Progress Bar double feature on Friday and Saturday night
Progress Bar curates two special nights of music for Sonic Acts Academy 2018. Established as a club night that is less suggestive and more explicit and demanding in its politics, each event aims to connect socially and politically engaged art with an audience who can help affect change. For the Academy’s double feature, the Friday night lineup sonically reflects on the politics of noise, alienation and discomfort, while Saturday’s programme resonates further with issues of collectivism and unity. In all, Progress Bar serves as a reminder that participation – in conversations as well as in physical space – is a necessary good.
Progress Bar aims to represent radical equality, communality and hopefulness. Now in its third season, it has become a growing community of artists, academics and activists who occupy clubs for a better politics. When confronted with the world today – institutional inequality, neofascism, platform capitalism, austerity and a dying planet – being happy becomes a political act. Supporting radical club cultures that believe resistance is necessary in order to change the world. Or, as a play on the famous quote by the feminist and anarchist activist Emma Goldman: If I can dance, I want to be part of your revolution.
As part of the Sonic Acts Academy opening evening on Friday 23 February, we join Progress Bar at Paradiso Noord, Tolhuistuin, for the Academy's first night programme – a lineup that reconsiders the potential of club space and promises little interest in comfort. With artists Wartone, Anni Nӧps, Geng, Violence, Dreamcrusher, Swan Meat, Moor Mother, M.E.S.H, Kilbourne and Born in Flamez, Progress Bar welcomes dancers to tread into a dark confrontation with noise, alienation and resistance.
On Saturday 24 February, we return to Paradiso Noord, Tolhuistuin, for a night that steps up the intensity on the dance floor. Featuring a selection of artists we feel represent the cultural abundance in our generation, a world where all sounds are created equal, from the streets of Lisbon to the parties of Sao Paulo, there’s a frantic energy with all of the artists performing – Juha, PARADISE, Lyzza, Linn de Quebrada, Dinamarca, Ase Manual, DJ Lycox, DJ Haram, and Drippin.
More information about both nights can be found via the Programme page.
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