Our event “Sound System Culture – On the radical roots of rave” on April 19th was a beautiful gathering of creative people from various genres.
We are so happy for how wonderful the evening was and very thankful for everybody who was a part of it and enjoyed this night with us!
Soon we will feature detailed retropectives and, of course, diverse audible treats from the event!
But yet before that let us introduce you to the participating artists who have not yet been featured in previous posts.
SAOU TV is a VJ and Video Artist based in Leipzig. Born in Tokyo and raised in Paris, she studied photography in Berlin before studying media art in Leipzig. Inspired by old TVs, youtube dog videos and old-school computer graphics, her VJ sets are colourful and mixed with found footages, 3D objects and glitches.
The Leipzig based artist & musician Kevin Koen, works with improvised sound and reactive audio as a different kind of
communication between the participate artists or the attending audience. In his installations and/or performances, he expands the view in sound and live situations and combines audio, visual, spatial and installative working methods.
Right now he studies Media-Art in Leipzig.
Kevin Koen and SAOU TV have been collaborating since 2018. Combining their two mediums to an audiovisual live performance, Kevin and Saou are creating an atmosphere where the music and visuals are bringing the viewers to travel into a glitchy and noisy dimension.
You can find an example of this experience here:
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www.vimeo.com/saou
www.instagram.com/saoutv
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Already being into reggae by the end of the 90s, BenJammin got strongly infected with dubmusic in 2000 through a Shaka dance. Joining the ‘Peace Time Sound’ soundsystem in 2003 he soon was resident in the legendary Dubwohnzimmer on the RAW-area in Berlin. Within this context various international acts were invited, often coming to Germany for the first time.
Parallel to this project BenJammin later also became an active member of the MoonBass Hi-Fi Sound System and at one point was part of the Serendubity collective as well.
Strictly playing vinyl and staying underground until today, he developed his own versatile style and collection.
Check out his mixes and the set he did for our first small orbit event Sound System Culture – On the Radical Roots of Rave – Chapter #1 containing a cross-section of gems from roots to future dub:
Since 1997, the Berlin based Hägen Daz is an active DJ and started to do club parties and open airs one year later.
In the first couple of years, he experimented with musical styles like techno, house, hip hop, elektro and breakbeat.
Also having studied audio engineering, today his main emphasis is on Drum&Bass, Jungle, Breakbeat, Dubstep, Dub, Hip Hop, Halftime and Broken Beatz but also genres like Jazz, Funk, Reggae and diverse other musical styles belong to his repertoire.
With this love for music and years of expertise it is no surprise that he played on countless events, to name just a few: Sisyphos, Wilde Renate Club, Mensch Meier, Kater Blau, Void Berlin, Supamolly, Hangar, Fusion Festival, OBOA – Oderbruch Open Air Festival.
As he already served us a very memorable 90ies mix for Sound System Culture – On the Radical Roots of Rave – Chapter #2, we were exited to hear the vinyl treasures he brought to the main event to play on the sound system! 🤩
Here are two mixes to catch a glimpse:
https://hearthis.at/hgen-daz/halftimemix/
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The presentation “Hardcore techno and sound system culture” by Bianca Ludewig explored the use of soundsystem culture in connection to breakcore and gabber. The sonic aspects and potentials of these styles are interrogated and linked to the social aspects of sound and music. This is illustrated by the Berlin Fuckparade, an event that is happening annually since 1997.
The Fuckparade is a vivid example for the interweavings of soundsystem culture, (gentrification of) urban space and social potentials of music.
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Get a taste of one of her banging mixsets from her alter ego:
Jukebox Utopia
Listen to her here:
https://www.mixcloud.com/wiseupradioshow/
https://www.mixcloud.com/JukeboxUtopia/
Gretchen Bazooka is one of the curators of the event.
Her agenda is to introduce harder and faster music to Berlin`s rave scene, but also to inspire DJs and rave organizers to take themselves less seriously and to be more daring in combining different musical genres.
Loving UK Happy Hardcore and combining it with various styles like Hardtek and Hardstyle, she was set out to blow some brains that night.
Listen here:
Stay tuned to find more intruiging and banging sets from Sound System Culture Berlin on this blog very soon!
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