The 14th edition of CTM – Festival for Adventurous Music and Arts - will take place from January 28 - February 3, 2013 in different venues in Berlin including the HAU theatre, Berghain, Stattbad, and Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien, as well as the historic Funkhaus Nalepastrasse, home of the DDR National Broadcasting Corporation until 1990.
Entitled The Golden Age, CTM.13 reflects on the (over-)abundance of music in the modern world and its consequences for individuals, aesthetics, politics and the economy. Read more on the theme here. As always, the CTM festival will be held in parallel to and in collaboration with transmediale - festival for art and digital culture - which takes place at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt.
We’re pleased to announce prolific Berlin promoter and DJ Michail Stangl (Boiler Room, ≠ not equal, Leisure System) as a new co-curator of CTM’s music program that aims to walk the line between the playful affirmation of aesthetic plentifulness of the one side, and radically subjective restrictions on the other.
As a prelude to the music program, beloved US duo Matmos will perform their new album, "The Marriage of True Minds", at the CTM.13 Opening Concert on January 28th at HAU 1. Scheduled for release in February 2013 on Thrill Jockey, their new album was recorded through four years of experimentation in Ganzfeld telepathy experiments that seek proof of ESP.
Matmos - Very Large Green Triangles from Thrill Jockey Records on Vimeo.
Also on the bill is Diamond Version, a new collaboration between Raster-Noton label heads Carsten Nicolai and Olaf Bender. With an EP already out on MUTE, the duo is set to release two more this November 2012 and January 2013, right ahead of their CTM.13 performance, which will be only their second live show under this new project banner. Their EP series will then culminate in a full-length album in June 2013. Joining Diamond Version on stage will be Atsuhiro Ito, who plays a modified fluorescent tube (the Optron) like a guitar, adding to the raw noise and dynamic visuals of the performance.
The world of austere, sculpted sound that defines Diamond Version is interpreted on a different register by UK duo Emptyset have been steadily honing a dark, metallic sound that evokes their native Bristol, an industrial center under drastic reconstruction. Performing in support of a recent release on Raster-Noton, Emptyset's new live AV show plays with gritty analogue visuals that amplify the raw precision of their sound.
Myrninerest is the new Hallucination from Current 93's David Tibet. They will perform their first album, "Jhonn," Uttered Babylon, which was written by David about his close friendship with Jhonn Balance of experimental group Coil and about Jhonn's tragic death. The album was composed by David with founding member James Blackshaw. With all lyrics by Tibet and all music written by Blackshaw, the project features James Blackshaw on classical guitar/Indian harmonium and David Tibet as vocalist, Andrew Liles (electronics and percussions), Reinier van Houdt (piano), Aloma Ruiz Boada (violin) and Davide Pepe (hallucinatory utter film).
Through a series of performances and events, CTM.13 is also proud to create a portrait of the German composer Ernstalbrecht Stiebler in collaboration with Berlin’s m = minimal label, and including musicians Agnieszka Dziubak (PL), Werner Dafeldecker (AT), and ensemble L'Art pour L'Art (DE). As one of the first German composers to adopt minimalist composition techniques, Ernstalbrecht Stiebler is one of the pioneers of a strict, reductionist, repetitive, sound-oriented music. In light of recent trends in electronic music, the methodologies developed by artists such as Stiebler take on a renewed importance, but have not been fully recognized to date. Specializing in connections between experimental electronic, minimal club music, Krautrock, the Berlin school, and contemporary music, the m = minimal label has recently published a few of Stiebler’s works, thereby taking a first step towards a wider reception of this artist.
Under the name Oneirogen, New York based composer and multi-instrumentalist Mario Diaz de Leon creates hallucinatory washes of sound with electric guitar, electronics and acoustic instruments. With his latest release Hypnos, out this past August 2012, Oneirogen descends into an otherwordly territory of ethereal synths and unsettling distortion framed within techniques of modern composition, underground metal, and noise elctronics.
Despite an aversion to the limelight, post-punks Iceage made waves with their urgent, abrasive gloom when they surfaced on Danish underground label Escho in 2011. With a new album scheduled for release in January 2013, the group’s mash of frantic, disinterested, hardcore energy is a reminder that the fringe of the post-punk movement is still fighting tooth and nail.
In cooperation with the PAN label, which can be described without exaggeration as one of the most exciting and conceptually compelling platforms for experimental music around today, CTM will present a night of high contrast performances and installations at Berghain, where new projects by SND's Mark Fell (UK), Florian Hecker (AT), Keith Fullerton Whitman (US), Jar Moff (GR), and Lee Gamble (UK) set out on a spatial sound journey throughout the Berghain. Culminating in a session of Extended Play with Heatsick (UK) the evening illustrates the label’s fascinating wealth of works across genres, generations, and scenes.
Another unusual program highlights Purge/#Gashtag, currently the most daring and eclectic party series in Berlin. Taking over the atmospheric Stattbad for their CTM.13 instalment, Purge nights are a black and fearless mixture of neo-goth and industrialized electronics, acid magic, ritual-rave and witched-out hip-hop, trance inducing drones, and black-metal-blasts.
As in previous year’s, the festival’s Exhibition will be housed in the Kunstraum Kreuzberg / Bethanien, which will already be open on Friday, January 25th in the context of an extensive Berlin-wide partner program. Repeating last year’s format, the weekend of January 25-27th sees a large number of independent Berlin art, music, and media organizations open their doors to introduce projects that connect to the festival themes of both CTM and transmediale. Ongoing until February 24th, the CTM.13 Exhibition explores, among other, the interpretation and editing of pop music in internet user culture, and highlights how through the appropriation of music – mostly in the form of music video remakes – a new musical vernacular with far-reaching implications is appearing beyond professional networks of composers, musicians and music promoters.
The Kunstquartier Bethanien, within which the Kunstraum Kreuzberg / Bethanien is housed, will also host a newly designed program segment entitled Transfer, an interdisciplinary laboratory and meeting ground for professionals and interested members of the general public. Encompassing a conversation program, theoretical discussion, presentations, workshops, and networking events, the Transfer program aims to intensify the exchanges between experimental artists, musicians, cultural workers, music technology developers, researchers, and industry professionals.
And not to forget, CTM and transmediale will once again present a number of signature collaborative projects at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt.
Stay tuned as the second wave of CTM.13 artists and program series will be unveiled early December, along with a newly redesigned festival website! The full CTM.13 program will be available in the first week of January 2013.
EARLY BIRD PASSES NOW ON SALE!
A range of CTM .13 and transmediale 2013 Early Bird Festival Passes are available at discounted prices between 70 - 150 EUR until December 17, 2012. Festivalgoers can choose between CTM.13 Passes as well as Kombi Passports that grant access to both CTM.13 and transmediale 2013.
Professional visitors are invited to apply for special discounted passes at 100 EUR, while press representatives are invited to check back as o f November 5, 2012 to apply for Press Accreditation.
