First We Take Berlin

Stefan Lehmkuhl’s adding two days to this year’s Berlin Festival to give new talent a chance to benefit from the event.
Emerging acts will get the chance to take Berlin Sept. 4-5 on several club stages dotted around the Wrangelkiez.

This “trendy” region of the city has such well-known venues as Astra, Postbahnhof, Magnet, Lido, Festsaal Kreuzberg, and Fluxbau, while 34.2 percent of its residents are aged 18 to 35.

“It will be largely for international acts but there will also be opportunities for acts from Germany, particularly the good local acts from Berlin. There are a lot of acts and musicians living here in Berlin,” Lehmkuhl told Pollstar.

First We Take Berlin is being funded by Festival Republic, which bought 51 percent of Berlin Festival from Lehmkuhl and his two fellow shareholders in 2011, and the local city council.

Lehmkuhl says it’s still “a showcase budget,” especially as the plan is to charge euro 15 – or less than $20 – for the two days, while Berlin Festival ticketholders will get in free.

Festival Republic’s Natasha Haddad, who has recently taken over the booking of the UK’s Latitude Festival, and Lehmkuhl’s Melt Booking team are looking for “more than 80 export-ready international and national acts.”

They began putting the net out at the UK’s The Great Escape (May 16-18) and hope to be able to start naming the lineup at the end of June.

Lehmkuhl reports that Berlin Festival will come close to selling out its 25,000 capacity, while his Melt Festival will sell all of its 20,000 tickets. Last year’s Melt, the event’s 15th anniversary, sold out two months in advance.

Berlin Festival (Sept. 6-7) has Blur, Boys Noize, Pet Shop Boys, Bjork, Ellie Goulding, and DJ Shadow.

The Melt lineup (July 19-21) includes Tricky, The Knife, Amon Tobin, Django Django, Everything Everything, SBTRKT, and Kettcar.