the yoof there, great for them to get a taste of what MAW were all about but not so exciting for and old bastard like me who had just driven around France listening to the MAW 10 Year Anniversary Boxset (this and this).

Still classics are called that for a reason and I found it difficult to resist the big scream ups in ready supply :

Harddrive 2000 – When you touch me

Nu Yorican Soul – Runaway

Nu Yorican Soul – Its Alright/ I Feel It

River Ocean – Love & Happiness (Yemaya Y Ochun)

This carried on late into the night before Barbara Tucker took to the stage and did a 30min set of all her classics :

Harddrive – Deep Inside

Barbara Tucker – I Get Lifted

Blaze – Most Precious Love

This was the high water mark on my music holiday!

Once done, she went over to Louie’s booth and sang along to whatever he was playing. Shitballs!!! It was unspeakably awesome! The top moment would have been Mr Vega running a drum loop and just working it out as Barbara Tucker `sang’ for about 20mins.  Top Sausage that! One funny thing that did come out of it was this lil gem of a story.

As I had been out dancing for around 13 hours that day I had developed a bit of a sore back (yes, yes, lay on the old man jokes here).  Luckily they had half of the club shut and I was able to sneak into the empty bit to stretch out me back yoga style.  I had been doing this for a wee while when 1 of the security guys came up to me and asked what was up in whatever language he uses (it was loud and I’m old remember).  I explained that I had a sore back and was just having a quick stretch whilst pointing at me back.  He smiled and says `ahhh you dj’, ya what? He follows this up with `would you like a drink?’ now, booze is somewhat expensive and I’m not one to look a gift security guard in the mouth!! So yes I’ll be having a glass of Rose thanks mate!  He then turns to the massed Guards and tells them I’m a dj as well, they smile, nod and move along…. I guess it’s either the beard or that I’m wikkidly cool or something… But I got me drink and invite into the VIP room, I decided that would be pushing me luck somewhat so stuck it out on the floor like the good old Kiwi battler up from struggle street that I am!

Next day was Monday!

That’s DC10 day people!!! But it was shut and that’s about enough about that. 

Monday July 28th  Amnesia – Cocoon

So Monday set us off to Amnesia to see Sven Vath’s night Cocoon. I wasn’t holding out to greater hopes for this as the DJ line up wasn’t top notch, are we seeing a pattern here? So away we went!

We got in early doors and had the run of the place for a while and were shocked at the size of the terrace room where Locodice and Marco Carola went back to back for the entire night.  This sounds good in theory but was a bit average in practice, it sorta never went anywhere and not being completely `cunted’, we were needing them to do a lil something.  It wasn’t long till the place was absolutely heaving and even less time till it was impossible to move anywhere.  The don’t have seats there cos then they would fit less people in and make less cash money… humpf.

Highlight for me was Locodice playing Green Velvet’s – Flash

As I was standing next to the NOS table…. I soon commenced to giggling.

We tried a couple of times to get in to see Sven but it was a total road block so we gave up and carried on where we were till just before 6am.  I left not enamoured with the joint, well massive and well packed in.

So that’s that then, what I did (music wise) on me holidays.

Let the normal service resume now please.

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Some fun times at the weekend!

I don’t have my ‘keystone LP’ review thing ready yet, sorry.

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What the hell is this stuff???

I have been finding me as much Cassy, Miss Fitz, Mara Trax stuff as possible of late. Its all super deep jackin house in the style of early Chicago house as in it uses an 808 and not a hell of a lot else. I can’t get enough presently!

May I recommend these readers:

Miss Fitz – Drifting on

Cassy – April

Mara Trax – Let Goose

Miss Fitz – Colici (Sascha Dive’s dark beat mix)

Delightful!

Also can’t go too far with out mentioning the beaut Afefe Iku mix of Ruff Way – Rhythm & Sound (Afefe Iku remix)

immediately figured, `Why would ya bother that old dog? It is pretty much perfect how it is but, as usual, me wuz wrong…..

The Ame Fabric is a very good listen too, which has come to be expected from these guys. I still barely go a month with out feeling the urge to re-run either Dessous Skin is In or Ame Mixing

Top drawer gear there.

Oh and heres Petre Inspirescu/Pedro smashing it in Romania

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So now feeling a touch worse for wear we prepared for the inevitable return home. The good news was we still had a night in Paris to look forward to! Alas, my worse for wear was growing exponentially. By the time we hit the plane i was in quite some state, i even managed to get a vomit in onboard! motion sickness was killing me dead… mind you, we had yet to actually move. This
did not bode well. To get to our hotel there would be trains, taxis and walking required… i was in not fit state by now. I musta looked pretty ruff as people were walking around me on the train like i was a plague victim! a nice lady at a train station offered me some drugs, but we had left ibiza by then and i didn’t feel like dancing. A nice man helped Nat unload the bags from the train as i was nearing death, quietly too i may add, like a real man i just took it and kept schtum (note from Nat: this is not true).  Eventually we made the hotel which was dead centre of all the cool stuff in Paris. Fat lot of good that did me… all I was good for was lying face down on the bed in our room and not moving. Nat didn’t let my impending death slow her down though as she pootled off to take in the
beauty that was a summers evening in Paris. I did try to get up for dinner but couldn’t make that stick either and abandoned Nat at the table to eat her dinner and mine and drink her wine alone.  I’m dead nice like that.
Next we came home.

It took the usual 40hrs of travelling.

suck.

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For me, the long weekend started last Tuesday when i saw Radiohead in Amsterdam. After arriving slightly late to find them already playing ‘Lucky’, I was hoping to see them play a more obscure set of songs from Hail to the Thief, Kid A, Amnesiac on top of what was obviously being toured. Don’t get me wrong, there were great moments like Reckoner and then they were ruined by middle aged women clapping along to the beat of Just. G’ah!

The next morning my friend Nick and me rise in our smelly 16 person hostel room and head to our local cafe ‘Ben’ for our final coffee before Nick and I go our seperate ways. I head to Berlin to catch up with Justin, Silke, Matt and of course BMPer Wayde. Feeling average i manage to get my way to Silke who laughs at the sight of me before guiding me to their new sweet pad.

After a quick beer and catch up i made my way to meet with Wayde and we headed to the first of our musical expeditions, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy. Doors opened at 8pm and we figure the support act ‘Full Fucking Moon’ will be on till 9.30 or so. We arrivedat 9 to find no one even checking tickets and Billy singing You remind me of Something (The Glory Goes) off his new album. Wayde checks and sees our assigned seats in the middle of the row are taken and so we stand at the door for a bit before finding two free seats at the end of the two rows next to us. Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy is a handsome man. Culdesac balled spot with tightly curled ginger hair and beard. Barefoot, though Wayde insisted he was wearing Crocs, he also wore a denim shirt and rolled up jeans which he every-so-often pulled a cloth from to wipe his face and forehead. Double bass, guitar, drums and a very hot (well endowed) violinist completed the band. He played for almost 2 hours, a lot of which i hadn’t heard before, but enjoyed all the same.

Thursday night – Ricardo playing live! Justin, Silke and myself arrive at Berghain around 12.30am and luckily Silke use to work for De:Bug who are putting on the party so she has her name on the guest list so we get to jump the two or so hour long queue and go to the 20 minute guestlist line instead. First on was Alva Noto. He played a lot heavier than when i saw him in Auckland. Very dubby but very good. No visuals however so maybe this is how he plays when there are no visuals to coincide with crazy noise.

Ricardo stepped up and so did the beats. Opening for Richie i was only expecting to hear bass around the 127bpm mark. He was supreme. At this stage i was stone cold sober other than a few beers and Berghain, while very dark and a little empty, was what i had expected. Large dancefloor, but not overly so, not the size of Galatos main room for instance.

Wayde and I work our way in to the middle of the floor and dance our way back as people push forward. Ricardo kept his set very level so as to not show up Richie. Richie starts and now i’m not so sober. The room is feeling a bit more heavy now and i manage to persuade Matt to buy me some water while i go feel sick. I pull it together and try to get in to Richie’s set, but struggle to get in to the bang-whizz, and end up following Justin and Silke down before they head home. It’s not long after i go catch a cab with Wayde and miss Apparat and MIA (bummer). Now that i’ve seen Richie play almost more than any other international, three times, i can comfortably say, he’s not a fave.

Friday’s a write off and Saturday we finally get to hit the shoe and record shops. Wayde found some nice Adidas and he actually bought some records!!

Saturday night and we find out that Matt and Simon have been up till 3am Saturday morning from Thursday night and not so in the mood for early Berghain. This suits me because i’m tired and apparently the good DJ’s don’t start till real late. I make arrangements to get up around 3am and go meet Wayde, but i sleep through till around 9am. Relieved i was to get a text letting me know Len Faki, The Mole, Cassy and Moritz von Oswald are all yet to play. After meeting with Wayde and Simon at the station we head along to Berghain while they tell me how amazing Rolando was and how disappointing Cobblestone Jazz were. Len Faki is banging it out in Berghain. The Mole is a lot more housey. I enjoyed parts of his set a heap but Wayde thought he was rubbish despite him playing Dem Young Scoonies.

Finally Cassy comes on in the Garden so we go sit in the corner in the shade and watch and listen as she effortlessly and seamlessly mixes her way through a solid few hours of deep house. Struggling to stay awake Wayde manages to stay and we stay put in the corner for Moritz von Oswald. Tikiman was vocalising for about 2 minutes of the hour we saw before Wayde hit the sleepy wall and we headed off.

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Shit Cooking

Dubstep Allstars Vol 6 by Appleblim http://www.discogs.com/release/1348634

BMP hats

Nike Slippers

BMP long weekend in Berlin

Scat Night thurs @ Laboratory http://www.lab-oratory.de/index.html

My new mix cd

Just shit

Over 40hrs of travelling in Cattle class

No DC10

People talking about computer programs

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Just to keep things poppin along here is what I wrote about last Sunday with a few amendments.

We missed Cassy Got there in time for last hour of luciano in the sun – lots of ‘his’ set records, freaks come out, god made me funky, the thrill me thing he played at Fabric (which I missed) again. Maybe 1000 people getting into it. Wink played next but about 20 min in massive rain came down and everyone hid under umbrellas apart from mentallists up the front. I didn’t really get into it, seemed like the wrong kind of music for that part of the day.. The sun came back out and he started playing vocal samples of the blaze ‘lovelee dae’ tune.. Then Matthew Dear’s big band played, I am ashamed to say I actually skipped out on this and checked out Karotte who Matt said was like Germany’s Sam Hill, but for whatever reason I had a lot of fun for his set. Came back outside and Hawtin was playing, he was a bit better than in Detroit, by this point had met up w/ simon and all his mates so there were a lot of us having fun.. Couldn’t tell you any of the records he played apart from finishing his set with re-edit of Michael Jacksons’ ‘Don’t stop till you get enough’ and ‘billie jean’..
Things started to get pretty confusing by now, the main area shut down after Hawtin and we all moved inside to see Guido Schneider and Steve Bug.. But it looked like Bug didn’t play and Josh Wink played again! Much more housey this time, with Marshall Jefferson -’move your body’ (crucial ‘key tech’ track paul!) and Dave Clark (i think it was red 2??) coming through!.. Then Loco Dice who seemed to be playing btb with Luciano(!) although i was somewhere else by this point and couldn’t say for sure what was happening.

About 3.30 things hit a complete wall with the twin Bore-o-thons of Heartthrob live and troy pierce (Who sounded like being stuck in a satanic washing machine, but less awesome than that description seems). I was done. we’d been there 14 hours by this point. Pacou Osuna in the other room was actually sounding cool but I was finished, Mike had lost his coat, Silke was tired, and Justin was looking for red wine to get him to sleep! so we left. 5 min before leaving we actually found a third room but I didn’t see anything there.

Overall, awesome times, and now I want to come back to Berlin again for longer. Thanks to Simon, Nat, Matt and the friendly adventurers of Berlin.

I am in Tokyo now and have been introduced to a Jamaican resturant that does jerk chicken and has Jamaican dancehall radio live off the net coming through the soundsystem. Haven’t done any musical stuff yet but next weekend Guido Schneider and Johnny D play Womb.. it would be remiss of me not to pop along.

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I lost a whole bunch of Raresh sets off my Ipod (same set in fact but split in 5 and i can’t even remember where exactly it was recorded to re-download it). I still don’t know why my ipod synched up with this machine. Now the set is stuck on my computer way back in NZ and for some reason, one of the only things i didn’t bring backup copies of!?

Respect to Bob. He was the champion who gave me Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy and this is what I’ve come to rely on while busing, training, sleeping under the stars on a boat in the Mediterranean and generally just getting around. He plays Berlin on July 2nd http://www.last.fm/event/571855. This is possibly not what Wayde is coming here for but would be super if i could be here again from Amsterdam on July 2nd to check it out! Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy has a new album out titled ‘Lay down in the light’ and i hear it’s very good.

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Cassy

Her live at panorama bar mixes have been untouchable, as has her Ibiza voice podcast
http://www.ibiza-voice.com/sessions/media/Cassy_Ibiza_Voice_Podcast.mp3

Vera

I managed to get a 4.5hr mix of hers @ Zukunft 11-01-08, which at no point gets anything other than awe inspiring, you should find this… it will complete you.

Johnny D

To go with his outstanding form in the field of house manufacturing, this mix killed the shit out of me at work last Friday. Make yaself useful and go get it
http://www.getthecurse.com/2008/04/28/johnny-d-oslo-gtc025/#more-262

RPR

Now with the added D & B, no not drum and bass, Dan Andrei and Boola..

• Petre Inspirescu & Rhadoo : Floete & Clarinette ep
• Dan Andrei : Balada Redo (boola remix)
• Boola : Anima Tru ep

For the record Johnny D – Orbitalife is the tune of the year for me so far, of course this is liable to change next week…Possibly to Riddim Mood from the same ep

And can somebody get me a copy of
Omar feat Stevie Wonder – Feeling You (Henrik Schwarz mix).
Proper soulful house without the soulful house baggage.

Hopefully I will manage to catch 1, 2 or all of the above djs when I hit Berlin and Ibiza next month. Chalk me up fer a spot of dancing at:

• Panorama Bar
• Watergate
• Weekend
• Bar 25
• DC10
• Cocoon @ Amnesia
• Space Terrace

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My name is Benny and at the moment along with my friend Mick I am representing the overseas section of the BMP.

Hopefully in the next few days I will post about our experiences here in Berlin.
I was going to do a big intro post all about myself but it is just us reading at the moment right(?) so maybe there is no point in that yet. Over time my distinct writing style will separate me from the other BMP members anyhow, think PG Wodehouse on crack.. or maybe not.

Today we hit the record shops and second hand stores of east berlin, should be fun. Chuuus!

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