Low Entropy's Producer Diary: Producing the "Berghain Still Sucks" EP

That was the third track in my "anti-berghain" trilogy. first one was "**** berghain" (later released as "techno stomper" on vinyl) and also "p*** over berghain".
this track happened after not properly doing music over a longer period and usually, these projects end up being kind of crappy for me, as i need to have a bit of "warming up" before i can do "good" tracks again.
but, in my humble opinion, this one ended up being quite good.

so... let's talk about the production.
i tried to "keep it simple", as simple as possible, but in the end it got more complex again. (can't help!)
so, the framework, at its core (pun intended!) is the distorted 909 kick. it runs at 126 bpm, quite slow for (harder) techno actually.
i never ever got to get a bass drum sound like this again! ultra distorted, but also somewhat metallic or industrial. there is lots of reverb, but the reverb does not eat up the drum. which is a problem i had with other tracks.
not sure what or how i did it! but i think the drum "slams". (in my opinion)
so the next thing was the bassline. for years, i avoided using deep / low bass together with hardcore kicks. i always thought they would eat up each others frequency. and, if i listen to stuff like that at home, it feels like that indeed.
but hearing bass heavy hardcore and techno tracks at parties, on loud PAs, made me realize that stuff like that can "work". the bassline feels like it is happening in another range (or dimension?) on loud PAs.
i added some weird futuristic and metallic fx to the bass.

and then... i piled layers of noise, noise and noise on top.
there is a novelty with this track, as it is a techno track without any use of percussion! besides the drum.
no hi hats, no snares, no cymbals, claps, shakers, cowbells...

i ended up doing two mixes of the track, one is ultra distorted and the other is... very distorted, but maybe not ultra.

i recorded the edits as live jamming. i set up the loops, hit record, switched on channels, switched them off again, played with the fx, did some filter sweeps.
i recorded both tracks this way. and in one take each. take no quarters, never look back, when producing (which is my personal advice).

with a track name like this, it was of course no difficulty at all to find a label that wanted to release the track. it ended up being on kenny campbell's pitch dark records, who also did some other releases with me.

the track actually became a (very) minor hit, got some international club play. made some dj top 10s. the "crowning" moment for me was when it got played by Umwelt in a french radio show.

kenny had some promo agency, don't know how it exactly worked, but it meant famous djs got the promo and could leave a comment. which they did.
it was fun to see some people like CJ Bolland or Dr Motte drop comments like "too distorted for me" etc.

oh, and why did i dislike berghain?
i didn't like the whole mood and atmosphere of that "place". the elitism, the concept to exclude people from parties. that they thought they were super radical and different, while even major conservative politicians and journalists loved and supported that place.
but, most of all, i never was up for things that become overly hyped and popular.

i made a few re-edits of the track later, one faster one and an ultra-speedcore one.
the faster one got released in a collab EP with Brandon Spivey, who was one of my favorite producers in acid and techno. from the 90s. i felt very happy to be able to work with him!
he had a very strong dislike towards berghain culture too, so he was up for that collab.

either way, a producer acquaintance of mine, who was a super fan of the club, later told me that "it would be ironic" that i do an anti-berghain track, when in fact the DJs at berghain do play my music to the crowds on the dancefloor there.
so, i guess this very track happened to be dropped at that place. but yeah, i guess this was inevitable to happen.

https://pitch-dark-records.bandcamp.com/track/berghain-still-sucks-distortion-edit

https://doomcorerecords.bandcamp.com/track/low-entropy-berghain-mayhem