Day two of Distortion crosses the bridge from center city Copenhagen to the Nørrebro neighborhood. Superhang Julianne and I sweep away the first night’s brain confetti and navigate to Nørrebro through the eerily vacant early evening streets by following strains of dance music hovering in the air. Turning a bend onto the Peblingesø Canal, it becomes apparent the festival activity hasn’t crossed the Dronning Louises bridge, it’s consumed the bridge. One of Copenhagen’s busiest traffic points, Distortion has once again wielded it’s party en masse power over the city and scored a stunning setting for it’s second day soirée.
What festival is complete without a 30 foot public wall for drug inspired doodles and profanities? Stopping for some Jamaican grub and a stereo feed of cyborg reggae from the right and mutant techno from the left, we continue along a stretch of Nørrebrogade street past some unforgiving Bay Area hip hop, around the Klashy Tank (an actual war tank parked in the middle of the street) panda bear pile up (not actual bears), and eventually into a cement tile soccer field where it appears the entire cool teenage population of Copenhagen has assembled under the sun bleach to drink beer, smoke hash, and listen to dubstep. Do their parents know they listen to dubstep?!
The sun finally starts setting around 10 PM and we follow the zombie festival express to the Korsgadehallen venue (a gymnasium built into the side of a hill) where the Red Bull Music Academy has assembled a Tropical Bass Night. Red Bull was just recently legalized in Denmark causing “problems” as described by a party pedestrian and a new world of marketing opportunities as witnessed here. Beat junky J Rocc warms up a crowd slowly filling the gym floor under uncontrollable bright lights. Once the lights go down, the vibe is set for a tongue-in-freak DJ set by Madlib and a monster dub head charge by Kode9. Rattled to its core, my head is done for and no match for J Wow. I walk with the street sweepers and early sleepers (3:30 AM) back to the hotel.
