Off - Rave Series

The idea for our first rave sprung off far away from Berlin, on Harlem's legendary Rucker Park basketball court. My friend Evan and I were travelling NYC and while we sat and observed ball after ball hitting the net, we discussed plans for our upcoming birthdays. There is an old transmission tower located on a hill close to our hometown and its far reaching visibility makes it somewhat of landmark in the area. We'd both been to the bottom of the tower a few times. Over the decades the place had turned into a dumping ground for people's old furniture, cars, even busses. Next to the tower is a former maintenance building with an expansive basement floor. It was in on the other side of the Atlantic that we settled on the idea: we had to host a rave down in these rooms.

Back home we got to work as there was only 2 weeks left to prep. We planned electric routing and arranged renting of a power generator, built a makeshift light setup using hardware-store LED tubes in combination with a DMX-controlled power switch and prepped our sound system for transport. After observing the location for a few days, we figured out what would be our biggest challenge: a security guard pulled up in a car a few times each day and night to check on the tower. It turned out the building still held in-use radars to guide planes on their approach to Berlin airport. Somewhat foolishly, we remained determined: we would manage to guide hundreds of guests to the location without attracting the guard's attention. To get a sense of his schedule, we put up a wildlife camera that would film the site entrance on any movement. His schedule proved to be fully random, so we had to set up a watch post on the path leading up to the party and carry wireless radios to keep communication between our inner circle group of hosts.

We set up a group chat and kept the location unknown until the day of the event. I don't think either of us slept much the nights leading up to the party. With the rudimentary elements already placed in the rooms, like a few sofas we had picked up for free off eBay, we arrived at the location early night through our hidden-from-sight pathway. On this day, of all days, we were not alone there - a car stood next to the tower, and we could hear voices. Had we been ratted out? A group of us snuck up, only to discover that some wild campers had set up their tents. Would they play along with our event? How would the local hunters, which the campers apparently knew, feel about the noise? That moment, discussing under the full moon, I think we were a moment away from cancelling the whole thing. Thank god we didn't - the campers agreed to move and keep quiet. We continued setting up. It was when we first started the generator, and the round, echoing bass of our subwoofers filled one of the basement rooms, that a sense of certainty set in. Nothing could go wrong. This would be amazing.

We have some aftermovies that show this and the other raves above. What stuck for me from that first one was the experience of the first time arriving that many of our friends reported. Disorientated, following our rudimentary drawn map and some battery-powered lights dotted across the forest, but slowly hearing music grow louder in the distance. Then, entering the building down the main stairs, around the corner, and through a long lit corridor at the end of which you could see the dancefloors red lights. Would the guard have come during the party, there was no way we could have hidden what was happening. Luckily he only showed up in the morning, as we were taking down, and we managed to hide from sight.

The following years, we expanded the party series. From encounters with wild boars to scouting of old WW2 Bunkers, we kept pushing for good locations. We probably hit peak risk at the second rave, hosted in an abandoned warehouse well within earshot of the next residential area. Just before the first guests arrived, we heard reports of multiple police squad vans parked outside of the forest. That was bad news obviously - perhaps second time not so lucky. We ushered all arriving groups to stay put and wait. To our immense relief the police vans started leaving after about half an hour or so - they had been called because someone had pulled out a knife at a close by village fair. I remain convinced that this village fair later in the night saved us, as it probably probably distracted residents enough not to raise concerns about our music that ran well into the early ours.

What made the every "off" special were the guests. It remained a reunion of our wider friend group and youth in the local area, bringing people together that had lost touch. And the commitment of people amazed us. One rave, a girl allegedly broke both her ankles while dropping down a slope off-site, and made it out of the forest before calling an ambulance just to not allert attention. The names of guests remain in the basement next to the radio transmission tower, where everyone signed with markers next to the big "off" graffito.