After two industry awards (Red Bull Elektropedia “Breakthrough Festival” and Visit Brussels’ “Evening Experience” award) Brussels Electronic Marathon’s team returns for a third edition taking place from the 12th to 14th of October. After a successful second edition that attracted a diverse audience, BEM looks once again to bring together electronic music lovers from Brussels and elsewhere.
L’Union fait la Force:
Brussels Electronic Marathon is a celebration of a modest yet beautiful city and its citizens that make, play, or simply enjoy electronic music. BEM is a grassroots project that supports and promotes our local artists, places and spaces. In 2017, 66 collectives and concepts took part, supported by some 130 volunteers. It is by almost every measure the largest urban electronic music festival in Brussels and even Belgium. BEM17 was 33 locations, 65 events hosting 229 local artists, from all corners of the electronic music world; hip-hop, electronica, techno and house, noise, ambient and neoclassical as well as glitch and acousmatic. A diverse sound for a diverse city.
A living city:
Electronic music and culture isn’t only late night parties. Workshops for children, talks, screenings and concerts for the first generation of music lovers are integral parts of our festival. A city is an organism that lives both by day and by night, and as such topics such as health, transport and fairness are at the core of BEM’s dna.
For its second edition Brussels Electronic Marathon received two awards of great significance to the small team behind the festival. Firstly as winner of Breakthrough Festival for the Red Bull Elektropedia Awards and following the the “Evening Experience award 2017” from Visit Brussels. These awards prove that the project supports the argument that culture doesn’t stop at midnight and furthermore that Brussels itself is a capital city rich in events concerning electronic music.
Just like last year, BEM18 will be a 3-day marathon of events in Brussels. The first two editions of BEM brought together more than 24,000 Brussels residents, clubbers and electronic music-lovers from all over Belgium and further abroad. Spread over 3 days, BEM18 will offer more than 60 events, and involve 30+ venues and 40+ music collectives & partners.
Brussels Electronic Marathon continues its mission to showcase the quality and diversity of the Brussels and Belgian electronic music scene through a huge variety of events & venues. Last year museums, warehouses, underground caverns and even a laundry hosted events, and this year a number of similarly unique venues will be added to the programme, including a swimming pool, a medieval tower, a former Citroen garage and an old lead-shot factory.
A programme which welcomes all age groups and sections of society will continue to expand in order to continue BEM’s role as a catalyst for bringing people together from all kinds of backgrounds. At a professional level, BEM will seek to further expand the collaboration between various actors and organisations with workshops in collaboration with SAE Institute, Ableton and Roland.
Brussels Electronic Marathon doesn’t only bring the city to life to electronic sounds for a whole weekend, it also delineates an authentic map of Brussels’ electronic music scene today. We are, modestly, writing and recording history, just like the early pioneers in Belgian electronic music.
BEM 2018 Programme
For this 3rd edition, Brussels Electronic Marathon proposes something new; a grouping of events into 3 distinct areas. BEM18 articulates these as three zones; the canal area, the centre of the city, and the are around Flagey.
The events in the canal zone start on Friday at LaVallée with an evening marrying together Strictly Niceness and Shaft. Sunday LaVallée proposes an afternoon of ambient music with Initiate Reflections. Exhibitions and a huge party feature at Kanal Centre Pompidou on Friday.
In the centre, Café Central hosts Court Circuit and FTRSND on Friday while BEM & Bozar Electronic presents concerts at Bozar. On Saturday the zone includes Botanique with performances by aMute and Aponogeton, while at Fuse we once again present United, which since the first edition of BEM has brought together a huge number of Belgian techno and house collectives under the same roof. For those who want to keep going right until the end, C12 hosts the closing party with Deep in House and Initiate.
In Ixelles, Flagey hosts two unique concerts in homage to Marc Moulin with Philip Catherine and STUFF. On Sunday evening Bar du Marché invites Beatronic to play the final notes in the Flagey area.
Unique venues
Once again BEM will host events in various exceptional venues. Play Label Records will take over the Tour à Plomb (Shot Tower), a unique site in Brussels. Global Hybrid will showcase performances in both the Port de Hal on Saturday afternoon as well as underwater music in the Public Swimming Pool high up above the Place Jeu de Balle on Sunday afternoon.
Three exhibitions
Throughout the whole weekend, various visual art and sound installations can be experienced for free at Kanal Centre Pompidou.
At Lavallée, attendees will be able to experience various audio-visual installations. These will bring together various artists and coders in order to harness their imagination as well as combine their strengths and allow them to explore the overlaps between their disciplines.
Once again BEM brings installations and performances into the magnificent and Coudenberg palace, a venue that is both literally and figuratively underground, often not even known by residents of Brussels.
An exceptional party
Kanal Centre Pompidou will host an exceptional event, bringing together the two powerhouses Fuse and C12 in a vast space that has never before held a party – an exceptional event this year before the renovations of the building start. This evening is a great example of bringing together different actors from the scene and uniting them for a night of techno and house, in the middle of an enormous, unfinished museum, and a symbol of BEM’s values.
