Nathan Hamelberg and Magnus Eriksson (CMDR Mangs) have been running soul/electronic club Belleville for a few years at Marie Laveau. We decided to ask Nathan a few questions about the club night’s background.
What is the history behind Belleville?
It used to be an all-out dance club with guests such as Aaron Carl (R.I.P.) and Gary Martin (Mole People, Technotika, Gigi Galaxy) but now it’s more of a bar club focusing a bit more on the soulful side of dance music.
Marie Laveau was a creole voodoo priestess in early 19th century New Orleans, and the name Belleville is an homage to the three techno wizards Juan Atkins, Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson, who grew up in Belleville and put Detroit on the map. Their aesthetic was creole in every sense, mixing Italian and French disco, German synth, British and New York new wave with equal parts of black American soul, funk and disco. Our club is the perfect compliment to the nightclub in the basement.
Introduce yourself?
Us guys behind Belleville are Magnus Eriksson (who used to be bartender-in-chief and DJ-bookings man at Södra Teatern back in the day, as well as excellent disco and house DJ himself, but I’m biased) and myself, Nathan “Nasty Nate” Hamelberg. I’ve spun records for the better part of my life but I come more from a hip hop background.
How did you come up with the idea for the club?
House music and techno, along with club music in general, have such a long history in Sweden. That unintentionally causes a kind of Emperor’s New Clothes effect if promoters and DJs want to forever revel in a faux “shock of the new” hype.
We wanted a platform to celebrate this form of music in all its variety and depth whilst having fun. (Sadly defunct) Stockholm record shops like Vinyl Mania sold (Chicago House) imprints like Jesse Saunders’ Jes-Say Records back in 1985; the average clubber in Stockholm was born after house and techno got played out, so it’s about time it gets treated like a mature genre. Having said that, we’re far from a museum – in the daytime, I work as a web editor at the Swedish Museum of Architecture and Design, so I can assure you I know the difference.
It’s more that we’re just as excited about spinning a newly-discovered drum machine funk tune from 1982 as a contemporary house track. In all fairness, I should mention that Magnus pay his bills mostly from incomes earned from helping us compare the latest tech gadgets at Pricerunner…
Who do you imagine to be the typical audience?
Probably the slightly more picky music lover than the average clubber, but even more of a fun lover. All ages but a lot of stamina.
What are your plans for the future?
To begin with, to record more of our sessions! Seriously, a lot of the inspiration of DJing comes in the spur of the moment and can be really hard to recreate afterwards. The sound at Marie Laveau is new and improved, so now we feel it’s time to book both underrated DJs that rarely get to spin. But also to start playing as Belleville outside of Stockholm. Personally, other than playing solo, I think I’ve only played as a part of a club ten times outside of Stockholm at the most. Personally, I run a bastard hip hop club called Bring The Noise together with Bruce Leenus, but as he lives in Gothenburg, it’s a bit quirky to play more often but we’re looking for a monthly residency.
What do reckon are the typical trends for Stockholm at the moment?
Stockholm is at a crossroads; on a given weekend the trendy lot have plenty of choices of semi-legal clubs just outside of town. The only way for inner-city nightclubs and bars to take them on musically is to focus and develop some sort of identity and musical concept instead of all the haphazard personality/blogger-DJ bookings that cater only to the inbred clientele. I don’t go out as much as I used to, but some places have neglected music to the point where a random visit is approaching a kind of sonic Russian roulette.
There’s a Swedish trait that really must be fought – the inclination for consensus in all situations. In nightlife, it spells disaster, with the majority mortally afraid of taking culture seriously. Anyone not taking entertainment – music or dancing, or liquor for that matter, seriously is an idiot. It’s putting your own and your loved ones pleasure in the hands of charlatans. Besides the new season at Marie Laveau, I’ve got high hopes for Tjoget and Taverna Brillo. Hopefully they will take a step to remedy the slapstick elements of the Stockholm nightlife.
