|
Saturday night I went to the local bar on Alte Schönhauserstr called Miss Hecker. I don't know if it's famous or infamous, but every time I go, I wonder why I don't go more often. The place is just really relaxed, and though it seems to be a squat, the decoration appears to have been applied with love and vision. I've been hanging out a lot with a video artist friend for the last two months, and as his time in Berlin was drawing short, I decided to accompany him on an excursion of his choosing. To go mingle with the art world: dealers, gallerists, dilettantes, etc.
First we had to go and catch up with his journalist friend at Miss Hecker. And if I’d had any expectations about the evening, they would have no doubt been wrong.
After climbing the stairs up to the small space and stepping off the landing, we encountered a fully crowded room, and had to stand in the doorway as a jazz band played. It wasn't the standards, and it wasn't loud. In fact, the drummer was using synthetic light brushes, and the trumpeter was using his mute mainly to control the depth of breath noise coming out. I was captivated by the long slow segments, and excited when the band built up some steam, even though the drummer never got to full Clyde Stubblefield funk and intensity, which I'd secretly been wishing.
The final track they played before the encore really blew me away though as the drummer (who I now know to be Rudi Fischerlehner, of Pinx Trio) started the song with a 5 minute solo of textural drumming. By textural, I mean it wasn't a beat but more a skill exploration of stutters and flams on the various other surfaces of the kit, like putting the stick in the center of the snare was somehow passé. The final effect was somehow like an acoustic Autechre.
After the end of their concert, we moved on to Electronic Church on Greifswalderstr. Again, not because we had any idea what was going on. I find forced ignorance to be a good place to start from when collecting inspirations. There, we saw the second band of the evening, called Pan Am Scan, who were again working with a textural drummer, a guitarist, and a vibraphonist. This time, the drummer was using a bow to saw across cymbals, a disembodied speaker to resonate through the drum bodies, and what I could only guess were vibrators to clatter across the surfaces. The racket created was even less rhythmic than the first drummer I saw.
I began to wonder if there's a specific motivation in Berlin by non-techno artists to explore every musical space which has been dominated for so long by the metronomic kick drum.
*While researching the night in question, I found an interesting listings site for experimental music in Berlin.
|
