Paul Hanford’s study of Berlin as a club culture capital profiles DJs, music makers and subcultures via history, politics and psychogeography

In west Berlin, near the edge of the Grunewald forest stands the Funkturm radio tower, a now defunct broadcasting tower built in 1926. Considered at the time to be a marvel of the age, the tower represented the achievements of a modern, urban society, not only pushing signals out to the world but also serving as a landmark, proclaiming Berlin’s status as a city of the world, a hub of industry and more importantly, of creativity and culture.

The permanence of this structure (it no longer broadcasts but is a protected monument) says something about Berlin: it is a city that broadcasts to the world and is a magnet for those wanting to create. In Paul Hanford’s Coming to Berlin, this sense of the German capital as a truly global centre and its prominence in club culture is perfectly captured.

Based on the profiles and reflections of musician migrants, settlers and newcomers to the city, Coming to Berlin manages to convey the frenetic, intoxicating energy that hums along the tramlines and crackles through the streets and nightclubs of Europe’s home of electronic music. Through the perspectives of these DJs, producers and other beat obsessives Hanford beautifully presents the famous metropolis and all its contradictions; the city which was always becoming, never to be, as it was (in)famously described.

Despite the above description of Berlin framed as criticism, Hanford skillfully grasps this paradox, offering up Berlin as it truly is: a seductive, pulsating city where invention, change and the sense of anything being possible is found in every local music scene. Across 12 chapters that serve as vignettes, profiling different musicians and their subcultures, you are taken on a tour of the multiverse that is Berlin’s musical landscape. Local ecosystems and countercultures are explored and as well as focusing on the music itself, you are offered insight into the history, characters, local politics and even a touch of psychogeography as well.

One of the most enjoyable elements of the book is in exploring the different neighbourhoods of the city and the influence a local community can have on an individual. Through this, we catch glimpses of old ghosts, East German punks teaming up with priests to fight the authorities on Mainzer Strasse; Nick Cave, the eternal nighthawk “waging a war against sleep” at Café M in Schöneberg and Romy Haag running a club that made Studio 54 look like a children’s fancy dress party. Listen closely and you will hear these echoes as you wander the streets yourself.

Coming to Berlin isn’t only about ghosts of course (and Berlin has plenty of them). If it is ‘always becoming’ then its recent story can’t be told without reference to people like Farhad, a young Syrian who arrived in 2015 along with thousands of others fleeing war and oppression after Merkel’s famous ‘Wir schaffen das’ implying that Germany was able to handle the role of opening its arms to the refugees arriving in Europe from across the world. His story of fleeing the Syrian civil war, his travels across Europe and finally to Berlin where he learns to be a DJ really demonstrates the heart of the book. It’s a tale not so much of escape but of arrival, of finding a home, somewhere to understand and be understood. In the chapter about Farhad, it concludes with him saying farewell as the author recalls words he said to him: “When I came from Syria, there were a lot of borders to cross, a lot of things you have to do to just represent who you are. Here in Berlin, I don’t feel any borders…. You are a musician; you are welcome here.”

Like all the best stories, Coming to Berlin has people at its heart. Their stories and reflections are infinitely more fascinating than some dull hipster guide to a city’s trendiest and most obscure happenings. This is the story of the people that make a place and how that place, through its history, its structures and, crucially, its culture, make those people.

Paul Hanford’s Coming to Berlin is published by Velocity Press

Chris Bateman
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