It’s those surprising, euphoric “hands up sing along” moments. People look at each other half-expectantly, half-surprised, almost jumping, arms fly through the air, peak time: “Wo bist du, mein Sonnenlicht? Ich suche dich und vermisse dich.” (Transl. “Where are you, my sunlight, I’m looking for you and I miss you”) blasts out of the Funktion-One. 

The same phenomenon happened last year with a different song at the Melt Festival. Only this time it was the pitched-up part of a song by Hessian rapper Sonya that provided a disruptive highlight. And something else was different here: The track was already circulating on Tiktok and was mainly used as a meme sound by young, hip party people. In other words, memes have left the internet and have now arrived on the dancefloor. Does Tiktok make techno funnier now?

There are some funny and catchy techno edits with high meme potential circulating on the short video platform. Many use voice samples either from funny German trash songs, gangsta rap or excerpts from iconic interviews. These are then combined with straightforward, catchy beats. Musically, they move somewhere between 90’s hard house, donk and UK garage.This results in relatively obvious, simple productions, some of which play with absurd inside jokes, but which work on the dancefloor thanks to their driving soundscape. DJ YARAK, the self-proclaimed “World’s first Tiktok DJ”, sampled interview sequences by Christoph Daum, freestyles by Money Boy and lines by Mark Forster, among others. His cover images on Soundcloud look like memes, sometimes with the similar DIY trash factor of early cloud rap covers.

On the one hand, the popularity of cloud techno DJs shows that the techno scene is becoming increasingly differentiated into niche styles and subgenres. On the other hand, it also shows that genre boundaries and subcultures are becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish from one another. In the club context, for example, techno edits of 2000s pop hits have currently reached peak popularity. Festival sets, on the other hand, are packed with samples by Madonna, Nelly Furtado, Ciara or Britney Spears. 

These blends of pop, hip-hop and techno illustrate how the techno genre has been opening up to new styles and influences for some time now. Even techno purists can be persuaded to play something that goes beyond their stylistic framework, but in case of doubt will attract more people than the 70 euro record from Discogs.

With cloud techno, the motto is: vibe over message. The memes that spill over onto dancefloors are probably one of the more extreme examples of how a genre can open up. The shift of subcultures into the digital space is a major contributing factor. Everything that is produced culturally – be it an interview excerpt, an item of clothing or a beat – now takes place in real time on the internet. This means that everything that happens culturally anywhere in Berlin is immediately related to what is happening culturally in Tokyo or New York, for example. This creates an extremely accelerated stream of mutual reception, influence and reference.

For the fans and creators of cloud techno, it is therefore less about outdated and distinct genre categories or subcultural demarcation. Rather, the intertextual references, the jokes that are played with and the energy that is released on the dancefloor show that the common denominator is the same understanding of memes and online culture. If you follow the same shitposters and consume the same memes or meme genres, you understand each other. You instantly connect.

Techno DJs have always played disruptive taste-breakers as the highlight or finale of their set, songs from their own youth or some classics. It’s just that the next generation of DJs and producers no longer necessarily have Depeche Mode or Talk Talk to provide as this common denominator.

What’s interesting is that for some techno purists, cloud techno comes close to the limits of good taste. Audiophile techno snobs could adopt a highly cultural attitude of rejection towards cloud techno. At the same time, it breaks up the widespread and highly stylized seriousness and gloominess of the techno scene. From this perspective, cloud techno, with its simple, obvious productions, relates to a fifty-minute Ricardo Villalobos jam like a McDonald’s Happy Meal to molecular cuisine.

After two years of not partying during the pandemic, people were starved for fun. For a generation that was only just legally allowed to go clubbing when the lockdown started, there’s a lot of catching up to do. Young partygoers in particular have a real craving for excess. It’s about letting yourself go completely, experiencing limits, having fun and reconnecting with each other. If you’re willing to give in to your cravings completely, then junk food can be just the thing for that moment. Cloud techno enables hedonistic escapism, but in your own comfort zone. And here, too, there will be an awareness somewhere that the music is not exactly bursting with substance – regardless of whether this is glossed over with ironic indulgence or whether you genuinely enjoy it after all. But if cloud techno offers a low-threshold introduction to the world of electronic music for a younger target group, then there is something enriching about it. After all, it should be perfectly okay to indulge in comfort food from time to time.

This story was published in August 2022 in vakuum Issue II.