- The Great American Techno Festival may be the punkest event of its kind in the United States. Nearly all of its events this year were unlicensed, with several parties going down in an unadorned basement outfitted with a Void soundsystem. GATF's marquee party took place in a parkour (free-running) gym without an obvious security guard in sight. This fly-by-night attitude forced attendees to criss-cross Denver in Ubers, though for Friday's afterparty, the festival provided a bus to take ravers to yet another underground location. If this all sounds a bit ridiculous, it's because it is, and festival founder John Templeton admitted as much in his RA Exchange conversation with Will Lynch last year. That said, from the artists playing and the weathered attendees to the overall attitude, GATF feels like the direct descendent of the Midwest rave scene. Templeton's cowboy mentality and bend-over-backwards approach to hospitality have earned him the allegiance of several key US crews (such as The Bunker and Smart Bar), and the festival's fifth and final year felt like the culmination of a wild dream.
While most mid-sized festivals grasp for spare change from sponsors, Templeton and his crew of organizers decided to stop chasing funding a couple of years ago. The only outside assistance I spotted came in the form of a MP2015 rotary mixer lent by Rane to fulfill a tech rider requirement. As if to underline the anti-corporate stance, the opening party, which took place at the Milk Bar, was free. An Iowa DJ (formerly one of Denver's premier jocks) going under the name Attentat (he also runs a label centered on radical ideology called Wage Slave) turned in one of the most impressive performances of the festival, mixing an all-vinyl set of raucous modern techno that included tracks like Dungeon Acid's slept-on "Carnal Knowledge." In the previously mentioned Exchange interview, Templeton decried the city's 2 AM alcohol curfew, and sure enough at 1:50 AM the lights went on and Attentat put his hands up in mild frustration.
As if to underline the incompatibility between GATF and Denver's mainstream club scene, the next evening's Proper Trax showcase at Beta Lounge (located near Coors Field) seemed like a tough one. In the end, I gave up on getting in after being directed to a burgeoning line behind the club, full of young clubbers queuing up for an unrelated EDM event. About 25 minutes away, though, the simultaneous party at multi-use DIY space Eko Haus was as real as it gets. Smart Bar residents Sassmouth and Jeff Derringer traded records while Pittsburgh's Shawn Rudiman fiddled with his hardware setup. There was a convivial feel to the three sets, but at half past midnight, Sassmouth was still on, relegating Rudiman to auxiliary percussion, a thin contribution considering the kit he had hauled to Denver. Things heated up when Rudiman was allowed to build his own groove, the highlight being his final track, a cover of Ashley Beedle's "Strings Of Life" remix that had the crowd heaving. Later that night, Rudiman was seen losing it to more Detroit fare served up by DJ Skurge, who threw down tracks like Red Planet's "Star Dancer."
The next afternoon, the Eko Haus basement felt less cavernous. I was there for another hardware set, this time from Clay Wilson, a reserved and genial New Yorker who also appeared at last year's festival. Wilson was apparently struggling with his equipment but still managed to present a solid set of dubby, slo-mo techno tailored for the early time slot. On the contrary, Downwards duo Talker didn’t hold back with their live PA, which was full of expertly produced industrial-tinged tracks constructed with raw, lo-fi elements.
For Saturday's main event, a "Berghain in the Rockies" type of affair, slanted walls replaced the techno mecca's imposing pillars. The night's visuals were limited to a small, Watergate-style LED wall behind the DJ booth (a similar fixture is utilized at Pittsburgh club Hot Mass) and subtle clamp lights along the wall. Musically, the night was exceptional. Nihal Ramchandani doesn't make many mixes, but expect to hear more from him soon. The young New Yorker appeared at Detroit's vaunted No Way Back party earlier this year, and Interdimensional Transmissions' mainstay Carlos Souffront was among the most animated dancers for his near perfect warm-up set. L.I.E.S affiliate Antenes ramped things up with a jacking live performance which set the stage for Headless Horseman's full-tilt Elektron Octatrack acrobatics. Function played it fairly straight, rolling techno with blink-and-you'll- miss-it diversions into electro and house.
For Sunday afternoon's rooftop closer, the gods smiled on the scrappy affair, blessing the festival's funeral proceedings with a pink, orange and purple sunset scored by Souffront and Patrick Russell. The duo's back-to-back set provided ample justification for their growing reputations, with memorable tracks from Gescom, Perbec and AFX. Souffront appeared at the first Movement festival 15 years ago, long before anyone outside of Detroit knew who he was. Dave Sumner, AKA Function, held a residency at Limelight in New York, and Rudiman started building his maze of a studio in the '90s. The bill as a whole was full of generator party survivors. Templeton's tendency to mix up the veterans with younger acolytes has a preservationist bent—the classic American approach to dance music will never die if new, talented DJs and producers continue to carry the torch. Hopefully he’s inspired some protégés of his own with his raw, quixotic festival.
Photo credit: Alena Dubavaya (Lead, Red smoke), Candace Price (Chris Mitchell), Christopher Cole (Rooftop)