Club Watergate: the Berlin reference of world electronic music turns 20

It's one in the morning on the first Saturday in November and the line to enter Watergate is as far as the eye can see.

The line reaches from its entrance to the middle of the Oberbaum bridge, over the Spree river, which during the three decades in which a wall divided Berlin was a border post.

Until 1991, the bank the club is on was the west.

On the other side was the Democratic Republic, communist Germany.

Today the bridge protects from the rain the hundreds of people who want to attend the first of the nights that celebrate the twentieth anniversary of an electronic music club that is an institution.

In the list of the best clubs in the world by DJ Mag, the most widely read electronic music magazine, it is at number 35. There is only one other venue in Berlin ahead, the Berghain.

Those in the queue are going to have to wait.

On the top floor, where Sven Väth, a historic disc jockey, has just started his session, which will last until five in the morning, there is no room for anyone.

In the one below, where the Australian Kristin Velvet is giving it her all, it is still possible to break through.

In the bathroom, the tail is almost longer than the one outside.

But the party will last until noon.

So with patience it ends up entering.

Ulrich Wombacher (above), one of the three founders of the venue.

Because the Watergate access policy is more relaxed than usual in Berlin.

A kilometer away is the Berghain, whose doorman is so famous for being an edge that he has published his autobiography.

But here, for example, they do not turn away tourists.

“They are welcome if they are music enthusiasts and come to share common ground,” says Ulrich, Uli, Wombacher, one of the three founders of the venue and its day-to-day manager.

The problem is that Watergate isn't very big, it can fit 600 people, and things get complicated on special nights like this one.

“Who was going to tell us?

When we opened, no one came in.

I remember being here, looking through this window, ”he says, pointing to the window overlooking the river, which is one of the great attractions of his club.

“I would see people walking across the bridge.

He thought: 'Well, they come to the club', but they passed by.

It was very frustrating,” he recalls.

What it does share with the Berghain is an inflexible policy of prohibiting photography on the premises.

If they catch you, you go to the street.

This contributes to creating an atmosphere of freedom on the track.

Dance however you want, you won't end up being a meme on Twitter.

Belgian disc jockey Biesmans.

The Watergate opened in October 2000 in a former office building.

Berlin was already one of the capitals of electronic music in the world.

"I was born in 1973, I'm one of those kids from Berlin who grew up in a kind of prison, in the western part, but surrounded by communist Germany," explains Wombacher.

“In the early 90s, when Berlin became the capital of underground electronic music, we used to throw parties all over the city.

The standard situation was: you use an abandoned house for a club, you stay until they kick you out and you go to another one.

There came a time when we aspired to have something fixed and we rented this”.

Kristin Velvet, Australian disc jockey and one of the current Watergate residents.

Occupying in Berlin was easy.

After World War II, the 4.4 million inhabitants of 1939 had become 3.3 million.

When the Wall splits it in two, most try to get as far away from it as possible, and border neighborhoods like Kreuzberg, where Watergate is located, fill with immigration and squatters.

Few people want to live in Berlin, so it becomes a refuge for poor artists and other disinherited.

When the Wall falls in 1991, entire blocks are empty in what is once again downtown.

And an open bar to occupy in those areas that have been deserted for decades.

The authorities have too many problems with reunification to worry about some kids throwing electronic parties that last for days in places that don't even know exactly whose they are.

This is how rooms like Tresor were born, in the basement of an old department store, or E-Werk, in a disused power station.

The entrance of the Watergate and the Oberbaum bridge, which during the three decades in which a wall divided Berlin was a border post.

Hard techno rules in those early years.

electronics

the kind that echoes in your head two days after leaving the club.

House has its place thanks to the Love Parade, a massive and festive parade that accommodated more friendly rhythms.

That side was joined by Watergate.

"We started out very dark, very Berlin, we even had the windows covered," explains Wombacher.

“But one day we decided to let the light in.

We also put leds on the ceiling.

Then people freaked out.

We went from being just another club to a memorable one”.

Disc jockeys grew up in Watergate and are today stars like Solomun or Richie Hawtin, who played at the anniversary parties.

“I told Solomun: 'We could rent a stadium for you, but you have to be here, this is your living room.'

And the same, Richie.

A moment from a Sven Väth session.

The club was the first in Berlin to put LEDs on the roof

Watergate attracts people like Kristin Velvet, an Australian raised on a farm who, after passing through Sydney, Tokyo and London, decided to move to Berlin in 2013.

“It was a big city, full of possibilities, but not as hectic as some others,” she says.

After collaborating with Felix da Housecat, a house star, she starts DJing at Watergate, where she is now a resident.

“What makes the club unique is the location, seeing the sunrise creates such a special atmosphere… And that it is like a family.

Also, you can play whatever you want: techno, house, nu disco, afro…”, points out the disc jockey.

In addition to being a club, it is a brand.

He has his own record label and artist representation agency.

It organizes Watergate nights in Barcelona, ​​Amsterdam, London, Istanbul or Moscow and tours with its residents around Brazil.

He sells merchandising, of course, which is made by the Iriedaily company.

"There was a time when you could tell if a clubber was going to Tresor, Berghain or KitKat by the way they dressed," says Patrick Kressner, the brand's head of design.

"Here it was much more open, that's always been a great thing about Watergate."

Patrick Kressner, head of design at Iriedaily, a clothing brand founded in the 1990s that is in charge of designing and producing the club's merchandising.

Their detractors, which there are, accuse them of being commercial, but the people involved in the club see it as a virtue that the public is constantly renewed.

“I found out about the club in 2008, I came to play at another venue and the night before I went out dancing and came here.

It was amazing,” recalls Biesmans, a Belgian disc jockey who is also a resident at the venue.

“When I moved to Berlin, they were looking for a sound technician and they hired me.

Three years passed before they let me play in the room.

Watergate is great because a lot of people are from abroad, they come for the first time and they want the night they spend here to be special.

I never prepare the session.

The public guides me.

That's what makes Watergate a unique club."

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