Unscene Berlin

In the first couple of hours that I spend at Fuck Parade this year, I come to the conclusion that there are four reasons why I always go to it: 1) It's free. Free!! What better reason could there ever possibly be for going out?? 2) It's got variety . Zuruck zu den Wurzeln , Dienstagswelt, ZMF, Brunnen 70 , and Seismograph are some of the floats I see lined up here, and sunny Subland ’s hosting the after-party. Even the likes of Death Rave are present and accounted for, complete with dark gabba sounds. Gabba hasn't been my cuppa tea since the late 1990s but it’s hardly changed since then, so I can still get into it. And as an upside, its naked aggression seems to be keeping all of Berlin's pesky hipsters at bay*. 3) It's political.   This year I see banners protesting right wing extremism, GEMA club fee hikes , the dismantlement of Mauer Park as a freiraum (e.g. free creative space); the incarceration of Pussy Riot … etc. Which puts...

At the moment I'm working on a book so I probably won't have much time for entries over the coming weeks but a glance at the party calendar indicates that August is already brimming with parties. With the amount of people in town for the city's peak tourism month, even the alternative events I've listed are guaranteed to be splashy. .. So, there is no need to settle for run of the mill 'techno' parties that all sound the same; plenty of other subcultures within the electronic genre - psytrance, gabber, hard industrial techno and flower-power free parties - are present and accounted for this month. Saturday August 4th T t here will be a free openair at 'the Devil's Hill' from 12 p.m. Despite the scary name, it will probably be a fluffy (glittery and neon-y, too) party. The site itself is also an icon for urban explorers so you can kill two strange birds with one stone by going there. There is also a BGE parade on the 4th which, as far as I u...