I like to go out, but only sometimes, as staying on the couch watching a show isn’t the worst either. Growing up in Berlin, the music scene is heavily based on electronic music, such as techno, industrial, acid, old school rave and house music. Now living in London, I am trying to get as close to a Berlin club experience as I can.
On saturday I went out to two clubs, SET in Dalston and Ormiside Projects in Peckham/Bermondsey. SET had different noise music artists perform and later played some ravey-techno music, which was a lot more danceable. Before the techno DJ’s started, everyone just stood around the noise artists, as if they were watching an art piece (which in a sense, it also was). It was packed and the smoke machines made it hard to find anyone, but also encouraged shy dancers to step out and feel compfortable to move their legs. The lights were flickering to the beat which had an hypnotic effect on everyone on the dancefloor. The light work and smoke in the room fit perfectly to the music that was playing coherently. The general experience was good, although I have realized how wasteful drinking cups in the club are. Every time one wants to get a new drink, may it be beer, wine or water, I get a new plastic cup. I doubt, that the cups are recyclable.
Afterwards we went to Ormiside Projects in Peckham – it was 2.00 am. It was a long way from Dalston in East London to Ormiside Projects in South east London, but on the way me and my friends saw factory smokestacks blowing fume into the air. We were all just baffled about how much fume it extracted, especially seeing it so up close. My one friend said ‘this can not be good’, and I agree. The amount of fume that gets into the air every second must have an impact on our health and CO2 levels.
As we arrived at the next club, I ordered more drinks. Of course, I got plastic cups for them. It pains me to know that the cost of going out and having fun also influences my carbon footprint. In bars you get glasses to drink of and they will be reused and can often be recycled. I wonder what the club owners can do to lessen their carbon foot print. If you have any ideas and suggestions on how to tackle this problem, please comment below.
In relation to the course, I wanted to look into ‘modernity’ and ‘postmodernity’. Our postmodern world right now is shaped by mass media and consumerism. The western world is constructed as a consumption-based cityscape. When I go out I will consume permanently, I will buy loads of drinks as part of a consumerist and common idea that to party one has to drink a lot and therefore spend a lot of money. I will also buy cheap fast food which is using cheap meat, which contributes to the unethical food production. There are so many factors which go back to times of ‘modernity’, in which humans are masters of the world, shaping it’s climate and influencing how our world grows and decays. Postmodern consumerism is ingrown into our society, making it basically impossible to live without it and to go against it, particularly when living in the city. Globalisation has made this a problem which is occurring in most parts of the world
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