Luca Eck: The Underground Is Moving Too Fast

Berlin has spent decades turning the underground into part of its mythology. Luca Eck has watched that mythology accelerate into something more complicated: intimate queer scenes becoming industries, aesthetics travelling faster than the communities that created them, and the people responsible for what comes next increasingly struggling to afford the rooms where it begins. The underground still regenerates. It just has less time to belong to itself.

Born and raised in Berlin, Eck has watched scenes emerge from smaller, interconnected spaces that accumulate visibility and eventually become something much larger than the people who established their original codes. Commercialisation itself is not new. The acceleration is.

"I think that scenes go through cycles and I have not been a part of the scene I first encountered, which was mainly focused around harder techno subgenres, for a long time. What was once driven by intimate queer community parties has been turned into a multimillion dollar industry with straight cis men at its forefront. However, the experimental queer music scene I am now a part of really reminds me of that early day spirit. I enjoy being a part of the next thing, ahead of the curve.

"Some scenes may stay niche and maintain that community feeling for a long time but others will inevitably become part of a very commercial mainstream and stripped of its core. It's the lifecycle of subculture. The only thing that has fundamentally changed in my experience is the speed at which we move through this lifecycle which has drastically accelerated."

The people who establish those scenes are also facing a more immediate problem: remaining financially able to participate in them.

"I think those who shape a scene the most are being priced out of their own communities. Who can afford to show up to the function every weekend if entry is 25€? Don't get me wrong, I think parties are fairly priced given that promoters rarely make any profit these days due to the rising costs of putting on events. But when I started going out, entrance to the club was 12€, 15€ at most. At that time, it offered way greater accessibility and a sense of freedom.

"I think my optimism comes from all the amazing grassroots collectives who put their all into keeping culture alive. Shoutout to Bleach Berlin, [8], hoe_mies and countless others!"

That grassroots layer complicates the familiar argument that Berlin's queer nightlife has simply lost what it once was. Eck sees something more uneven. Commercial nightlife may absorb queer aesthetics while stripping away their context, but beyond that surface they find a scene that has become broader.

"I think while there is always room for improvement when it comes to representation and diversity, the spectrum of queer nightlife in Berlin feels broader and richer than ever. Historically, I would say that European gay cis men were definitely overrepresented in the scene but now I believe there is a plethora of great FLINTA parties from queer subcultures from across the globe. If you look away from the mainstream commercial side that strips queer culture down to a marketing aesthetic, the actual grassroots reflection is more dynamic than ever."

Protecting that diversity requires more than visibility. For Eck, the relevant question is whether the structures underneath queer nightlife are secure enough to survive beyond individual bookings and seasonal campaigns.

"Genuine investment means structural security, not just tokenistic visibility or a single booking during Pride season. It looks like direct public funding, subventions, and real estate protection for independent, queer-led venues so organizers aren't forced to choose between paying fair artist fees and charging crazy entry prices. It means funding long-term residencies and giving resources directly to grassroots collectives who do the heavy lifting of scene-building."

Eck is also approaching nightlife infrastructure from another direction. They are is currently developing an event discovery and ticketing platform intended to reduce financial pressure while placing curation back in the hands of the communities using it.

"We're trying to come up with alternative ways to fund a culture that maintains financial accessibility and is more curated, spotlighting different niches. I think there are very few community-owned, grassroots digital platforms that originated from the same people that they are meant to serve. But there is a lot of power in building your own tools and tailoring them to your needs rather than optimising for capital extraction and it allows us to e.g. offer free software and a non-profit ticketing model to our partners."

The way people discover nightlife is part of the same equation. Rather than allowing visibility to reproduce itself through recommendation systems, Eck favours deliberate human selection.

"We pride ourselves on curating our events manually instead of using algorithms and oversaturating the platform. If you lower the financial burden, people are far more open to discover new events. Our platform has become the first place where those who are interested in communities beyond the mainstream look to hear about new events."

There is a similar resistance to fixed categories in their music. Eck spent ten years playing double bass in a classical orchestra before their experiences with Eurodance and Berlin nightlife began colliding with that foundation. The music they are making now pushes those contrasts further rather than resolving them.

"My sound is moving even further into a completely fluid space that refuses to choose a single lane. Having grown up playing double bass in a classical orchestra for ten years, and then getting heavily exposed to both early 2000s euro-dance and the harsh realities of sneaking into Berlin clubs at 15, I've always wanted to merge those worlds.

"Right now, what feels different is how aggressively I'm contrasting those elements. I've actively rejected the 'clean' approach to sound design; I want everything to feel dirty, distorted, and harsh, but paired directly with unapologetic pop sensibilities, catchy melodies, and vocals."

That freedom has sometimes proved easier to exercise away from Berlin. Moving through queer scenes internationally, particularly during a recent US tour, challenged the assumption that the city's history necessarily makes its dancefloors the most exploratory.

"What I've noticed is that while Europe, and Berlin specifically, likes to pride itself on being the 'real deal' when it comes to club culture, that legacy can actually create a lot of rigidity. People here can take themselves incredibly seriously. In an environment with hyped, scene-y parties, you see crowds just standing around, scanning outfits, and expecting a very specific, narrow selection of genres.

"Moving between cities, especially during my recent US tour, I found a completely different, exploratory energy. The crowds felt far less pretentious and way more open to a hybrid, crossover sound i.e. I can mix a trap track into electroclash and then slam it into hardstyle, and the crowd is genuinely excited by it."

But faster circulation between scenes also raises questions about who benefits when local sounds become global material. For Eck, cultural exchange has to involve more than access.

"It's not about stripping local sounds to make them globally palatable; it's about real collaboration. If you're a white European artist, you shouldn't be building an entire career and making profits off of Brazilian Funk MC Splice loops you dragged and dropped from the internet. For me, the line between global exchange and cultural appropriation comes down to direct benefit: are you actually co-creating with local artists who share in the credit and financial profit, or are you just sampling uncompensated labor?"

These tensions return Eck to the question underneath their view of Berlin. A scene can travel, expand and change. What matters is whether the communities responsible for generating culture remain able to participate in what it becomes.

Their upcoming releases bring that question back to their own practice, where refusing a single lane now means exposing more rather than simply combining more.

"I think my upcoming music will be my most mature and comprehensive yet. I want to leave my comfort zone and challenge myself to really be vulnerable and hone in on the most unique aspects of my sound. I want to be frank but also continue to lean into my playful side."