Fr. Nov. 22 | 00:11
22.11. | 00:11
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3°C 
"Thank you! you were great! Great Show, good music!" Otto Jankovich, head of Events at MuTh
You dance love, and you dance joy, and you dance dreams (Gene Kelly)
DJ is Eugene’s favourite role, but not his main job. His style is a London mix of film soundtracks, funk, jazz, soul, disco and feel-good grooves, a playful, freewheeling collection of party tunes, that has led him to play at Ost Klub, Arena, Elektro Gönner, Fluc, Alte Post, Alte WU, Donaukanal, Rathausplatz, Club U, Lusthaus, Brunnenpassage on Yppenplatz, Urania, on the beach at Eisenbahnerbad, outside WU, Alte WU, Dominik Nostitz's Laden on Piaristengasse, at Oliver Hangl's SilentDisco on Wientalterrasse & Blumenwohnstrasse Markgraf-Rüdiger-Strasse, MuTh Concerthouse, lakeside in Aspern, Meidlingermarkt, Funkhaus, Anaconda, RoterGürtelBogen, Brotfabrik-Expedithalle, Urban Future after-party in Messe, Hotels…-Kempinski, -magdas and -Ruby Marie, Schraubenfabrik, Casino Baumgarten, Vienna Design Week, Streetlife Festival on The Ring, on UK radio station LSR, plus so many house parties, weddings, pools, parks and gallery launches. Ideally open air. He has spun records alongside Kristian Davidek, John Megill, Jeschka Oszilat and other players on the Wiener scene.
So the message is, if you are organising an event or party, and want the music to be curated creatively, with personality, joy and freedom, give Eugene a call, and he will deliver clever music to back up your concept. And remember, dancing is global and we should explore all kinds of worldwide styles!
#playersGonnaPlay
Recent experiments have included:
- To make the After-show party at Urban Future Global conference into something special, Eugene asked delegates for a song about their home town. And once he played it, waited 30 seconds before typing on a big screen the name of the city. Those present tried to guess the origins of the tunes they heard, before it was announced. It made the event more interactive and colourful, and allowed all present to actually represent their home city. The event included music from 35 different countries, and cities as diverse as Shanghai, Oslo, Bamako and Medellin. This concept was adapted for the opening of Urbanize! in Alte WU.
- Why not mix up the music of different communities who live around Vienna? We bring grey public spaces alive, & give a Grätzl something to talk about. For Music Safari, dj Eugene plays open air, in daytime, with music reflecting all the people who live nearby. After visiting a local school for research, he entertains a neighbourhood with Turkish, Bosnian, Chechen, Roma, African, Bollywood & Austrian tunes. Anyone can ask for a special song they’d like to hear. Residents start to dance, & are surprised to hear ‘their’ music played by a Brit, & alongside other styles. It allows local children to lead the dancing, showing each other the right steps & moves. It helps validate their culture, & shows that those tunes don’t just belong at private house parties or weddings, but also out on the streets of Wien. In UK, lots of music from ethnic-minority groups feeds into mainstream pop music (M.I.A.-Sri Lanka, UB40-Jamaica, Sade-Nigeria, Ed Sheeran-Ireland), but that rarely happens here. We see from Heinz Fassmann's Schulschlusskonzert 2021 how out of touch educational leaders are with the songs children want to listen to (DJ Ötzi, Tina Naderer, etc). Safari is a lovely Swahili word meaning journey. Oe1 chose our project as one of their Reparatur der Zukunft concepts. Andre Heller's progressive political group ACT.NOW made a promotional film about the concept, narrated by fellow Brit dj Stuart Freeman (FM4):
Here is a short film about the early days of the project, in 2012, in Meidling:
- The Baustellenfest at magdas Hotel (before the building had electricity), where dj Eugene played music from all the countries whose residents had recently arrived in Vienna as refugees.
- At the Feature Night party series in Elektro Goenner, the boys from nameit positive media played songs and audio on a theme each month, for example ecology, Autumn or 1970s films.
- With dj storytelling, Eugene takes the dancers and party people on a journey of discovery, mixing styles and ideas, keeping the music visible all night, sometimes eccentric and always full of Felliniesque drama.
- For the opening of #kommraus - Forum Öffentlicher Raum on Vienna public space, Eugene plays only music from or about Vienna. The soundtrack to the city. In funky and experimental Brunnenpassage, from 21-23:00 on 16 May 2019, and free.
- For Roland and Duy's wedding, in a Waldviertel castle, Eugene mixed up music from the 2 boys' backgrounds (Roli is Viennese, and Duy Vietnamese). This was Euge's first gay wedding as dj, and definitely his most spectacular.
- At Whoosh colleague (& professional musician) Dominik's 50th birthday, Eugene chose a song from each year since 1973, and played them in order, to build a relevant musical biography of passing time.
- To mark Brexit Night (Fri 31 January 2020), Eugene played the best of Brit music - from The xx to Radiohead, Led Zeppelin to The Streets and Kate Bush, in a pub next to Hundertwasserhaus, to recognise this sad day of UK disengagement from 47 years of EU integration. Every time somebody started to dance, Eugene asked them to sit down, since this was no kind of celebration. The event was reported on by ZiB2, APA, Oe1 Leporello, Radio Orange, Puls4, FM4 morningshow, MeinBezirk, etc.
- At Streetlife Festival, where Babenbergerstrasse in central Vienna is closed to traffic and opened up to people, Eugene has for seven years played a soundtrack of walking songs to mark European Mobility Week. There are hundreds of tunes on this theme, since walking is a metaphor for courage and independence: You'll never walk alone, Walk on the Wild Side, Radetzky Marsch, Walk on By, Walking on the Moon, Ramble On (Led Zeppelin, Euge's favourite).
- ACT.NOW conference wanted a spectacular event to show how we can overcome divisions & the new populist hate-speak online, so Eugene chose songs from cities all along the refugee route of 2015, from Karachi to Stockholm, and every single person danced there.
- Nightlife is under enormous pressure in 2022, not just from Corona and changing lifestyles of young people (see the notes to our Midnight Tour for more details on the new night-time economy), but also because residents complain much more now about noisy clubs nearby. So there is no better solution than a silent disco in public space. Silent Discos - organised in Wien by Oliver Hangl of Guerilla Walks fame (the boy is a legend!) - work through 200 headphones, with a choice of two different DJs on 2 channels. Eugene was invited to play on the spectacular Wientalterrasse (1050) and also on Meidlinger Markt and the Blumenwohnstrasse Markgraf-Rüdiger-Strasse (1150). At a time of reduced work for DJs, with all clubs closed for Corona, Eugene was honoured to be one of those selected to play and get paid at these free events. And there is a certain theatre in having competition to see which DJ is more popular (you can tell from the dancing who is listening to which DJ). It always seems be a hot night for these parties. A silent disco is somehow a very Vienna concept. The dancers look crazy to passersby, but we just don't care.
- 100 Songs to Save the Planet, up on the roof of Urania, at the Bildung fuer nachhaltige Entwicklung, sponsored by UNESCO, at their Auszeichnung Fest in Nov 2021.
- Eugene has made a series of School Proms and Maturabaelle more colourful by playing, alongside all the usual party tunes, songs reflecting the migrant kids who live in Wien. This is about representation and surprises, but also varied dance styles and new flavours.
Trying something new every time - that’s why it’s called dj storytelling. So what is that? It’s a flexible concept which means the music is not in the background, but something people can talk about all night, including ideas and diversity, but always involving the crucial element: funky beats to jump around to. Cinematic colours and booty-shaking slammers. And to reflect more worldwide sounds, which keep people thinking and exploring and surprised.
For those sceptical of the political or transformative power of music and dancing, remember how clubs are one of the great levellers, where a wide mix of people come together to party. Disco music was a revolutionary force, providing a colourful new platform for gay people, black people and women to be centre-stage. Please read this article to learn more.
There are too many cliché dj’s in Wien, playing the same abstract electronica, with few beats, no rhythm and often no dancing at all. For Eugene, this approach is all wrong - dance music is called that for a reason. It is spectacular when a dancefloor erupts in collective sexy joy. But in Wien the scene is more about sitting around drinking beer, smoking and chatting, rather than self-expression out on the floor.
Is the city too white, too straight and too intellectual? No! The dj is playing the wrong songs. To dj should never lead to cliches – music has always been about the next big idea, and innovation. Instead we get bland gallery music with no words or ideas. If a song is completely unfamiliar to the audience, it’s less likely to move them.
Disc Jockey culture was born in 1950s black America and Jamaica. Being MC was always about pushing things forward. And wild parties. Neither of which is easy to find in Vienna. The ethnic clubs in Vienna provide much more dancing than the local scene ever does.
Eugene finds that cool is over-rated, and what matters more is joy and passion. He mixes up 70s soul grooves with Led Zeppelin, Moroccan mountain music and Irish jigs. Anything to keep the crowd dancing.
A simple story illustrates so much about what is wrong with the dance scene here. Eugene tells of a friend who was at a ‘cool’ party, and asked the dj for a song she wanted to dance to. The DJane expressed astonishment and said: 'Bin ich YouTube?' (Am I YouTube?). And you understand from this reaction that A) Vienna dj's are less interested in how the crowd react to their songs. B) Since nobody was dancing, that her promise to dance to the song meant nothing. Dancing is often irrelevant to Vienna dj’s. Maybe even irritating. Many are performers in an art scene, and certainly not there to please the public. Or cause people to dance. One dj friend of Eugene described playing song requests at a wedding as prostituting herself!
Dancing is like a carnival, freeing you from what you normally are; dancing together creates harmonies between people with different tastes. Dancing is non-verbal communication, and opens up dialogue between people who share no words. This is illustrated at the beautiful Caritas Wien project Brunnenpassage, where new immigrants mix up with long-time residents to share culture and rituals through dance. Dancing is self-expression, identity, sex, joy, group connectivity, wildness, freedom, cool, creativity, release, art. Join us soon.
Contact: eugene@whoosh.wien or call 0680 1254354
& in Summer 25
-Open Lilie in the Innere Stadt 10/2
-Magdas Hotel 10th Birthday on St Valentine 14/2
-St Patrick's Day parade of Irish Wien, 17/3
-Beatles Wien tour with loud songs in Rudolfsheim Fünfhaus 10/5
-Swiss pop on Song Contest Day 10/5
-opening of Alternative Economic & Monetary Systems summer school in BoKu, with protest and political songs 14/7
-Opening fest of 1. Österreichische Fussverkehrsgipfel, playing all those walking songs 23/9
-Christmas for Atheists 20/12
-Winter Songs for Wien Museum Pub Quiz #3 - not sentimental, but melancholy
-On the anniversary of Russian Revolution, on our Soviet Echoes in Wien Tour, we hear Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev & of course Skibidi.10/11
-Silly Walks for Ministry of Climate Protection - 20 Walking Songs incl Walk on the Wild Side. 26/10
-Wien Museum - 18 songs about Vienna food & Drink. 22.10
-Wien Museum Pub Quiz #1 Democracy - 18 Songs about activism, campaigning, freedom, feminism, black rights, democracy. 24.09 (3 days before Austrian elections). 24/09
-Swedish Wien for SongContest remix in Walking Week, with loud Swedish POP all over the City 27/7
-Winerlieder from 1923, for Wiener Bauhaus Tour, as part of Walking Week, 24/7
-BOKU Kinderweg zu den Schule Kampagne, mit laute lieder zum Thema, auf Deutsch, 17/6
-Euro Football Strandbar Herrmann Soundtrack, where we play the music of the 2 countries playing, to build atmosphere before each game. 14/6-14/7
-EU made our City, at European Elections on 8 June. 3 Euro Anthems: Beethoven, Handel & Charpentier, 29/5
-Swedish Wien Tour for Eurovision (It will be LOUD!), 11/5
-Open Lilie, 1010, 17/4
-Klima Biennale opening fest - 100 songs to save the world, 5/4
-St Patrick's Day Loud Parade, with progressive irish beats from Alsergrund to Innenstadt. 17/3
Parties with Euge in Summer 2023
-Dominik Nostitz 50 Birthday!, 17/11
-Urbanize! Festival opening party, Alte WU, 3/10
-Ana & Roman wedding 24/06
-Stuttgart Urban Future afterparty 22/6
-Falco Tour, 12/6
-Songs about Energy for the Energy Cities Forum, Heerlen, NL 21/04/23
-Artist Kathi Fink 40th Birthday Fest, Neubaugürtel15., 7/4
-BRG Zirkusgasse Maturaball, Casino Baumgarten, 18/3
-Flower Power Fest, Munich 22/2, 30/5 (block party!), etc
-CEU Intercultural Fest in Brotfabrik, 28/1
-Open Lilie creative networking Fest, 26/1
2022
-10 years of MuTh celebration
-Open Lilie for DNA RockStars, Liliengasse. 7 Oct
-magdas Hotel Closing Fest. 31 August
-School Prom GRG Karajangasse. MuTh, 15/6 00:30-03:00
-Urban Future Sweden. Worldwide songs from cities attending the event, in a bar. 4/06 1-4am
-Hasret 32nd Birthday Fest, Kosmos Bar, Meidling. 14 May
-GRG Zirkusg. Prom party 26/03
Parties with dj Eugene in Summer 2021
- 40 years since Falco's first single, Ganz Wien, with plenty of loud music on the tour, 1 Aug
- Garden Party to welcome the new Chefin of Fundraising.at, Döbling, 20 August
- Brit soundtrack for 1 hour before Eugene's presentation at Tandlermarkt, 31 Aug
- Walking Songs, for Sonnwend Mobility Fest, Bloch-Bauer-Promenade, 1100, 11:30-12:30, 26 Sep.
- Party in the Park to welcome Central European University to Wien, Helmut Zilk Park, 1100, 11:30-13:45, 2 Oct.
- Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung (BNE) Auszeichnung 2021, Urania. 100 Songs to Save the Planet
Spring/Summer 2020:
