CTM.13 – The Golden Age

Welcome to the 14th Edition

Fifteen years have passed since the first festival edition was held; fifteen years in which the CTM – Festival for Adventurous Music and Art has accompanied and fostered contemporary musical production. 

Through this 14th edition, we once again hope to present a programme full of contrasts, one more open than ever before to a broad range of music, beyond the carefully drawn borders of individual genres, styles, formats, and traditions. This This is where the multifaceted yet interwoven strands of contemporary music are wired up, where the pop music of the future meets yesteryear’s avant-gardes, where sophisticated, historically-conscious approaches take the stage alongside eclectic montage, and abstract sound research mingles with the club sounds of the moment.

Here’s an overview of the 14th edition programme, to help you find your bearings in a programme that’s bursting at the seams.

CTM.13 Press Reviews

A selection of CTM.13 reviews of that can be found on the internet.

CTM.13 Gallery

Photos from the last edition of CTM.

CTM.13 Video of the Day

CTM partner Realeyz.TV is on-site during festival week to provide exclusive coverage of different highlights throughout festival week. A new video is uploaded daily, so be sure to keep checking back!

CTM.13 Theme

The Golden Age

Within the conditions of digital culture, globalization and postmodernism, that which has always been key aspirations and promise of art and pop culture now fully unfolds: unleashed subjectivity and an unharnessed imaginary meet the wide public acceptance of its diverse forms of expression. Those manifest not so much as essential originality but rather as the products of continuous processes of self-design based on the eclectic or syncretic appropriation and transformation of already existing materials. But when self-expression, once a heavily-contested strategy for emancipation, becomes the norm within digital capitalism’s gift economy, that which at first glance appears to be the manifestation of long-fought-for creative freedom quickly also reveals its shadow side.

Q&A with Eugene S. Robinson by Glissando magazine

Is it Art or is it Life?

CTM partner Glissando magazine caught up with Eugene S. Robinson ahead of his CTM.13 appearance with Xiu Xiu, to creative approaches and inspiration.

Q&A with Mark Archer (Altern 8)

Rave Undead

CTM daytime program co-curator Annie Goh got in touch with Mark just before Christmas to talk about traveling back in time for his upcoming CTM.13 performance at Berghain.

Andreas Richter portraits Berlin bands Reliq and Sun Worship

Way Beyond Metal

Reliq and Sun Worshop evoke the golden age of a niche culture, which is now looking behind the scenes of its primordial, impulsive theatre with a willingness for debate and serious criticism.

Björn Gottstein portraits Ernstalbrecht Stiebler

Coming to Terms with Sound

Rebelling against codes of serialism that were so dominant in the 1960s, Ernstalbrecht Stiebler contributed to a new understanding of sound through work that can also be credited as laying the foundation for modern-day minimalistic music.

Q&A with Mark Fell by Glissando magazine

The Sounds of Multistability

CTM partner Glissando magazine caught up with Mark Fell ahead of his CTM.13 performances under both his own name as well as Sensate Focus.

Q&A with Atom^TM by Glissando magazine

Ode to Musical Conservatism

CTM partner Glissando magazine caught up with Uwe Schmidt ahead of his CTM.13 appearances as Atom^TM, where the prolific artist will present two of his latest collaborative projects

Andreas L. Hofbauer digs deeper into the Golden Age

Discourse Groundwork

Today, in contrast to earlier times, the idea of a fully realized utopia, of paradise gained, is disturbing. Unfreedom, determinism, automatism are immediate associations and evoke images of a fanatically imposed totalitarianism. Whether situated in a glorious past or a projected future, the concept of utopia conveys an impression of narrowness that is contrary to our common ideal of broad-mindedness. It seems that if you would rather not actually live in the City of the Sun (Civitas Solis) or Schlauraffen Land (Brothers Grimm), and if you have had enough of paradise seekers and believers, the idea of the "Golden Age" can’t be approached with anything but irony. Even utilitarian proposals that aim to maximize happiness for the majority ultimately prove to be the conscious, inchoate moral tartuffery of exploitative, capitalist machinery geared towards the maximisation of profit.

CTM.13 Exhibition

In That Weird Part

The project 'In That Weird Part', presented in the CTM.13 exhibition, is concerned with the interpretation and editing of pop music in internet user culture. Through the appropriation of music – mostly in the form of music video remakes – a new musical vernacular with far-reaching implications is appearing beyond professional networks of composers, musicians and music promoters.

Translated by Annie Goh

QRT - “Tekknologic, Tekknowledge, Tekgnosis – Ein Theoriemix” Merve Verlag Berlin 1999

As part of the Death of Rave series, co-curator Annie Goh has translated an exceprt from a work by QRT aka Markus Konradin, a nihilistic intellectual, whose texts have been said to range from “musicological-medicinal, pharmaceutical-pornographic, technologic-theoretical or criminologic-cinematographic”.

CTM.13 Catalog

Have a look on our 96 page catalog, complete with programme schedule, event descriptions, theme text and more – or download as PDF.

CTM.13 Artists on RBMA Radio

Here’s a selection of interviews and live recordings published by Red Bull Music Academy Radio featuring CTM.13 artists Sunn O))), Kode9, Matmos, a PAN label special,  DJ Sprinkles, Xiu Xiu, Shed, Simian Mobile Disco, A Guy Called Gerald, and more.

CTM' Sister Festival

transmediale 2013 – BWPWAP

For its 26th edition, CTM's sister festival transmediale, that takes place in parallel at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, boldly goes BWPWAP – Back When Pluto Was a Planet.