(I can't get no) Immediate Satisfaction
__Diktat in Berlin [iii]

august 05, 2011.

[ podcast :: sbpc 47 ... ]

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On Sunday, June 19th - a gray and rainy day - Diktat checked out Berlin's former City Airport - Tempelhof, thus called because in the middle ages the site was Knights Templar land - for a fourth OUT-side. The airport halls of Tempelhof, built in the 1930's, were part of Albert Speer's plan for the reconstruction of Berlin. They were designed by Nazi architect Ernst Sagebiel, and (according to Wikipedia) still rank among the largest built entities worldwide. We found Tempelhof pretty much deserted that afternoon. Its grandiose constructions radiated a splendid and exquisite desolation against the backdrop of which little Diktat-ors, like ourselves, all but vanished...

iv. Tempelhof

This is Rébus' YouTube report of our performance at the Tempelhof:

From Tempelhof we continued to the Emserstraße, where Rinus that evening had programmed an event in the Sucked Orange Gallery, an up and coming artistic enterprise of Spanish lineage. For marketing-tactical reasons the evening was announced both as an edition of daskleinefieldrecordingsfestival (only too rare these days) and as the 8th edition of Tales for Tapes. It all began in the Sucked Orange backroom. In a short lecture/demonstration Rébus argued why it is that the analog dictaphone is not merely a device for the recording and the playback of magnetic audio tapes, but also a pretty versatile musical instrument; I continued with an anecdoted introduction to Foundtaping, and of course did not forget to draw the audience's attention to the fact out the full Found Tapes audio stream is one of the fine 24/7 sound art streams that can be accessed via the new edition of Raudio iThing app, released not so very long ago. The special limited edition Discuts Found Tapes cassette was not yet available then, otherwise I would surely have brought along some copies of this great little collector's itemmetee, which sells online (world wide p&p included) for only € 10,-.

It turned out a fabulous evening at Sucked Orange. It also was a relief that, for this 3rd Diktat IN-side in a row, for once we found ourselves not below Berlin street level, but in a light & white space with a big, clean shop window that one could look through, all the way over to the other side of the street.

Diktat's unplugged performance in Sucked Orange's front room was part installation, part concert, and nicely fitted the surroundings, which lend itself for a little laid-back (living room) theatricality. From a spectator's point of view, it must have been the most interesting of our Berlin IN-sides to witness. And though of course Sucked Orange is an art gallery, and not really a living room, Sunday's performance did suggest that 'living rooms' are more of a natural habitat for our quartet than the alternative & Echtzeit music holes that we end up in, most of the time. Therefore, if you are interested in hosting a (private or public) Diktat performance in your living room, do drop us a line. We'll be happy to talk about it.

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Here, as the 3rd part of our 'Diktat IN-side Berlin' recording triptych, is a track that will give you an impression of what Diktat sounded like on June 19th in the Emserstraße.

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Added August 10th, 2012: Sucked Orange is one of seven 'inside/outside' live recordings on D I K T A T in Berlin. Buy-Download the album @Bandcamp & support DIKTAT's upcoming US tour! We will use the proceedings of this digital album release to cover the costs of the band's stay in the US of A: car rental, gasoline, toll, parking tickets, hamburgers & beer, et cetera... "... If these were the 1960's, DIKTAT'd be the fucking Ronnettes...!" (Follow DIKTAT to the US of A @diktat_us)

The Sucked Orange track has been extracted from a binaural recording made by our Berlin friend and colleague Hanna Buhl. To hear Diktat with Hanna's ears, use your headphones to listen.

And though we were pretty up that fine Sunday evening, we did go down below street level for a taste of the underground a little later that evening, when we entered the Sucked Orange basement for some Romano Krzych agitp(r)op. Most of what Romano spit out, I'm sorry to say, was tedious, run of the mill, noise stuff. But he also had a couple of fascinating, almost sound-less, passages, with little else but the mechanical sounds of his equipment, and no amplification of the signals that came out, and were sent into the sound systems. This may have been due to some technical glitch, but I think Romano should jump at the serendipitous chance, and keep it in as part of future editions of his act. And maybe just drop the rest. Now that would be great. Otherwise, his performance came with a stale and naive pseudo-political discourse that annoyed me a lot. I will spare you the nasty details. Fortunately there was a lot of fine vodka on and behind the basement's bar. That made it easy - and a pleasure - to forget...

Before heading back to the Weserstaße we did - upstairs again - a short photo session. Now we were particularly photogenic in Neukölln, whatd'ya think? [ ... Click to see us even bigger ... ]

And the evening and the morning were the third day.

[ Previous 'Diktat in Berlin' report: 'Komm raussi!' ]

[ - to be continued - ]

tags: Diktat, Berlin, Sucked Orange Gallery

# .413.

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