new year's adventure plans
It's almost the end of the year, and i have just signed up for an adventure. I bought a ticket to a psytrance party, spread over multiple nights during the Chinese New Year break.
I have butterflies in my stomach, a kind of second-hand anxiety, because when i bought the ticket it was less than a quarter the price of the advertized presale amount. I know what that means. It means they haven't sold enough. I remember the emotion well from when i was involved in throwing parties 20+ years ago. The promoters start to realize they won't have enough cash to pay the artists or to rent the equipment. Phone calls go round trying to get favors. Loans are taken out. The crew gets put under a lot of pressure. Everyone has a pit in their stomach, and if there's drugs involved (which there usually is) it can make for some pretty intense moments. It takes a lot of willpower and team spirit to try to pull together something awesome regardless.
In my experience it did always work out. Not financially, of course. Nobody gets rich throwing underground parties. In fact, most promoters lose money. Crew members work for free. Local artists give up their pay so touring artists can get a taxi from the airport and a comfortable hotel room. And - if you have a good scene - the crowd will dance even harder when the space is empty to manifest love and energy and support for everyone who has taken a hit to put the show together. I hope Taiwan has a good scene.
And who knows, maybe it'll turn around?
The funny thing is, i wouldn't even have known the party was going on if an oldskool trancer hadn't posted it on a website that still exists from the olden days of the internet when sites had tiled images in the background and under construction gifs and visitor counters and guest books. When i emailed her to ask where to get tickets she said she wasn't even the organizer, she just posted it on this old website to spread the word to elder ravers like me. Everyone else is on Facebook.
Fuck Facebook man. It's so depressing that independent, grassroots scenes all over the world now rely on websites owned and operated by a bunch of eye-wateringly wealthy Americans who make their money mining personal information and selling it on to sleazy advertizers, propagandists and grifters. These scenes that came up with a punk/DIY ethic, usually with a decent anti-capitalist or leftist contingent, they just threw their hands in the air and gave up.
And i was there when they didn't! I know record stores don't exist any more so you lost one outlet for reaching your audience. (I bought my ticket at a weird hair dresser slash coffee shop slash custom tailor slash student hangout.) I know that street zines don't exist any more to run your announcements. But 25 years ago we still set up phone information lines and internet mailing lists. People leveraged connections at the local universities or chipped in to get a dedicated server. I know i probably sound like a "back in my day" grumpy old nan, but goddamnit, back in my day people who were interested in niche topics built and ran their own communities, they didn't set up inside a gated community run by a bunch of capitalist assholes.
Anyway, i did eventually have to open Facebook to find out more details about the party and get in touch with the promoter to figure out how to get there. Because, you guys, Tsuyoshi Suzuki is booked. I haven't seen Tsuyoshi since i lived in Australia. I didn't even know he was still around. He ran Matsuri Productions, the label that wrenched psytrance from its hippie dippie melodic Goa roots and started pushing out truly weird and gnarly stuff that confounded the dancefloor, stuff that went down a treat in my corner of the world at the time.
I used to describe this new kind of psytrance as something like acid, except without the acid line. Like, you'd get these hints of synthesizer sounds that gave the impression something was just about to blow the fucking roof off... and then nothing would happen. The ultimate anti-climax genre, one whose primary gimmick was to endlessly tease an epic release and then give you a wack movie sample and a sad trombone instead. Oh hai. Here's some triplets. Of course this silly up-its-own-ass trend never really took off and i think 20 years later the rather more accessible "full-on" style remains the most popular with people still in the scene. But for those of us who were there in the 90s just before Matsuri folded, Tsuyoshi introduced us to stuff like Quirk.
Quirk - Mystic Linguistic
I guess if Tsuyoshi is still around he's seen every kind of party, big ones and small ones, ones that go off and ones that flop. I hope he kills it regardless if it's raining or cold, regardless if the local crew turn out or not.
SWEET SUNDAY: a Sagittarius Stream feat. TSUYOSHI SUZUKI Nov 2020
It's so funny for me going to events after Berlin, because seems like in Berlin a party never flops. Every festival sells out. Every club is always packed. DJs move to Berlin and make a career because even if you're a nobody you're going to find somewhere to play where you'll get paid and people will dance, or at least stop by for drinks. The experience of going to a party and then you're the only one there except for the promoter and their friends, that's something that only happens in the rest of the world.
When i say i've been spoiled by living in Berlin, this is what i mean. It's such an easy place to be a fan of electronic music. There's always something good going on. You don't need to go out of your way to support your faves, because there's a whole army of folks who will show up anyway. There's no butterflies in your stomach, wondering if this might be the last time you get to see someone play, because even if this promoter retires or that club shuts down, there's dozens more.
But at the same time... it does take a bit of the magic out of it. It's less of an adventure to go out when you know it's going to be good, when you know more or less what you're going to get. Part of what made raves exciting to me as a kid was that i didn't know. Didn't know if people would show, didn't know what kind of music would be played, didn't know if the party would get raided, didn't know if i'd even make it to the venue in the first place...
Speaking of, i don't know how the fuck i'm going to make it out to some rural/indigenous community way out back of Pingdong during Chinese New Year. I don't even know how i'm going to get out of Taipei with public transport packed to the rafters. I haven't opened my tent in over a year. Given the climate here it could be entirely mold-infested and then i will have nowhere to sleep even if i do make it. What the hell am i thinking?
Well, i'm thinking it's going to be an adventure, whatever happens. If it sucks, it sucks. If it's great, it's great. Even if i get stranded in a train station in middle of nowhere and sleep on a bench... well, wouldn't be the first time. At least it won't be work.
Oh hey, here's a song from an album i bought last weekend featuring a synth player from Sudan. Released on a hipster record label that i'm sure every self-respecting Guardianista already knows about, but just in case not...
Jantra - Khadija
It thrills me that there are these micro-scenes all over the world where people discovered that synthesizers just sound awesome, and there is nothing better than dancing to them.
I have butterflies in my stomach, a kind of second-hand anxiety, because when i bought the ticket it was less than a quarter the price of the advertized presale amount. I know what that means. It means they haven't sold enough. I remember the emotion well from when i was involved in throwing parties 20+ years ago. The promoters start to realize they won't have enough cash to pay the artists or to rent the equipment. Phone calls go round trying to get favors. Loans are taken out. The crew gets put under a lot of pressure. Everyone has a pit in their stomach, and if there's drugs involved (which there usually is) it can make for some pretty intense moments. It takes a lot of willpower and team spirit to try to pull together something awesome regardless.
In my experience it did always work out. Not financially, of course. Nobody gets rich throwing underground parties. In fact, most promoters lose money. Crew members work for free. Local artists give up their pay so touring artists can get a taxi from the airport and a comfortable hotel room. And - if you have a good scene - the crowd will dance even harder when the space is empty to manifest love and energy and support for everyone who has taken a hit to put the show together. I hope Taiwan has a good scene.
And who knows, maybe it'll turn around?
The funny thing is, i wouldn't even have known the party was going on if an oldskool trancer hadn't posted it on a website that still exists from the olden days of the internet when sites had tiled images in the background and under construction gifs and visitor counters and guest books. When i emailed her to ask where to get tickets she said she wasn't even the organizer, she just posted it on this old website to spread the word to elder ravers like me. Everyone else is on Facebook.
Fuck Facebook man. It's so depressing that independent, grassroots scenes all over the world now rely on websites owned and operated by a bunch of eye-wateringly wealthy Americans who make their money mining personal information and selling it on to sleazy advertizers, propagandists and grifters. These scenes that came up with a punk/DIY ethic, usually with a decent anti-capitalist or leftist contingent, they just threw their hands in the air and gave up.
And i was there when they didn't! I know record stores don't exist any more so you lost one outlet for reaching your audience. (I bought my ticket at a weird hair dresser slash coffee shop slash custom tailor slash student hangout.) I know that street zines don't exist any more to run your announcements. But 25 years ago we still set up phone information lines and internet mailing lists. People leveraged connections at the local universities or chipped in to get a dedicated server. I know i probably sound like a "back in my day" grumpy old nan, but goddamnit, back in my day people who were interested in niche topics built and ran their own communities, they didn't set up inside a gated community run by a bunch of capitalist assholes.
Anyway, i did eventually have to open Facebook to find out more details about the party and get in touch with the promoter to figure out how to get there. Because, you guys, Tsuyoshi Suzuki is booked. I haven't seen Tsuyoshi since i lived in Australia. I didn't even know he was still around. He ran Matsuri Productions, the label that wrenched psytrance from its hippie dippie melodic Goa roots and started pushing out truly weird and gnarly stuff that confounded the dancefloor, stuff that went down a treat in my corner of the world at the time.
I used to describe this new kind of psytrance as something like acid, except without the acid line. Like, you'd get these hints of synthesizer sounds that gave the impression something was just about to blow the fucking roof off... and then nothing would happen. The ultimate anti-climax genre, one whose primary gimmick was to endlessly tease an epic release and then give you a wack movie sample and a sad trombone instead. Oh hai. Here's some triplets. Of course this silly up-its-own-ass trend never really took off and i think 20 years later the rather more accessible "full-on" style remains the most popular with people still in the scene. But for those of us who were there in the 90s just before Matsuri folded, Tsuyoshi introduced us to stuff like Quirk.
Click to viewQuirk - Mystic Linguistic
I guess if Tsuyoshi is still around he's seen every kind of party, big ones and small ones, ones that go off and ones that flop. I hope he kills it regardless if it's raining or cold, regardless if the local crew turn out or not.
SWEET SUNDAY: a Sagittarius Stream feat. TSUYOSHI SUZUKI Nov 2020
It's so funny for me going to events after Berlin, because seems like in Berlin a party never flops. Every festival sells out. Every club is always packed. DJs move to Berlin and make a career because even if you're a nobody you're going to find somewhere to play where you'll get paid and people will dance, or at least stop by for drinks. The experience of going to a party and then you're the only one there except for the promoter and their friends, that's something that only happens in the rest of the world.
When i say i've been spoiled by living in Berlin, this is what i mean. It's such an easy place to be a fan of electronic music. There's always something good going on. You don't need to go out of your way to support your faves, because there's a whole army of folks who will show up anyway. There's no butterflies in your stomach, wondering if this might be the last time you get to see someone play, because even if this promoter retires or that club shuts down, there's dozens more.
But at the same time... it does take a bit of the magic out of it. It's less of an adventure to go out when you know it's going to be good, when you know more or less what you're going to get. Part of what made raves exciting to me as a kid was that i didn't know. Didn't know if people would show, didn't know what kind of music would be played, didn't know if the party would get raided, didn't know if i'd even make it to the venue in the first place...
Speaking of, i don't know how the fuck i'm going to make it out to some rural/indigenous community way out back of Pingdong during Chinese New Year. I don't even know how i'm going to get out of Taipei with public transport packed to the rafters. I haven't opened my tent in over a year. Given the climate here it could be entirely mold-infested and then i will have nowhere to sleep even if i do make it. What the hell am i thinking?
Well, i'm thinking it's going to be an adventure, whatever happens. If it sucks, it sucks. If it's great, it's great. Even if i get stranded in a train station in middle of nowhere and sleep on a bench... well, wouldn't be the first time. At least it won't be work.
Oh hey, here's a song from an album i bought last weekend featuring a synth player from Sudan. Released on a hipster record label that i'm sure every self-respecting Guardianista already knows about, but just in case not...
Jantra - Khadija
It thrills me that there are these micro-scenes all over the world where people discovered that synthesizers just sound awesome, and there is nothing better than dancing to them.