Berlin, as you probably know is a bi-monthly minimal based event hosted by the guys in Nashville. If you have stopped here before then this should be no new-news for you. This Saturday they host their first BERLIN of the new year with special guest Dietrich Schoenemann. D should be no new-news as well, with a long list of accolades, his most notable one as a member of Prototype 909. To save a long spiel about him, i’ll let you read up on the details to the left on the flyer.
There are several reasons I’m posting this flyer. One being that recently I’ve been feeling a bit stifled as a dj creatively due, in large, by the atmosphere here in the Memphis area. If you know anything about Memphis, it’s mainly a hip-hop and soul town. A strong house presence exists among my friends and family in the music industry here. I myself enjoy plenty that the dance community offers in that realm however my heart yearns for much more than they can provide. In my opinion, Techno has become the redheaded stepchild of this city and it shows. The few of us here are scattered across the metro area and find it hard to get together except for the occasional low-tek late night places like Odessa and Nocturnal. In the spirit of the mantra from Memphis’ very own TripleSix, “It’s hard out there for a Techno Pimp.”
Over the last 10 years, house & techno have made a shift in the same direction causing the birth of psuedo-fused genres like prog (trance fuses with house), electroclash ( 80’s & Electro meets techno), tech-house (house and techno fused) and minimal (techno subdued) …
***sidenote – these are generalizations and are no means a definitive definition***.
…these variations offer different appeal to an otherwise traditionally raw and aggressive techno “throw down” or groovy “hands in the air” house vibe. As these areas develop and mutate, so do the crowds that follow them. I’ve seen shifts in what djs play and the people that they used to call a following moving and changes sides, if you will. Stay with me here, I’m about to tie all this together.
As a dj who has been forced to step out of my comfort zone and play anything and everything from top 40 to underground Memphis rap in order to make a semi-living, I’ve been trying to get back to my roots, leaving my club gigs and returning again to “the scene,” or so I hoped, to focus on TECHNO. The scene as once known is nothing like it used to be. I brought up the genre dilemma because I think with the change in styles & music tastes over the years along with the inbreeding of musical genres, I’m feeling lost. Living in a place where house surrounds me, fortified by hip-hop and soul culture of the city I live in, I have arrived at a strange place in my life. I feel like I have stepped off the path where once, long ago, I forged a direction musically. I’m now looking to get back on track but I find that there is no longer a path where there once used to be.
My internal musical struggle continues as anyone who has read my blog also knows. They say that when you have lost something and wish to find it, the best thing to do is go back to the beginning and retrace your steps, so that’s what I’ll do. Vanilla Mike and myself have decided to head to Nashville to see Dietrich and the other guys from the Berlin crew for a dose of good techno-ish music inspiration. Let’s see where this take me.
I hear you brother.