Deadly Buda with a report from the Brittany Teknivals
A RadioValve Brain Drain
Here's the report below in text form. To check out similar live recodings from partys around the world, tune in to Rant and Rave which airs 3 times each Saturday
The Brittany Teknival was renamed "The Harshival" because initially, it was in an abandoned Rock Quarry. Yes. It was harsh. The ground consisted of sharp rocks, interrupted by sort-of toxic waste sludge that was at one time a normal puddle. No life existed at the center...until the Sound Systems materialized. The London contingent, with which I arrived, soon abandoned the already brutal sounding idea of a north vs. south London pick-up football(soccer) match, because it became readily apparent that someone would either die or perhaps lose an appendage if they fell down on the ground.
There were I believe, 6-7 sound systems, ranging from Spiral Trance to brutal Noizecore. I cannot tell you the names of each soundsystem, as I had the disadvantage of not being able to speak French, I believe the one I was working with was called "Underbase", which consisted of Michel from TNT technozine, Explore toi, and a host of other very interesting Djs, many of which played their own tracks , sometimes off of cassettes. They were shortly joined by myself, Christoph from Praxis, Controlled Weirdness, Jason of Lorenz Attractor, Dj Stacy, Nomex, the mysterious DJ Scud, and Jason from The Association of Autonomous Astronauts and Agro.
For those not familiar with Teknivals, which would be almost anyone reading this in America, they are a coming-together of various sound-systems at a pre-designated location, a mystery to even the Sound Systems until the day before. A meeting place is designated apart from the actual event location. Someone from the soundsystems then starts a caravan to the location.
On the first night, only a limited number of rendevous take place, in order to get enough people in one place to foil any attempt by the police from breaking up the teknival before it starts. Once this is achieved, the directions go on an info-line- and the party grows exponentially from there, usually over the course of a few days. From what I gathered, the biggest one has reached 5000 people, and lasted 6 days. I could be off a couple thousand, either way. The event is always free. This is what seperates the Teknival from the rave culture.
The Teknival is in many ways, a reaction to the corporate take-over of the rave scene. With outrageously expensive parties, consisting of COMPLETELY FUCKING AVERAGE SELL-OUT CUNT DJS for the most part, sponsored by various bottom-line sweat-shop misery corporations being the rule of the day, the Teknival under-cuts the social failure we call raves by giving attendees the musical creativity the non-brainwashed public craves, at a rock-bottom price. The only thing to spend money on is; food ,drugs, beer, tapes, records, the odd CD, and money you owed from last weekend. An American equivalent would have been the old Grateful Dead parking lot, minus the old-ass music, plus an anarcho sorta D.I.Y. attitude with the actual artists and musicians hockin' and trading their records for money or the above items.
Night 1 of the Harshival was almost foiled by myself. Let me explain. While waiting impatiently for the rendevous, I had somehow managed to guzzle about 4 schwag Pils. Finding myself in the lead car, stuffed with 5 other people sitting on top of each other, it occured to me that ten minutes into the journey, I had to piss. Turning green and screaming to pull over, which was difficult since I knew no French,again, I almost caused a 20 car pile-up when we finally did. So, my first bit of advice: lay off the schwag, pre-caravan. This was the beginning of the harshness. After frolicking all night in the gravel and slime, we were rudely interrupted by the owner of the quarry, who I guess seemed to think someone would get hurt and sue him. Which might have been a safe bet, in retrospect. This buzz-kill grew, as we found out the police had blocked the only entrance to the quarry. [Underlining the fact that open parties should be from now on in open geographic areas.] A small town sold a lot of beer and absinthe that afternoon until a new space, this time a forest, was found.
Night 2 was great! Mushroom tea and absinthe were the rule. The juxtaposition of fast metal soundscapes with the forest pixies was truly awesome, so awesome that me and the 500-900 odd people all but forgot that this was named the Harshival. We were rudely reminded the next afternoon, with a torential-freakin' downpour. The Harshival persisted, though, prepared with tents and parkas. The rain never seemed to stop.
By Monday morning, 1 and a half days later, the Harshival wrapped it up, the last one of the summer. Despite the shit weather, as a first time teknival participant, I was truly inspired by the concept and the chaotic and effective praxis thereof.
May the teknival spread across the seas!
