C/O Pop

So myself and my good friend Mark did a bit of a trip over to Cologne in Germany for the Cologne on Pop festival. (or ze Germans idea of pop which in a Uk/Nz sense doesn't really translate to Kylie or Brittney)
I'm sort of wanting to call it the Confused on Pop festival, not because the festival did anything to confuse me, but because I got internally confused by the festival. I think I may get to that later.
We decided to take the train to Cologne from London because it seemed more adventurous, and having watched 'The Darjeeling Ltd' five times now and loving it to bits the idea really tickled me.
So we got on the super fast train, and on the five hours down (with a stop in the middle in Brussels, which incidently in our hour there seemed quite boring) and went and stood at the the bar a pretty much drunk continually the whole way. It was quite fun propping yourself up at the bar and watching Europe go by whilst drinking overpriced beer, but it certainly wasn't like the romantic ideal I had in my head. Why oh why do they have to make modern trains so stark and hospital like on the inside. I want 1930s plush plushness with a stale smell of books and a slightly moldy feel. Maybe a few special made mini chandeliers that look like a rich Smurfs extravagance.
We arrived in Cologne, had a quick meal of what tasted like reheated lasanga and then headed out to the Kompakt Total 9 party, figuring what better place to go to a Kompakt party than in its home. Speaking of which I never realised the Kompakt logo is in fact the logo of Cologne. It was funny walking around and seeing it on Ambulances and man hole covers everywhere.
The party itself was in a large hall with arches running the whole length and immense ceiling height. Impressive but the sound left a little bit to be desired. There was also an upstairs which was smaller and had much better sound. The party itself was only ok. No one really took off though. Supermayer did most of the songs of their album live, which was interesting to see, and I am quite happy to report that Superpitchers voice translates quite well live.
Aril Brihka was boring as buggery. I hate that new trance bollocks he makes and plays. It never really went anywhere and just seemed stale. I suppose some people could get into it, and there is no doubt his stuff sounds really good so he is obviously a talented producer, its just not my cuppa.
Tobias Thomas was good, but not as good as I have seen him. It was still a fun place to be and not a total right off, I guess I was expecting more of a Kompakt wind up as the night rolled on and not just to be belted in the face with quite hard music right from the outset. Maybe this is a problem of having all headliners on a line up. Either way, the musical flow felt somehow off. In fact I think I only had a decent bop round to DJ Koze. I did end up speaking to Sasha Funke in an rather embarrassing mix up of identity, but thats another story.
We decided to head off to the after party. So after a lovely stroll around Cologne in the wee hours and an annoying conversation with some rich English university students who were trying to reason out and use their philosophy 101 majors on our obviously tongue in cheek conversation about the possibility of farming dumb humans for meat, we arrived at Odonien which as you can see by the photo is a cool junkyard space equipped with fire breathing junk dinosaurs and all.
The actual mixer and turntables are hanging from the ceiling in a small room at the back of the junkyard and although at first this looks like it surely must be a dodgy as place to put turntables, despite the gentle rocking back and forth they never seemed to skip.......until knocked mid mix by one of the above annoying students.
This was much more like it. Michael Mayer and Superpitcher playing back to back, an absolutely fantastic sound system and a sunny day in an open venue. We sat here for quite a while soaking up the sun, talking rubbish (this farming humans conversation just wouldn't die) and listening to the music. Which was really good by the way. A lot more of that music they are known for that makes even the straightest of white men swing their hips from side to side like they are a funky fresh jive talking black man from the 70s. Although I note with much horror that now I am 30 I seem to have replaced any type of dancing with a casual thigh slap which would look more at home in a hoedown. Needless to say at this party my jeans were getting a worn patch on my right thigh.
After this we went for a quick sight see around Cologne (Cologne Cathedral is one of the most impressive buildings ever) Then we went home to bed.
We awoke at about 10.30 on sat night, faffed around for ages then got going to see Larry Heard at the Subway club. This was a strange choice for us, but with the hang over still grasping at my head like the pincers of a giant crab the idea of the Triebstoff party or the Traum party seemed too heavy and too far away. Subway was right around the corner from our hotel as well.
Subway is really cool. When I first walked in I thought that perhaps it was a little cramped, but the bar staff were really quick at serving so it was never a problem getting a drink and I ended up really liking the place. It has a lovely tight sound system, and they let just the right amount of people in. We basically just sat and had a good listen to the music and chatted whilst sinking copious amounts of beer to fight off the dehydration of the night before thus becoming fully entrenched in the circle of alcoholism this weekend was creating. Larry Heard was pretty good. I'm not a massive fan of house with vocals telling you its house music. We were never quite sure why we needed constant reminding. I'm also not sure about the lyrics which state things like 'Music is love and love will solve problems' and how soulful and how much love house creates. I always just want the music to speak for itself. Luckily the tracks underneath this carry on were really good, and he had a pattern which we deciphered that went a little something like this: Vocal house, vocal house, acid house, acid house, techno/tech house, techno/tech house then round again.
I was surprised to hear a Johannes Heil track and he certainly pulled out AME -Rej at a funny time. His mixing was tight, but sometimes the tracks he put together didn't work so well and it sounded quite messy. I enjoyed the musical variation though and it was a lot of fun. Kraftwerk- numbers sounded amazing over that system as well. Superpitcher showed up with a bunch of flossies in tow and had a bit of a groove next to us as well. He looked like he hadn't slept since the party from the night before. We left this party at about 4.30 in the morning to go and get some more sleep. I really enjoyed this night. It was nice and relaxing and the music proved to be again, thigh slappingly good. The worn patch continued to grow.
We woke at about 11.30 am the next day and sat round and read books for a bit. I read Ballards 'Empire of the Sun' and am writing a bit about that at the moment as well. Theres nothing like reading a war book to make you feel alive and happy after you have removed your brain from the grimness and repositioned it in a sunny Cologne where your about to go and see Ricardo Villalobos and Sven Vath.
We had a big long walk down to the venue which was pretty good, but as it turns out a mistake. You see this open air party started at midday and finished at ten pm. We assumed Villalobos would be playing last, but as it turned out we assumed wrong. Sometimes those assumption things really bite you in the ass. I really should have payed more attention to that stupid saying about it.
Anywho, we arrived at this little grassy area covered in a circle tent with speakers and about 1000 german wasters of vary sizes and description. There really were some funny looking people there. Being an overweight guy with large biceps and no top on seemed to be one of the orders of the day. Old Villalobos was doing his thing when we arrived, and I have to say, no matter how many times I see him I just don't get bored. This is because every time I have seen him, he has played completely differently to the last time. He had his whole tribal minimal Latin click thing going on so we did some more thigh slapping. I really enjoyed it when he played the B side of what I believe was Lucianos 'Amelie on ice' and he finished of his set with an ever lasting mix into a beatless orchestral, rolling thunderish sounding track. It was a shame we only saw him for an hour, but it was a very good hour. Sven Vath came wandering up and wouldn't start mixing until they found a mic, plugged it into the mixer and had someone announce his arrival. Which was twatsville USA if you ask me. I really don't rate him as a dj anymore. I think he has just become a crazed, over drugged, silly man. He did his usual act up to the crowd, which was not cute or funny anymore and played really obvious tracks right till the very end when he would do a one or two bar mix even though he had been standing there queing the track up for the full 6-8 mins of the previous track. See this as an example of what I mean. The extended cueing drives me insane!!!!!!! Just mix the tracks together already. After watching Ricky V Sven Vath looked like Amateur hour. So we left.
After this we went out for dinner, and then went of for a drink with Emma Jean, who is a NZ'r who lives in Cologne and I have had an internet friendship with, but only ever really met twice in noisy clubs beforehand and for a total time of about 5 mins and about 5 years ago on top of that. Its always amusing meeting someone you only know from over the internet, and me being me suffered a case of verbal diarrhoea. I have found in the past from meeting people like this that they often speak how they write, and somehow, and I'm not sure how, it seems that their mannerisms imitate their words in some way too.
So that was my C/o Pop experience. Its a festival I will attend again. Is really enjoyable and seems to have a nice laid back vibe about it.
Now the confusion part. I'm beginning to wonder if I am seeing just as good a dj sets as I used to, but not enjoying it as much because I'm getting bored of the music. I'm sure I would have liked the Kompakt party more a year ago. Or am I?
I guess I'll throw all my balls on the table and see if they bounce by going next year and seeing the lay of the land.