hard-hitting
house and disco
to avant-garde
pop. Unlike many
cities, where the
only chance to see
a decent DJ is in a club, Malmö’s dance scene is “50% in
bars,” says Eliasson. "It works the way it does because it’s
based on DIY principles. You’re forced to do everything
for yourself – there’s a large group of people who know
each other and we help each other out.”
But the club night that seems universally popular
doesn’t involve DJs at all. Widely thought of as being
at the trippy heart of the city’s emergent psychedelic
movement, the sporadically planned Klubb Kristallen
nights (
klubbkristallen.blogspot.com
)
fuse live music
with lectures, art installations, dance performances
and melty, multicoloured oil projections.
At Jetzt (
45
Södra Skolgatan; jetzt.se
),
an Eastern
European restaurant near Möllevångstorget, I meet
organiser Cecilia Flink. Fresh from helping to arrange
the biggest Klubb Kristallen ever – around 500 people
attended – she explains the basic idea: “We like to focus
on the aesthetics, so there’s no division between the
crowd and artists. We invite bands from Copenhagen,
Malmö and Gothenburg, and try to have them all
overlapping so there aren’t any gaps in the sound.”
So, can someone who’s shaping a boundary-busting
psychedelic scene get excited about Eurovision? “I’m
actually quite looking forward to it,” Flink admits with a
smile. “It’ll be interesting to see how local people react.”
Other Swedes are similarly optimistic. “At first I
thought it was a bad thing that they’d picked Malmö,”
says 24-year-old student Anton Augustini. “But it’ll
be much more visible in Malmö than in Stockholm,
where you’ve already got a lot of tourists. It’s a huge
event for such a small town.”
Not everyone is so keen. At Paddy’s (
7
Kalendegatan;
paddys.se
),
an Irish-themed bar near the train station,
the members of local thrash-metal band 5 Seconds of
Hatred tell it to me straight. “It’s not very good music,”
says guitarist Daniel. “But it draws in an incredible
amount of people and hopefully when they come they’ll
explore other parts of Malmö’s music scene too.”
At Babel’s battle of the bands, the results are in. The
Vibe are ranked fifth out of seven, with 76 votes from the
crowd. A disappointing result, especially after that
incident with the bird. But at least it wasn’t
nul points.
The Bishop’s Arms
(
62
Norra Vallgatan; bishopsarms.com
)
has good
beers on tap and Queen Elizabeth II on the walls. “Here or Paddy’s is
where we hang.”
DAMIEN ANDERSSON, BASSIST WITH 5 SECONDS OF HATRED
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