20 years ago, at the end of the 20th century, Sónar Festival was THE festival. In June, in Barcelona, there was nothing else. For three days and two nights, the best advanced electronic music on the planet was meeting in Barcelona and nobody dared to compete against it. Not even them. Soulblaster and Dj Gun-J didn’t pretend to be the alternative. They didn’t intend to counterprogram Sónar. They didn’t intend to take away the protagonism. Actually, they only wanted to attend the festival, but they didn’t have enough money to afford the entrance fee.
The passion of Soulblaster and Dj Gun-J for electronic music was what united them. A common friend introduced each other and, since then, they were childlike. Both recorded with cassettes their favourite songs when they were played on the radio, but it wasn’t until they frequented more underground clubs (and the occasional after-hours) when they discovered the genres that really fascinated them. “I remember LNR’s Working To The Bone or Lil Louis’s French Kiss”, says Soulblaster in an interview with the digital magazine Clubbingspain.
Tickets to Sónar Festival had a cost around 4,000 pesetas (approximately € 25). It may seem little now, but at that time it was an amount that strikes the pocket. Our friends couldn’t afford it and decided to stay all Friday night around the Fira Gran Via selling beer cans. With the money obtained, they would pay, at least, the ticket for Saturday. A whole night in silence? No, of course not. Soulblaster and Dj Gun-J got car, trunk, speakers and disks. A very Spanish and Barna equation.
They didn’t sell so much. Well, we could say they sold almost nothing, so that ended up turning into a classic ‘botellón’. During the night, some lengthened their entrance to the festival because of it. Our two friends had no intention of extending the adventure so much, seeing their little success, but you know what happens when alcohol and music join forces: the hours passed, and the sun began to rise. The rumble coming from the Fira Gran Via stopped. The clubbers began to parade, and the bravest ones didn’t hesitate to stop and dance around these two young guys loaded with beer. Almost without realizing it, they had become the heroes of the after-hours. That needed to be repeated.
It happened on Friday. They repeated on Saturday. And, yes, also on Sunday. Three sunrises on the outskirts of Sónar with Soulblaster and Dj Gun-J. The following year, again. And the next one, of course. The two young Barcelonians had become “the Sónar after-hours guys”. That had become “the Anti-Sónar”. A name, by the way, that they didn’t like at all. Soulblaster explained it properly to Clubbingspain: “A true Anti-Sónar would have consisted of doing something very different from what is done in Sónar. For example, instead of dancing to loud music, we could meet to read Don Quixote, pray the rosary or sing zarzuelas”.
There was nothing to do. The Anti-Sónar was a concept that spread throughout Barcelona. Every year, Sónar was just what preceded the street after-parties in a pure rave style. Every time with more DJs friends of the organisers who signed up for the game. Every time with a bigger audience. But always with a similar schedule, which never went too far. 11 o’clock in the morning used to be the deadline. The Guàrdia Urbana (the local police in the city) set some fines, but nothing big enough to prevent the viability of these parties. More and more professionals in the sector smelled the temptation to do something similar.
History began to change as we entered the 21st century. Trucks arrived (even from abroad) with a “Mad Max style”, according to Dj Gun-J’s quotes in Clubbingspain. They presented imperial sound systems and they organized parties that lasted all night. “That was the true Anti-Sónar. Those people were direct competition to the festival“, said Soulblaster. That was when they decided to step aside and see the bulls from the barrier. The Sónar week became year after year a growing lack of control, something unique that got bigger and bigger rumours around the continent. More and more clubbers were arriving in Barcelona to go directly to the raves without going to the festival. Good, pretty and cheap.
The police cut it short after a few years, but the idea that Barcelona was turning upside down that week was already installed. Many promoters set out to find the suitable spaces and to obtain the necessary permissions. Every year there were more daytime events, mainly open-air, which proposed alternatives to Sónar that were much more affordable. Unlike what happened with the rave organizers, much more careless, the promoters of these legal parties rejected the use of the “Anti-Sónar” concept. They wanted to avoid confrontation. They were not against anyone. They were only “the other option”. The “OFF Sónar” era began, something that later became the “OFF Week“ to avoid depending so much on the festival.
Currently, nobody fails the appointment. Sónar celebrates 25 years. The OFF Week round the decade (in some places it overcomes it and in others, it’s just starting). They are two giants that walk independently. Sónar would exist without OFF and OFF would exist without Sónar. It’s the electronic music week, the week in which (almost) anything goes. Afterparties are no longer legal, but countless squares, rooftops, boats, parks and clubs make up an astonishing events network. And there isn’t a single DJ from the international techno and house scene who doesn’t go through Barcelona during those days. Nowadays, the OFF Week definitely doesn’t look like those afterparties by Soulblaster and Dj Gun-J. Now it is a macro event. Something whose end is not glimpsed on the horizon.
(Cover Image: © Soulblaster & Dj Gun-J)
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