- The best festivals offer a memorable experience even if the music were taken completely out of the equation. Make no mistake, the lineup for the second edition of HER DAMIT was great. There was a mix of Berlin-based artists like DVS1 and Kobosil, Hamburg talents Helge Misof, Epikur and Cindy Looper, and Leipzig's own Steffen Bennemann and Credit 00. But the train ride from Berlin, past beautiful lakes and wildflower fields in Brandenburg and onto the island of Rügen, was almost worth the trip alone.
When I arrived onsite in Prora I was completely taken aback by the venue. Alternatively titled "Colossus Of Rügen," Prora is a holiday resort stretching 4.5 kilometers along the Baltic Sea. It was built between 1935 and 1939 by the Nazi Party's state-operated leisure organization, Kraft Durch Freude ("Strength Through Joy" in English). The austere buildings were meant to accommodate 20,000 vacationers but never officially opened until after World War II, when they were taken over by the Soviet army. The property was briefly managed by the German army after reunification, but today most of the buildings have been sitting abandoned for the past two decades. More recently, the eerie site has become a symbol of the displacement of cultural sites and gentrification, and some of the buildings have already been sold to private real estate companies as luxury condos. 2016 was the last time HER DAMIT would be held here.
I got onsite moments before Karenn started their live set, as psychedelic visuals flashed in front of the remains of one of the vacant buildings. Raving in and around a Nazi-era structure felt a little odd at first, but these feelings faded as soon as I hit the indoor dance floors. Here, the vibe was similar to most German techno clubs, with narrow corridors and dimly-lit pathways winding from one concrete floor to the next. In one of the rooms, Steffen Bennemann, who I saw play an outstanding back-to-back set with Lena Willikens at Nachtdigital last year, was dishing out relentlessly hard techno. Not quite ready for such dystopian sounds, I switched over to the corridor, where Manamana, AKA Map.Ache and Sevensol, brightened the mood with tracks like Roy Davis Jr's "Gabriel." Eventually I wound up in the aptly named Bunker room, where sweat dripped from the ceiling as Bambounou smoothly blended cuts like Mixmaster's "In The Mix" and Nightmares On Wax’s "I'm For Real (Remix)."
After a few hours sleep, I took a walk along the beach. Fellow ravers lay sprawled out on sleeping bags, some napping while others sat listening to the distant pounding of kick drums layered over the sound of the rushing sea. I later reentered the festival and stumbled across the surprising stand-out set of the weekend, a refreshingly humorous live performance by Golden Pudel's Carsten Meyer, AKA Erobique. Equipped with drumsticks and a melodica, he belted out German cover versions of '80s hits like Kaoma's "Lambada" and Joe Smooth's Chicago house classic "Promised Land." I never thought that a German rendition of The Beatles' "Here Comes The Sun" would work at a house and techno festival, but it did. The crowd sang along with glee as Meyer ended with his infectious hit "Easy." I overheard different groups of festivalgoers joyfully singing that song at various points throughout the weekend.
Straight after Meyer, Marcus Worgull played a technically skilful, if slightly monotone set, before Panorama bar resident nd_baumecker charmed main stage crowd with a spread of blissful tracks. Highlights included DJ Koze's "XTC," Lapsley's wonderfully poppy "Operator (He Doesn’t Calle Me)," and a tongue-in-cheek remix of Lana Del Rey's "Video Games," which was paired with an intense make-out session onstage. Later that night, I noticed that someone had scribbled something on the wall of one of the buildings: "Kissing is more important than Germany." Politics and partying collided in subtle ways at HER DAMIT, and this message was a cute reminder that love remains the best form of rebellion against Prora's dark nationalist past.
Photo credits /
Francesca Pohl
After a few hours sleep, I took a walk along the beach. Fellow ravers lay sprawled out on sleeping bags, some napping while others sat listening to the distant pounding of kick drums layered over the sound of the rushing sea. I later reentered the festival and stumbled across the surprising stand-out set of the weekend, a refreshingly humorous live performance by Golden Pudel's Carsten Meyer, AKA Erobique. Equipped with drumsticks and a melodica, he belted out German cover versions of '80s hits like Kaoma's "Lambada" and Joe Smooth's Chicago house classic "Promised Land." I never thought that a German rendition of The Beatles' "Here Comes The Sun" would work at a house and techno festival, but it did. The crowd sang along with glee as Meyer ended with his infectious hit "Easy." I overheard different groups of festivalgoers joyfully singing that song at various points throughout the weekend. Straight after Meyer, Marcus Worgull played a technically skilful, if slightly monotone set, before Panorama bar resident nd_baumecker charmed main stage crowd with a spread of blissful tracks. Highlights included DJ Koze's "XTC," Lapsley's wonderfully poppy "Operator (He Doesn’t Calle Me)," and a tongue-in-cheek remix of Lana Del Rey's "Video Games," which was paired with an intense make-out session onstage. Later that night, I noticed that someone had scribbled something on the wall of one of the buildings: "Kissing is more important than Germany." Politics and partying collided in subtle ways at HER DAMIT, and this message was a cute reminder that love remains the best form of rebellion against Prora's dark nationalist past.
Photo credits / Francesca Pohl