Musik – Numéro Berlin

WEEKEND MUSIC PT. 71: LADY GAGA’S MAYHEM BALL IN BERLIN

Anna Klusmeier — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 12:19:54 +0000

Lady Gaga’s riotous party descended on the German capital last week, delivering a double dose of unabashed Mayhem that echoes its own hedonistic spirit. The superstar’s ambitious eighth world tour is a masterpiece in camp theatrics, tearing up the pop rule book and cementing her legacy as the most fearless and OTT storyteller of our time. Bearing witness to a truly triumphant return to the top, here’s our take on a sublimely dark fever dream that set the city ablaze.

Produced by Gaga and Michael Polansky, The MAYHEM Ball features direction by Ben Dalgleish (Human Person), creative direction by Gaga, Polansky, Parris Goebel and Human Person, choreography by Goebel, and costumes styled by Hunter Clem, Gaga’s sister Natali Germanotta (Topo Studio), and HARDSTYLE. Production design is by Es Devlin, Es Devlin Studio, and Jason Ardizzone-West.

A theatre of chaos

Incorporating visual elements borrowed from 17th-century Venetian masquerades, the Uber Arena becomes a Colosseum-like opera house. Gaga emerges in a towering crimson gown (a nod to Thierry Mugler’s 1985 Lady Macbeth), with the velvet skirt parting to reveal her feral dancers. Over two and a half hours, gothic opera, fetish couture, and surrealist cinema collide in latex veils, chiaroscuro light, and a chessboard of black and red. She sings Perfect Celebrity to a skeleton in a giant sandpit, clunks down the runway on armoured crutches during Paparazzi, and dons a razor-sharp military tailcoat for Shadow of a Man. Logic takes a backseat in this riot of chaos and couture, and before Shallow, a hooded Gaga is grappled by dancers wearing sinister beaked masks before being ferried up the catwalk in a lantern-lit boat.

A spiritual homecoming

Once the epicentre of decadence and danger, Berlin has always rewarded boldness and individuality. Returning to her freaky first principles with a visceral stare, unrelenting hunger, and the devastating focus of an apex predator, Gaga reignites a fire in the city’s collective loins with her very first words: “Category is… TANZ ODER STIRBT!” A few songs later, the metallic thrum of Scheiße reverberates through the arena, punctuated with German phrases that land like insider winks, affirming a rare, shared cultural intimacy. It feels like the homecoming of a pop polymath at the height of her powers — chaotic, triumphant, intoxicating, and essential.

The gospel of Gaga

A strong narrative runs through the entire show: Gaga’s battle with her inner demons and ‘Mistress of Mayhem’ alter-ego. Having spoken about her fibromyalgia that has prevented her from touring in the past, self-doubt, break-ups and mental health issues compounded her troubles. Now blissfully engaged, her struggles are portrayed through elaborate choreography, embracing duelling gothic personas throughout. For the encore she appears with her whole crew and without make-up for How Bad Do U Want Me, addressing a romantic partner whose idealised image she can never match in real life. The duality of finishing a sublimely flashy show in such a stripped‑down fashion is classic Gaga, who described authenticity in a recent New York Times interview as “a committee of one.”

A queer love letter

“This show is for you, for your freedom. You have inspired my entire career!” Gaga has always carved out sacred space for her queer fans, and the tour feels like a cathedral for outsiders. After Paparazzi, an effervescent white cape unfurls across the entire stage, illuminated by a projection of the rainbow flag. Later, she dedicates Marry the Night to an attending Lady Starlight — her earliest collaborator and co-conspirator — and, as she tearfully recalls, “the only person who believed in me.” It’s a beautiful moment, and the crowd roars in recognition of their friendship and lineage, two dreamers who built this empire from the New York underground. When she finally rises from the piano to perform the apocalyptic love song Vanish Into You, there’s a feeling of reclamation: you can be too much, too loud, too strange, and still be seen as beautiful. Especially here. Especially now.

The voice behind the armour

The ball unfurls like a night in the city’s nocturnal underbelly, its setlist untethered from chronology. Opening with the operatic Bloody Mary and morphing into frenetic renditions of Mayhem’s Abracadabra and Born This Way’s Judas, green smoke pours down the stage for the dance-floor-ready Garden of Eden. The groove-tastic Killah and Chic-inspired disco-bop Zombieboy follow, while party-bangers Applause and Just Dance whip the crowd into a frenzy. Summerboy, in which Gaga jams on guitar while surrounded by a mass of gyrating bodies, is an unexpected hit, and the years fall away for the self-loving anthem Born This Way. Her slow ride in a gondola provides a soothing visual for an evocative solo version of Shallow, and the most potent moments arrive when she reaches the piano and lets her voice soar. For all the cosplay and pyrotechnics on show, the true luxury is Gaga’s voice, accompanied by a never-ending arsenal of hits. The stage ignites for her biggest of all, Bad Romance — a final flawless blaze.

WEEKEND MUSIC PT. 69: IN CONVERSATION WITH KING PRINCESS

Anna Klusmeier — Fri, 24 Oct 2025 16:56:52 +0000

King Princess grew up in New York and has already left their mark on the music scene at just 26. In our conversation, Mikaela reflected on their early days in their father’s Williamsburg studio, their thoughts on the current political climate, and the art of feeling comfortable in discomfort.

Numéro Berlin: Hi King Princess. You recently released a new album that you recorded entirely in your father’s studio in Williamsburg, which he has owned since the 90s. What was it like growing up there? And how did your parents inspire or shape your creativity? If they did…

King Princess: They certainly did. Growing up there, I was really interested in being in the studio. All I cared about was just being around music from as early as I can remember. At the same time, my mom would always have instruments at her house, even though there wasn’t a recording studio. So both my parents definitely influenced me. There was no pressure, but they saw that I was interested and wanted to leave instruments around for me. I think the biggest thing for me was just watching people record their music and becoming obsessed with these older musicians. There were trunks, people sleeping on couches, rock bands recording — and I just wanted to hang out with them because I thought they were cool. Usually, they were really nice and let me hang out.

So you always hung out there as a child?

I feel like all I wanted to do was just sit on the couch and watch everybody.

That must have been an interesting childhood!

It was definitely at times very inappropriate, at times really fun and at times kind of depressing. My dad is a recording engineer. The way I’d describe it, it’s like, okay, you’re at the fucking Audi factory or the BMW factory. You have the people who design the car, that’s the producers. And the engineers are the people that actually go to the garage and build it. Like build it from the engineers, from their designs. So it’s actually a more blue collar profession than being a producer because you’re physically plugging everything in and patching, and it’s manual, and it’s intense. From my dad’s perspective, he was not involved in record label politics at all. He was a freelance studio owner. We would watch records that left the studio sound really amazing and then all of a sudden you’d fucking get the mixes back from the label and it would all be like, ugh, what happened? That’s the politics. So that was always informative. Yeah. Sorry, I’m rambling.

No, don’t worry at all, that’s what we’re here for, so…

I smoked a lot of weed this morning. We got weed last night, it was fabulous.

Perfect, then you’re in the mood to talk, I hope. Your new album is called “Girl Violence”. Do you want to emphasize that girls can be violent too or what’s the idea, the approach behind the title?

It just is facts that the emotional warfare that occurs between women is way more intense than anything a man could do. I’m not talking about cisgender women, I’m talking about all women. The emotional intelligence that is within us. As a non-binary person I’m also oftentimes an observer to womanhood and an observer to femininity and yet I have sapphic relationships. I would consider my relationships very sapphic. They have been beautiful and chaotic and hectic and at times dangerous and at times desolate. That’s my experience and I don’t think it’s just my experience.

So I was just like let’s put a name to it “Girl violence” and let’s talk about it, like why we are, in fact, so cuckoo bananas.

Yeah, whenever I hear straight women say, ‘Oh, I wish I could just date women, it’d be so much easier,’ I’m like, hmm, not so sure about that…

You’re like actually, by the way, it’s not and the other thing is, there’s so much talking. It’s two people in a relationship who understand queer theory and also what it’s like to live under a patriarchy. That is deeply intense and not easy. You can’t really get away with shit.

How do you mentally prepare for the launch of a new album?

I don’t know. If you figure it out, will you let me know? I don’t think I will figure it out. Because actually it’s so intense and mentally it’s always the most challenging part for me to prepare for putting out music. I feel good at the touring part, I’m good at making the music part, but the actual time in between when you’re emotionally getting ready to like give birth or whatever I’m struggle boss on that.

It’s very vulnerable as well.

I think it’s very vulnerable, I think it’s really hard, and I struggle with it. But once it’s out, then it’s kind of beautiful because it becomes the fans‘, like it changes ownership from yours to someone else’s, and that I think is really gorgeous because then you see people connecting and finding their own way through the album. And you can see what they relate to, and I think that’s beautiful. That’s the whole point.

We’re getting a little more political now. With everything that’s going on politically around the world, and especially in the US where you’re from, it feels really important to unite as a community and stand strong together. I was wondering how you think your music can be a tool for that?

Well, first of all, that’s a great question. You touched on something I’m really interested in, which is how we, as a community, can unify.

I think it’s really allowed for our crack stuff to slip through because while we’re fighting each other, there’s laws being passed actively in the U.S, that are abolishing rights that we have already decided on.

There is a greater enemy.

Yes, there is a greater enemy. A big thing I think about is, what is it that makes it easy for us to unite? For me, when I think about what I love to do, it’s seeing live music, loving art, laughing, joking, being silly, you know? Partying. These are all unifiers we’ve used in our community throughout history to get through darkness. I hope that my music provides a space that’s safe to go and see live music and art, meet friends, dress up, feel good about yourself, maybe meet a date, feel less alone, rock out. That’s what I hope. I also throw parties, and I hope that that really encourages a kind of silliness and a space for people to just dress up and mess up. My music and my art are the far right’s nightmare. So I’d like to continue being their nightmare at every turn. I hope they’re deeply disturbed by me.

How do you feel this shift to the political right is influencing the cultural scene right now in general? And when it comes to censorship, do you think people are becoming quieter and more intimidated, or are they getting louder and more united? Do you have a sense of where things stand right now?

I think there’s a lot of disillusionment. We’ve become so used to physical violence and shootings that it just goes in one ear and out the other. We hear about multiple school shootings every week, and you become desensitized. The amount of violence and sheer chaos happening in this country – in my country, and I’m sure in yours too – is overwhelming. Maybe not the shootings, but I know there have been some really disturbing far-right political movements emerging here as well. I think the way my country has handled the genocide in Palestine is appalling.

My country as well.

I’m sure you have similar feelings about that. Yeah, I don’t know – there’s just so much information constantly coming at us now, with TikTok and the 24-hour news cycle. It’s hard to stay grounded or even know what to do. So I don’t think people are getting quiet because of censorship, although I do believe there’s already massive censorship starting to take place on social media for queer people. I’ve seen it firsthand on my own accounts.

In what sense?

I have been flagged for wearing makeup because I look like a boy. So when I wear makeup, it must be drag, right? I mean we’ve been in year-long fights with some of these apps trying to get my shit back just so I can promote my music. It’s beyond. It’s really nuts. And I don’t see that on other accounts. On straight people’s accounts. Like for example if I show cleavage… And that’s partially the app itself and that is partially homophobic people reporting shit. You know, but in summation, it is Project 2025.

That’s insane.

It’s time for us to just be making more shit, being louder, being more fucking ballsy and out and open.

Now that you already talked about drag a little bit. You once said in an interview „I’m not a woman, I’m a fucking drag queen“ and I was wondering what drag means to you today?

Drag has been a tool I’ve used on and off throughout my career – as a form of armor, self-discovery, and therapy. It’s been incredibly impactful for me to play with the form I was assigned at birth but don’t necessarily relate to. A lot of the parts of myself that are feminine feel like Mr. Potato Head – you put them on, take them off. As a non-binary person, exploring how I play with my flesh suit as a woman, as a man, and as everything in between has been necessary. Sometimes you just have to be in drag to do that: to embrace the silliness that femininity can be and to explore it openly. For someone who never felt like they were traditionally a woman, this can be incredibly freeing.

It’s just about performing femininity.

Which is how I feel anyway, so it might as well accentuate and be beautiful.

What role does gender play in your everyday life and how do you navigate a world that is designed for only two genders?

Gender plays a pretty large role in my everyday life because I’m so fickle with it. Even with what I wear, I get very nitpicky. What I wear really matters, because how I feel can change from day to day. That’s something I actually enjoy – if you can conquer it, it feels really special. But it’s not easy to conquer; it takes a lot of effort and work to make yourself feel okay, to feel comfortable in discomfort. So gender plays a big role in my life. I’m constantly navigating how I feel in a world designed for only two genders. Honestly, I kind of get the best of both worlds. I’d literally be using the men’s restroom all the time. You know what I mean? But sometimes I look like a little boy and get treated like one. Then I look like a really hot girl and get treated like that. Most of the time, I get treated like neither, and people are confused. There’s nothing anyone could say or do about my gender or sexuality that could make me feel bad about myself. That’s not my issue. I have a lot of issues, but my gender and sexuality aren’t among them. I’m not ashamed of who I am.

Yeah I think all of your fans know haha

I got way bigger fish to fry than being fucking gay and non-binary.

You are very comfortable with your sexuality and in your body now, so If you could speak to your younger queer self or to a queer kid out there right now, would you have something to say?

Yeah, I would, I’d piss myself off because I’d say, you’re really lonely right now, but being lonely is good because you’re going to figure out the things you’re interested in. And then I think I’d also say everything that you instinctually want to do is correct. Please continue doing it. Artistically, everything that is in your gut: trust it.

Great. That’s a nice ending. Thank you!

Thank you so much. Thanks for taking the time.

WEEKEND MUSIC PT. 68: IN CONVERSATION WITH PAULA ENGELS

Anna Klusmeier — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 14:52:36 +0000

We met Paula Engels shortly after she released her debut album, “Kommt von Herzen” (From the Heart). Paula is a musician unafraid to confront every part of herself, even the dark and uncomfortable corners. With this new album, she establishes her identity as an artist. Paula shares with me the intense journey of making the album, the highs and lows of the release process, and how she has gradually learned to care less about other people’s expectations.

Alexandra Schmidt: You recently released your debut album, “Kommt von Herzen”. How do you feel now that it’s out?

Paula Engels: The release felt really good, but mentally I’ve already moved on because the album has been finished for about three months. In the beginning, I always felt like I still had to explain who I wanted to be as an artist and what kind of music I make. But now there’s an album, and people can just listen to it and find out for themselves. That gives me a bit more freedom to do unexpected things.
The release itself was really beautiful, and I got a lot of positive feedback. But for a long time, I honestly didn’t know if I would end up being proud of the album.

What made you doubt whether you’d be proud of it in the end?

For the longest time, I just didn’t know what it sounded like or what it was supposed to sound like in the end. Now it sounds completely different from what I expected. At first, I thought it was going to be a lot darker and weirder. I really wanted it to sound cool. But now it sounds much more like me. It’s not trying to be something it’s not.

Is there a song on the album that surprised you, maybe one that carries different emotions than you first thought, or one that became more important to you over time?

That’s pretty much always the case for me. I almost never write songs with the intention of “I want to write about this specific topic.” Most of the time, I just start writing. I pour out all my thoughts and realize what the song is really about when it’s almost finished.

You’ve already put out a few EPs before your debut album. Looking back, how did your relationship with releasing music change over time?

When I started putting out songs, I realized that I didn’t actually like the process as much as I thought I would. The first time felt a bit like having a birthday. Everyone messaged me saying, “Oh my god, congratulations!” But by the second release, suddenly there was a bar set. You see the numbers from your first release and everyone else’s. I started comparing myself way too much because, for the first time, there was an outside evaluation. It was really hard not to let that affect how I judged my own songs. Eventually, I ended up hating everything I wrote in the following months.

And how did you overcome that?

I was overworked from the years before, and there was just so much new stuff happening all at once. I never really took time to reflect or let anything sink in. So I took a short break and went with my team to a beautiful studio in the South of France. That’s where a lot of songs were created. Songs where I tried to let go of the expectations of others.

You also wrote “Mittelfinger an die Welt” (Middle Finger to the World), which kind of manifests the idea of caring less about what others think. How do you see that now after the release?

I think with that song, I had so many other people’s opinions in my head that I didn’t even know what I wanted anymore. I couldn’t really tell if something was truly my own will or if someone had already talked me into it. After that break in the South of France, it became clearer. Overall, it works better sometimes and worse other times I think I’m still a bit of a people pleaser, but following my gut feeling is really important to me, and it usually works out well when I do.

“Gift” (Poison) and “An meinen Händen klebt Blut” (There’s Blood on my Hands) feel more like rage songs compared to your other songs. How did it feel to express your anger so openly for the first time?

I somehow find it really hard to feel anger. I’m never really angry, and if I am, it’s usually at myself. I think that’s a general issue among women. It’s something that’s kind of trained out of us. But I also think that everyone carries anger inside them. For me, music has always been a place where those “ugly” emotions can exist. A space where you don’t have to be fair. I’ve always loved when music pushes the boundaries that exist in real life. It felt really liberating to have a space where I didn’t need to be rational. Especially with “Gift”, I had so much fun in the studio. Just throwing things out there, saying what I wanted, without worrying if it was fair or not. I’m still working on allowing myself to feel anger and not dismissing it. I wanted the album to include everything I feel.

How did the title “Kommt von Herzen” come about?

I quickly figured out what I didn’t want. I feel like none of the songs on this album were written for anyone else. They all came from my emotions. One day, the idea just popped into my head. For me, “Kommt von Herzen” and “Mittelfinger an die Welt” belong together. My middle finger comes from the heart, you know?

You started writing songs when you were 14. What were they about back then, compared to the ones you write now? Has anything changed?

A lot has changed. In the beginning, my songs were in English because I didn’t want people to understand what I was writing about or how I felt. That’s changed completely. The songs that are hardest for me emotionally are usually the most important ones. The ones that resonate most with others and mean the most to me. Two years later, when I was around 16, I wrote my first song in German. And in that moment, I decided I’d never write in English again. My English songs were honestly terrible. I’m really glad I never uploaded anything to social media back then and that there are barely any recordings left.

The song “560km” seems to be about both geographical and emotional distance. Can you tell me a bit more about it?

I actually had to be convinced to release it. It took me a while to realize that it’s about finding yourself. But it’s also about the distance of 560 km from Düsseldorf to Berlin. I moved really naively; I thought nothing would change. The first nine months in Berlin, I just pushed through. But somehow, I didn’t feel at home in Berlin, and in Düsseldorf I felt like a guest. Suddenly, there were so many different versions of myself, and I didn’t know which one was the real one or if the version I had in my head was even accurate anymore. That’s how the song came about. A jumble of everything, really.

What’s next for you?

I’m going on tour in two weeks. I’m not sure what’s coming after that yet. There are still so many songs from the album process that I really love, but that didn’t make it onto the record. But there’s definitely more music coming, and I’ll be playing some great festivals next year.

How excited are you for the tour?

It’s my first tour, so I think it’s going to be really special. I’m incredibly excited.

Thank you Paula!

WEEKEND MUSIC PT. 66: IN CONVERSATION WITH MECHATOK

Anna Klusmeier — Fri, 19 Sep 2025 16:27:40 +0000

The day before we met Mechatok in Berlin, he played at the Live From Earth Festival, where hundreds of young people came together and celebrated on what was, for this summer, an unusually beautiful Sunday. Mechatok is a producer and released his debut album Wide Awake one month ago, featuring collaborations with Bladee and Ecco2k. I spoke with Timur Tokdemir — orignially from Munich and now based in London — about the importance of creative exchange and his experience in our shared hometown, the differences between producing music in London and Berlin, and his background in design.

Numéro Berlin: Hi Mechatok. You grew up in Munich, what was the creative exchange like there as a young creative person?

Mechatok: Honestly, I think I spent most of my time on my laptop speaking to people on Facebook and SoundCloud. There were a few things quite sporadically that really mattered. For example my friend Alberto Troia, a visual artist, was throwing sort of like after-parties for gallery openings at “Kunstverein” and always brought out really interesting artists. That had a big impact on me in Munich. And then there was a club called “Kong” that closed I think six or seven years ago, that place was really good. And I really like the Public Possession guys, we did a record in 2015. I think that was what Munich really did for me. But it was a lot of just being in your bedroom and being on the laptop, honestly.

Correct me if I’m wrong but you said that your new album “Wide Awake” it’s mostly about that feeling of being trapped in an endless loop online. Tell us about that.

The album wasn’t so much about purely being trapped in some online loop, it was more about the contrast of doing that while existing in this now very imperfect and stressful reality. I mean at least that’s my personal experience, you know, like living in some shoebox apartment in London, having very stressful commutes and things just being very hectic and imperfect. And then you look at these glossy things on your phone that look sparkly and perfect.

So you probably hear it with these very crystalline and almost clinical synth sounds and then all these samples and quite rough voice notes and stuff. That’s kind of the picture I was trying to paint I think.

So what role did the internet play in your life back then and now?

It was super formative when I was a young teenager but it’s funny because in the recent couple of years music has become a lot more real life based. I think going to London really changed that because making music there is a lot more of a social thing, because there’s a studio culture where everyone’s in the same basement meeting each other. Whereas in Berlin for me the social aspect of music was always very much going out and partying. That’s where you meet people, but making music was something everyone does at home on their own. So the internet stopped being the main place to exchange everything, which is cool. I’m glad it became a bit more physical in a way.

And how does it feel now when you perform to see this crowd of people that you otherwise only see as numbers on the screen?

Honestly, it feels really good because I think the numbers thing can make you really insecure. Because there’s so many factors that affect how these numbers look, you know? It might be like the time of day that you post something or whatever, so what’s really good about real-life shows is that people pulled up and they clearly have a very immediate reaction to the music so it’s definitely reassuring.

You almost became a professional classical guitarist. When and why did you realize that this world wasn’t for you?

Probably around like 16, 17 or something. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy doing that, it was more that the reality of how that would look is so different. It’s not like violin where you can just be in a big orchestra. Classical guitar is a quite particular thing and that world felt very conservative. It almost reminded me of sports, where people train 10 hours a day and then the rest of their interest is actually super basic. It’s almost like they’re not into art. It just doesn’t feel like there’s a larger interest in culture. It’s more, just sort of athletic, getting really good at doing this one thing.

You moved from Munich to Berlin, then to Amsterdam and from there to London. How do these cities differ and how have they influenced your music?

I think in Munich I was really like that typical teenage bedroom producer, where everything is in your head and you just dream up a world for yourself and communicate it online, but it’s all very imaginary you know. And Berlin really made me rooted in the club, I mean that’s to be expected haha. I was deejaying at OHM like literally every other Friday before it was so popular, now it’s so hard to ever have a party there. In Amsterdam I did my masters in design and fine arts. There things became very conceptual and theoretical and I was reading a lot and thinking a lot. Rather than making original music all the time, I was more working on sound installations and producing other people’s records. Then London was like laser focus on music, just being locked into the studio sitting there all night long writing an album.

People say that there’s a different kind of hustling mentality in London compared to Berlin. Do you feel that there as well?

Absolutely. I mean, it is so competitive. Obviously it’s an expensive city and you have to make things work so you just have to grind. But also if you see people coming up with new micro-genres left and right and new asthetics for their party flyers like every other week, you just feel a little competitive and you’re like, I want to be contributing something that feels as fresh or as absurd or whatever. So yes, I would agree with that.

And because of this pace in the industry, many artists find it hard to step back from their work and take a break. How do you deal with that?

I have to find out how to deal with that, to be honest, because I haven’t taken a break in… the entire process of making the record, and now I’m touring and promoting the record. It’s just sort of snowballing, the more you do the more doors open so it’s just more work. And I’m still probably used to the times where anything you can get, you should grab and do it. But yeah, I’m just finding out how to do that.

I can imagine. Alongside your music career you also studied design. Where was that and what area did you specialize in?

So I studied at the Berlin University of the Arts, UdK, and I graduated in Spatial Design actually in the end. So it was sort of like architecture, but less applied architecture. And afterwards, I studied what was called Design at Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam, which is like the master’s department of Rietveld. It was a double degree in fine arts and design and it was basically very research-based. I always thought that was obviously cool and interesting but also a little pretentious.

Were you already making music at that time?

I have been producing electronic music since I was 16. Throughout the whole university path, I was making music and that was always a bit of an issue. I was definitely not someone that attended every class, I always was a little bit absent from school. I made it work somehow, but I don’t think my teachers really liked me that much. I still feel good about having done it though.

That’s probably due to the contrast between working as a freelance artist and the structure of university.

Yeah, working in university followed this sort of assignment-based structure.

I don’t like the idea of having one person tell me what they think about it, like that’s just one person’s opinion whereas if you put it out that feels like a way more educational process. I’m kind of a stubborn and annoying student I think, so I did learn a lot but I just love to argue with my teachers.

And now that you’re done with your design studies and focus more on actually making music, how do you still feel the influence of your design background in your music?

The project, Mechatok, I mean it is pretty much like an audio-visual project. I have a lot of visual collaborators, but I still do the art direction of all the visuals and a lot of the graphic design is my own. I always view it as a visual project as much as a musical one, I mean for the new record we did five music videos. Both things emerge at the same time so I’ll make the music while I make the visuals. And there’s always movies running on screens while I’m making music. So it really goes hand in hand.

Thank you Mechatok !

EVENT RECOMMENDATION: BERLIN ATONAL 25’

Anna Klusmeier — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 15:54:21 +0000

Berlin Atonal 25’ takes place from August 27 to 31, transforming Kraftwerk Berlin as well as the clubs Tresor and OHM into a dense mesh of music, art, and performance for five days. The festival sees itself not just as a stage, but as a playground for experimentation, where commissioned works, premieres, and installations meet club nights and immersive spatial experiences.

At the center is the monumental main stage inside Kraftwerk: a 70,000 m³ space that temporarily becomes an atmospheric resonator. Fog, sound, and light create an environment where the boundaries between concert, performance, and installation dissolve. Listening becomes a physical experience that extends far beyond hearing alone.

The program is dense and diverse. Thursday features new immersive shows by emptyset with MFO, Carrier with Riyo Nemeth, and a dreamlike set from Malibu; afterwards, Lil Mofo, livwutang, and STILL take over the afterhours. Friday highlights Lord Spikeheart & NMR with their politically charged project »REIGN«, bela’s »Korean Love Sonnets«, along with performances by John T. Gast, GRIEND, and Billy Bultheel. On the club stages, Rrose, Skee Mask, and re\:ni b2b Mia Koden, among others, set the tone for the night.

Saturday brings Amnesia Scanner & Freeka.tet with »S.L.O.T.H.«, a rare duo concert by Mark Fell & Okkyung Lee, the live debut of Gombeen & Doygen, as well as new performances from Lechuga Zafiro & Verraco, Chuquimamani-Condori, and Sofii. The grand finale on Sunday features the debut of the trio Merzbow / Iggor Cavalera / Eraldo Bernocchi, a multisensory show by Heith, and the »Organic Intelligence« project by the Jokkoo Collective — a speculative soundscape imagining ecological and cultural resistance.

With its admission into the International Biennial Association, Berlin Atonal opens a new chapter this year. This step makes clear that the festival is designed to establish itself long-term as a music-centered biennial for sound art and interdisciplinary formats. The international recognition shows that this is not just a festival, but a platform for artistic risk-taking and experimental practice.

Tresor and OHM also play a key role. Here, what begins on the main stage as a concentrated listening experience unfolds into energetic club nights that stretch well into the morning. Between exhibition and dance floor, between perception and ecstasy, a field of tension emerges that makes Berlin Atonal unique.

Berlin Atonal 25’ is therefore less a conventional festival and more a laboratory for contemporary cultural practice — a place where boundaries are pushed and new forms of gathering are explored.

An experience that lasts.

Tickets for Atonal can be purchased here. See the full program here.

IN CONVERSATION WITH LORD SPIKEHEART

Anna Klusmeier — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 14:59:46 +0000

Redefining your understanding of – and connection with music, Lord Spikeheart is once again proving how intertwined sounds are with emotions, cultural appreciation and representation. While his last LP The Adept is still lingering in our minds and echoing in our heads, Lord Spikeheart is ready to provide us with a new experience that delves into his most intimate reflections with his new EP REIGN. Also released under his record label Haekalu Records, we will be able to immerse ourselves in the full experience at the debut presentation and performance at the Berlin Atonal Festival, happening this week in Berlin. Numéro Berlin couldn’t wait to find out more about the inspiration, his cosmos, how he transforms emotions, and what we should expect from the experience. We had the pleasure to talk to Lord Spikeheart aka Martin Kanja and can definitely assure you: this release is one to be excited about.

Franka Magon: Dogs that bark don’t bite. As a musician moving between metal, grindcore, rap, and techno, filling your music with growls and screams, does that make you a secret softie?

Martin Kanja: Yeah haha I would say so. For me music is just a way of expressing, it’s an art form. I’m completely different, I’m just a regular guy, maybe sensitive, sometimes dramatic but a normal person.

Your music is anything but calm; it is filled with chaotic energy. How do you find spiritual cleansing in this sensory overload? For many, that would seem like a contradiction.

That’s how I am inside. These sounds, these frequencies and all this vibration that’s what goes on inside of myself. When I’m asleep and I’m dreaming it’s always like these intense scenes and these spiritual situations.

I get a lot of calmness from my music. Like with meditation, I’m very present and there’s no thinking.

Is it ever calm inside of you?

I am always already visualizing situations before, so when they happen, I’m very comfortable in them. This is when my brain goes quiet. When it happens it’s just like I am in control, it’s like lucid dreaming.

Faith plays an important role for you. The church as an institution does not necessarily stand for freedom, but often for restriction. Your music is about reclaiming freedom, how do you endure this ambiguity?

I came from a very religious background, we used to read the Bible back-to-back. I reached a point in my life whereby I had more questions than I could get answers for, and it was better to live life and have these experiences through music, instead of just being told how life should be.

We started doing this kind of music to just do something we love. And no one understood it, everyone was telling us not to do, this is not good for you, you’re getting lost, you’re going into the darkness. But it was important to me. So you’d rather do it because at the end of the day, you only have one life and you will be alone in the last minute. So why not just live for you.

How would you describe your faith today?

I just believe we are one. I believe we should help each other out and be kind to each other because it’s just been getting darker and darker through the ages. I think we should start believing once again in mankind and humans bro.

In Germany we feel a growing radicalization of opinion, and it seems to be a global phenomenon. Much of it is driven by anger. Anger feels omnipresent, it is everywhere: politically, in the media. How do you respond to that anger in your music and to what extent is your music about love?

In our music, in the shows it’s all about oneness, equality, coming together and appreciating each other across all these different dynamic backgrounds and all these places where we’ve all come from. Everything that is wrong was indoctrinated to us, it was taught, people came here pure. At the end of the day, we should always come back to being together as one and enjoying the energy and the vibration.

I believe whatever you put out comes back to you and I’ve seen it in my lyrics: I would write some lyrics and then they would happen to me in real life, so I’m very careful with what I put in the music. If you go through the lyrics and if you see the videos and the message behind it, it’s very encouraging and uplifting music, honestly.

Do you feel an anger that for a musician in a western country it’s easier to gain success or to get a financial outcome than it might have been for you?

No, I don’t feel anger at all. I feel more of empowerment and inspiration, like motivated. It puts me at an advantage that I don’t have any advantage. I have a different mindset. I’m very hungry, ambitious, and aggressive.

Your great-grandmother is an inspiring figure to you, and you dedicated your debut album to her. She was the first female field marshal during the Mau Mau rebellion. In another interview you said she and the men by her side kept fighting even after the war was officially over because they simply could not imagine it had ended. Have you ever found yourself in a similar situation, where you just couldn’t stop, because fighting had become second nature?

Yes, I have many times, being an entrepreneur and also a musician at the same time running a label, making music, you know, there’s a lot of challenges. I had lots of people saying “quit, go back home, give up, you know, that’s it, man, it’s never gonna work”.

But I always told myself I’ve come so far. It’s too late now, we are in too deep. At some point, you just realize that you’ve worked so hard, and you’ve sacrificed so much. I came to respecting that and celebrating the wins along the way.

What advice do you have for other young artists, whose life is also filled with lots of fights and anger?

Remember why you started doing it, remember that your potential is huge, no one has any idea what your potential can achieve and whatever it is you’re going through it’s temporary, everything in life is temporary, life itself is temporary. It will pass no matter how dark it looks. Just keep pushing, just keep doing it for the right reasons. Be authentic. Be original.

What can people expect from your new EP and your performance at the Atonal Festival in Berlin?

My new EP and my new performances are an extension of my first album’s themes of the Mau Mau and how they went through the tough, tough colonial times when they were fighting against the oppressors.

We are exploring narratives of abuse, control, displacement, betrayal, loss of land, loss of freedom, and loss of culture. Colonization brought so much loss.

We are also trying to address themes of reclamation, hope, resistance, and renewal. Renewal is a powerful response to the inequalities that happened, all the oppression and systemic violence that had occurred.

We are doing an audio-visual show with NMR CC that’s going to be to be merged with the music, which is going to create a whole universal world that people can travel into, experiencing this message we have and understanding it as a warning.

Its a cautionary tale of what can happen if we don’t stand for our things and our culture, how we can get eroded and how we should always protect and achieve total control of what we have lost, so the future generations can also enjoy it.

That’s beautiful, thank you for talking to Numéro, we are excited for your new EP and performance.