Berghain
Notes on techno
Exhibited; Commonplace Projects Dublin 2011
Photocopied text available to take away
Techno music, particularly contemporary techno music, including minimalist techno, is stripped down and relentlessly repetitive. Unlike the form of many other genres of dance music (repetition that builds up to sweeping, euphoric highs) techno clings to the darker, deeper places and doesnt let go.
The aesthetic of techno can be readily associated with a very hard, queer, masculine sexuality. This is apparent in Berlins club scene where purist techno music and gay male sexuality are symbiotic.
Berlin based club Berghain, the internationally renowned temple of techno started out as the gay club Ostgut. Ostgut, like Berghain, was designed to facilitate un-inhibited sex between men. There is no trace of camp in the Berlin techno aesthetic, it is far removed from disco in its construction and intention. Techno encourages sex without flirting, without camp.
Techno is architectural, its form is hard and structured. The relentless repetition re-flects the urban environment...grids...blocks...divisions and unifications. Bodies are organised, unified and divided through the sound and rhythm. Topless men lock themselves into the driving insistent sound, shoulders lead the rest of the body, feet stay planted on the two foot squared space claimed on the heaving dancefloor. Torsos, shoulders, stomachs and arms are tense falling into an endless bounce from one sharp beat to another. There is an unspoken code of behaviour...anything is allowed as long as the rules are noted. Gay men are in control.
Techno is a deep grey darkness with a teasing warmth. It is the sharp grey light of winter mornings in Berlin. It is the sound of fucking. It is hard, unrelenting and melancholic.
If jazz is an expression of spontaneity and experimentation, Techno is the tight control and precision that seems to give us permission to let go and go beyond ourselves.
Emma Haugh 7-12-2010
