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LOCATION:Große Elbstraße 84, 22767 Hamburg
SUMMARY;ENCODING=QUOTED-PRINTABLE:***Off The Radar Club*** live: MYKKI BLANCO support: Perera Elsewhere
DESCRIPTION;ENCODING=QUOTED-PRINTABLE:Line Up: Pünktlicher Beginn!=0D=0A=0D=0A“If there is one thing I know how to do, it’s how to get the most=0D=0Aout of life. Yeah, sure, not everything is perfect. You fuck up. You=0D=0Amake mistakes. But hopefully, you’re achieving more than you’re=0D=0Afucking up. Overall, I would say I do well, milking life for all=0D=0Ait’s got.” — Mykki Blanco =0D=0A=0D=0AOn Café Paradiso, Mykki Blanco is completely reborn, trading the=0D=0Apersona-driven theatrics of his previous releases for something more=0D=0Ainterior and exacting. The record draws from the diverse, banal and=0D=0Ayet idiosyncratic contexts of the artist’s life in transit:=0D=0A“...shitty Wall Street lunch counters and an endless stream of dive=0D=0Abars in the East Village” in New York; “...drinking beer and=0D=0Aplaying pool in Belleville; the drink that lasts forever at Les Chope=0D=0Ades Artists and Chez Jeanette” in Paris; and “languishing for=0D=0Ahours at the tea houses or Café Hafa” in Tangier. From these=0D=0Afragments, Café Paradiso assembles a soundtrack for the contemporary,=0D=0Aqueer flâneur, moving through spaces where being alone does not=0D=0Anecessarily mean being lonely. “Café Paradiso is a record for artsy=0D=0Akids,” Blanco explains, “for my cosmopolitan aesthetes to sit=0D=0Aalone in a café and work on crafting the life of their dreams, or=0D=0Ajust make sense of it!” When asked which earlier versions of himself=0D=0Aappear here, Blanco is unequivocal: “None.”=0D=0A=0D=0AIf Blanco’s discography exists less as a linear evolution and more=0D=0Aas a series of deliberate mutations — each project shifting in terms=0D=0Aof tone, genre, and even the function of the voice — then Café=0D=0AParadiso represents his post-rumspringa clarity. “I love creating=0D=0Amusic but I’ve never liked the idea of being a one-trick pony,”=0D=0ABlanco explains, “I need to check some things off my ‘Life=0D=0AList.’” After his 2022 album Stay Close to Music and the Postcards=0D=0Afrom Italia (2023) EP, Blanco spent two years at art school in=0D=0ASwitzerland, getting his MFA and deepening his studio practice as a=0D=0Avisual artist. “I’ve got a lot of ideas for interdisciplinary=0D=0Aprojects,” Blanco says, “and I felt the experience helped me level=0D=0Aup in other areas of my career and expand my database of knowledge=0D=0Awhich just ends up making everything I produce even cooler. In=0D=0ASeptember of 2024, Blanco submitted his thesis "The Black Presence In=0D=0AEarly Soviet Union Russia" and graduated, then returned to his=0D=0A“first love” — songwriting.=0D=0A=0D=0AThe lead single “Little Feet” (featuring Ian Isiah and Breakaway)=0D=0Asets the tone for the record as a score for the “wayward=0D=0Ametropolitan,” to use the artist's own words. Blanco and his=0D=0Acollaborators purr about hanging out, hooking up, and dancing the=0D=0Anight away under the street lights over a sultry, nostalgic groove=0D=0Athat feels both familiar and slightly unreal. =0D=0A=0D=0AOn the second single, the provocative party anthem “Butt Sex,”=0D=0ABlanco calls all his “baddies to the floor” while banishing the=0D=0A“uglies,” turning the album’s sensuality outward — more=0D=0Adirect, more mischievous, and openly communal. On the third single —=0D=0Athe more restless “NYC DOGS” — Blanco commands listeners to=0D=0A“stick out [their] tongues” like the “bad dogs” they are, and=0D=0Arepeatedly invokes the city which inspired and helped actualise this=0D=0Aproject: “I chose to record Café Paradiso in New York because I=0D=0Awanted to come home for a bit,” Blanco explained, “New York is=0D=0Awhere I ran away to when I was 16 … where I first began writing=0D=0Amusic after dropping out of Parsons School of Design, where I=0D=0Apublished my first book of poetry, and where I launched my career on=0D=0Athe underground scene 13 years ago.” He continues: “Café Paradiso=0D=0Ais a record for city kids. It’s heavily inspired by New York, but=0D=0Athe New York of now, which isn’t parochial but transatlantic. Café=0D=0AParadiso is also global. It’s a series of vignettes that speak to=0D=0Athe lives lived inside the concrete jungle.” =0D=0A=0D=0ATogether, “Butt Sex,” “NYC DOGS,” and the fourth single, the=0D=0Agenre-bending Easy Does It (featuring Evanora Unlimited and Simone=0D=0AAlysia), show off the range of Blanco’s collaborative approach,=0D=0Ashaped through an international network of artists working across=0D=0Ascenes and sensibilities. At the eye of this storm is his=0D=0Alongstanding, near psychic creative partnership with producer and=0D=0Acomposer Drew “FaltyDL” Lustman. “I will probably create music=0D=0Awith FaltyDL forever, or as long as he’ll have me,” Blanco says.=0D=0A“Drew really helped me cultivate what I consider to be my ‘true=0D=0Asound,’ the sound that characterises my identity as an artist now=0D=0Athat I’ve come to maturity musically.” The “true sound” Blanco=0D=0Arefers to resists easy categorisation. Once described as a=0D=0A“magpie-like approach to sound with a casual disregard for genre=0D=0Aconventions” (MusicTech, 2023), Blanco’s music operates less as a=0D=0Astyle than a method — an aural frottage, or the sonic memoir of an=0D=0Aurbane artist assembled from fragments, encounters and drift. As noted=0D=0Aby Pitchfork in 2016, it is “a swerve from the brusque=0D=0Aheterosexualization of nearly all mainstream rap.” =0D=0A=0D=0AThis approach is epitomised by “FOXES” (featuring Tama Gucci).=0D=0A“I don’t think I’ve ever felt so free,” Blanco says of the=0D=0Amaking of this song, which begins with the artist introducing himself=0D=0A— midway through his third studio album, mind you — thanking his=0D=0A“amazing band,” expressing his gratitude for the “amazing tour=0D=0Aso far,” and shouting out his collaborators before launching into an=0D=0Aincantation like nursery rhyme-like refrain with fable-like lyrics.=0D=0AArguably the emotional and conceptual climax of this album, Blanco=0D=0Acites this track as “the reason I am a musician is to achieve this=0D=0Akind of freedom that elevates my soul into higher art and=0D=0Aperformance.’” =0D=0A=0D=0AWhile “FOXES” captures the album at its most expansive, other=0D=0Atracks locate that same sensibility within more defined,=0D=0Agenre-specific forms. A song like “Spread 4 Me,” for example,=0D=0Acould easily exist in the same lineage as heartland rock classics that=0D=0Aooze a certain kind of slick, nonchalant pop Americana. The song is=0D=0Aupfront and wholesome — as pop-adjacent as Blanco has ever been —=0D=0Abut it hints at something carnal and epicurean hiding under the=0D=0Asurface with its rallying cry: “Make like butter and spread for=0D=0Ame.”=0D=0A=0D=0AAs high energy as parts of this album might seem, Café Paradiso is,=0D=0Aat its core, a record about stillness. Blanco insists “is not a=0D=0Apoint A-to-B record, or a pre-game record. It’s an album about=0D=0Aenjoying your own company.” Resisting the logic of escalation or=0D=0Adestination, Café Paradiso lingers in transitional spaces — the=0D=0Asolitary meal, the late-night bar, the airport terminal — where time=0D=0Astretches and the self becomes momentarily unmoored. What emerges is=0D=0Amusic attuned to the quiet intensity of being alone in public, where=0D=0Aobservation becomes its own form of participation. =0D=0A=0D=0AThis dual position – being both observer and participant — harks=0D=0Aback to Blanco’s formative experiences on the early Internet. “I=0D=0Aliterally am who I am today because of how much music I was exposed to=0D=0Avia Napster and Limewire, and those thrilling early days of=0D=0Adownloading music and genre-splicing,” he explains. “It’s the=0D=0Asame with selecting songs on a jukebox. I love fragments. I love=0D=0Asketches. I’ve always been obsessed with worlds within worlds, and=0D=0Ahow subplots create a whole.” He continues, comparing Café Paradiso=0D=0Ato a “three-act play,” or a script for a “feature film,” and=0D=0Aciting references such as Saint Etienne, The Silver Apples, Towa Tei.=0D=0A“I mean this album is pretty bandy,” Blanco says, “it’s a=0D=0Afestival album.”=0D=0A=0D=0ACafé Paradiso does not mark a rupture so much as a refinement in the=0D=0Acareer of Mykki Blanco. Drawing together years of experimentation=0D=0Aacross music, performance, and visual art, this album arrives at a=0D=0Apoint of transient clarity — it is a confident statement of intent,=0D=0Apositioning Blanco not simply as a shape-shifter, but as an artist in=0D=0Afull command of his present form.=0D=0A=0D=0Amykkiblanco.bandcamp.com [https://mykkiblanco.bandcamp.com/]=0D=0A=0D=0APerera Elsewhere Video: youtu.be [https://youtu.be/P0Hfg8ryHas?t=55]=0D=0A
URL;VALUE=URI:https://hamburgwhl.infomaxnet.de/whl-kalender/e-mykki-blanco?eventDateId=30395958&widgetToken=J2c3z9UfufA.&
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DTSTART:20261017T210000
DTSTAMP:20261012T172413
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