The Potential: Tapping into the Night!
Stadt Nach Acht proudly presents
„The Potential“
by DBC Detroit Berlin Connection
Detroit and dance culture are synonymous. Motown songs and techno tracks bring positive energy to the mind and move the body, regardless of time and place. Yet in Detroit, itself dancing is prohibited after 2 a.m. This discussion now being led by the Detroit-Berlin Connection aims to shed light on how local laws must be changed to allow 24-hour expression of what the city does best: innovate, produce raw music power, change the world.
The Detroit-Berlin Connection is leading efforts to end a decades-long dance curfew from 2 to 7:30 a.m. in the city. The laws stretch back to a time when auto industry and political leaders in Detroit, along with the state’s Liquor Control Commission, aimed to limit hours of entertainment as a way to protect business interests – as well as reduce late-night options for people of color in neighborhoods like Black Bottom-Paradise Valley, which flourished with jazz and blues clubs in the 1930s and 1940s. But those neighbourhoods were demolished to make way for interstate highways and other urban renewal projects in the 1950s. Sadly, they no longer exist.
Detroit is considered an innovator and influencer in creative industries worldwide, yet its leading artists – most of them African American – must make their living in cities with less restrictive, more open night economies in Europe and elsewhere.
The ‚Tapping into the Detroit-Berlin night‘ discussion will dig into Detroit’s past, present and potential future. The panel includes Dimitri Hegemann, Berlin techno entrepreneur and worldwide advocate for the 24 economy; Walter Wasacz, Detroit journalist and co-founder of the Detroit-Berlin Connection; John Collins of Detroit’s legendary Underground Resistance collective and board member of the Detroit-Berlin Connection; and Mark Reeder, filmmaker and music producer originally from Manchester UK now living in Berlin. Wasacz will moderate the discussion.
Participants:
John Collins (Underground Resistance)
Mark Reeder (Founder of MFS Record Label)
Smiley Baldwin (Security)
Moderation:
Walter Wasacz (Detroit writer / Editor / Consultant)
