All in a day's work...

This past Friday I went to hear Daniel Bell play at the club Watergate. He's a well-known American DJ. I had emailed his agent on Monday on the off-chance that he might be interested in talking to me, and was very pleased to hear from him a few days later. All of the details came in at the last minute, however: he was only able to tell me when he was playing on Friday evening, and as I was leaving for the club I still wasn't sure if I would be able to film. I decided to take my camera on the off-chance...















It all worked out beautifully: I interviewed him about the performance for 30 mins or so before he played, then watched the set from 3:30-6:15. I filmed for a little over an hour during that time. This is the first DJ set I've filmed in a while; so many people are doing laptop sets now.

Watergate is a lovely club. It is literally on the water; there's a patio that juts out into the Spree, overlooking an old bridge with turrets. The interior is very elegant and features a wall of windows overlooking the river. It was interesting to see how they handled the sunrise--basically they lowered a curtain over the windows, but it was only translucent, not opaque. So one felt the change in the light, but in a muted way. This is apparently in contrast to Berghain, where they lower sunblocking drapes at the designated time (a good thing probably, since that's about when most of the patrons get there. :)

Photos are of:
1. The club
2. The set from behind the DJ
3. Outside the club as I was leaving