totally wired
This year, Le Guess Who? and U? team up to present totally wired. Built on shared knowledge and collective energy, this program celebrates DIY culture, the communities that shape it, and the connections forged across borders through local scenes, diasporas and intersections.
The program features a collective zine launch, a workshop, an exhibition, screenings, a market of local artists and distros, and a line-up connecting different shades of punk and bringing together exciting and loud voices.
totally wired is curated in collaboration with Antipode, a project that documents underground punk and DIY culture from SWANA and beyond; Girls to the Front, an Utrecht based initiative focused on the Dutch based FLINTA representation within the punk music industry; OCCII, an independent cultural center in Amsterdam that celebrates underground music; and ZALZALA, a DIY collective that celebrates underground hardcore and punk music from SWANA.
The lineup includes BeaBop, an Amsterdam based project that brings together ideas from noise, jazz, punk, improvisation, dissociation, hunger and whimsy; four-piece terror squad BOMBSTRAP, hailing from Manchester and Rotterdam, which brings nihilistic hardcore rooted in black alchemy and ultra violence; Gimic, an urgent and restless four-piece band who live and breath DIY punk; rapper, producer and multi-instrumentalist Emirhan X, who constantly explores and pushes the boundaries of hip-hop; and Bristol based underground hardcore band Sarsour صرصور—the Arabic word for cockroach—delivering raw, politically charged music self-described as "Habibi Hardcore".
Also performing are Snake Eater مارخور, with the sound of the screw horns of war against colonialism worldwide, blending hardcore punk, grind core and metal into an unrelenting sonic maelstrom; five-piece band Sublux, who drive by the marginalized identities and where they intersect; all-female conceptual punk band The Earwurms, who explore how being a woman affects their lives and how to deal with the confusion that comes along with it; The Woman, who, with a distinct mix of alternative and experimental music, gritty poetry and visual art, creates an immersive performance that is punk in attitude, open in emotion and radical in honesty; and Berlin based ZANJEER زنجیر, setting audiences ablaze with their blistering hardcore assault, through which they give voice to the frustration, anger and hatred stemming from systematic and ongoing oppression.