At some point last weekend while you were buzzing around the city somewhere, hands began to wind clocks backwards, and automatic systems on brainy computers everywhere snapped back Berlin's temporal locus by one hour. Some of you gained an extra hour of sleep, others sixty minutes of absent minded bliss on the dance floor. But you all lost an hour of daylight the next day: a routine which will continue to impede upon the light in your life for the next five months (yeeesh). But as the doctor will tell you, there's no use in getting all gloomy and staying indoors. What he may not tell you, is to remember that one extra hour of darkness means one more hour in which each party can peak; an extra hour to let your pulse race to whichever beat your fickle heart desires. One more hour of beautiful blackness when the birds don't sing and the sun doesn't shine, but speakers rumble and curious lights blaze coloured and bright into the night.
Fly Bermuda Festival soars into town this weekend, dragging a bunch of huge names along with it, and hijacking Berlin venues to drop them in. Watergate follows past trends and snags Ellen Alien who joins Thomas Muller at the BPitch Control Showcase tonight.
Love your local DJs? The Bermuda festivities give you plenty of opportunities to enjoy their Berlinesque finesse. Nerd at Festsaal Kreuzberg tonight supplies you with Jack The Rapper, Niko Schwind and Nico Stojan (that's two Nicko's for the price of one). Still in trendy town, Horst Krzbrg hosts BerMuDa: Pretty Vakant, with Mathias Karden and Nico Purman (Nico multiplicity week!) who has been spreading his wings of late and expanding his horizons, releasing on the Cross Town Rebels print as well Vakant.
For something completely fresh and different, Gegen Angst ('Against Fear' for all of you with no German skills and no google translate in your bookmarks tab) launches at the infamous Kit Kat Club tonight (yes, you know the one). Organisers propose audiences to "experience the event as an embodiment of their own fears; performing, dancing and seducing them as spaces of knowledge and times of liberation. There's no dress code but you're invited to express your fears".
Tomorrow night the actual Fly Bermuda Festival takes place out at the old Tempelhof airport. Canadian-born techno superstar, Richie Hawtin, presents Plastikman 1.5 live, with a long list of other commercially viable names: Sven Väth, Ricardo Vilolobos, Loco Dice, James Holden and Ellen Alien.
Meanwhile, Hamburg label Smallville brings its tasty deep house goods to town for the second week in a row tomorrow night, with a record release night for Moomin - Story of You, also featuring Smallpeople (Dionne & Julius Steinhoff).
And if you've managed to rid yourself of that big, conspicuous 'TOURIST' badge branded to your chest and succesfully blended into the appealing array of folk that call Berlin home, you could completely ignore all the Bermuda hype - much like Berghain / Panorama Bar's approach. Sticking to business as usual, they roll out another of their hugely successful Drumcode nights, this time celebrating 15 Years of Drumcode. The night / day / night (again) feature's the Swedish label's ambassador, Adam Beyer (playing two sets) along with Joel Maul, Alan Fitzpatrick and other Drumcode troupes assaulting the old power plant with their sleek, playful Swedish variety of hard techno.
