Niches · 12 picks · Wed to Sun
Queer parties, drag, LGBTQ+ artists and safer dancefloors.
Queer nights and the artists who built them, plus gigs, museum shows and sessions on safer dancefloors. We include a night only when its listing or the artists' own published bios say so. We never guess.
By Songpot desk · from the ADE programme, our venue guide and artist notes
We include a night when its listing says so or the acts' own published bios do; we never guess.
Noise, ambient R&B and a giant spring reverb, in a concert hall.
The live premiere of Crawler's 'Your Death Is a Lullaby' at Muziekgebouw: Nkisi's rhythmic noise and ritual pressure, an Unsound-commissioned quartet's hazy ambient R&B, and Coil's foyer performance with a spring reverb moved through the room. Challenging, in the best way.
For fans of Klein, Dean Blunt
Queer sounds from Philadelphia, pressed to vinyl.
The No One label launches a record of queer sounds from Philadelphia by Kevin JZ Prodigy, DJ Delish and Precolumbian, with Amsterdam artists alongside, at club RAUM.
A DJ in a church that was built to stay hidden.
Slimfit usually plays hard and all over the map: emotional techno, bubbling, post-club. Up in the museum's attic church it becomes a hybrid live set, one of three this week in the clandestine church of Our Lord in the Attic.
For fans of Bashkka
A queer underground night at PRIK, trance in its blood.
UNHOLY brings Mexico's queer club underground to PRIK and calls itself music, identity and community without the need for definition: GIGGYDEVY's rolling kicks and bright trance leads, Infame sliding from minimal tech into acid, and Martin Campos' peak-time techno, in a small pink cocktail bar.
For fans of Miss Monique, Cloonee
Wynnie Mynerva's Sidario: blood, a shroud and HIV history.
The Peruvian artist's ritual performance draws on Pedro Lemebel's writing about gay and trans lives during the AIDS crisis, at ROZENSTRAAT's performance space. Not a club night; a serious piece.
Slimfit in the attic church, second night.
A hybrid live set from the Amsterdam artist, remixing classical elements with live electronics in the museum's clandestine church. Small room, three nights only.
For fans of Bashkka
Eris Drew and Octo Octa, back where they lit up Bajes last year.
The partners behind T4T LUV NRG play ecstatic, vinyl-led house and breakbeat with real turntable feel, joined by Boston's Mx. blaire. Intercell says last year's set is still hard to put into words.
For fans of Honey Dijon, Shanti Celeste
Slimfit's last night in the attic church.
The third of Slimfit's hybrid live sets in Our Lord in the Attic: emotional techno and post-club sounds meet classical fragments under the church's old galleries.
For fans of Bashkka
RARA AVIS, Amsterdam's queer night, at full speed.
Fast, playful and vocal-heavy: Spikey Lee's rolling techno and cheeky booty cuts, DJ SEXSTASY's groove-led Brazilian techno and TEKNA's genre-hopping, high-BPM sets, across the floors of Club NYX, a former 18th-century carriage house.
For fans of VTSS
A Sunday dance for the 50+ LGBTQ+ community.
Pink Dance's monthly afternoon of ballroom, Latin and freestyle dancing, open to friends too. Warm, social and nothing like a club.
A house night built as a safe harbour.
SANCTUARY is an inclusive house night at BEARS, with Sainte Francis' old-school New York house and disco, Midnight Society's story-led melodic house and Sagia's progressive lift. Come as you are.
For fans of Kerri Chandler, Danny Tenaglia
Intercell closes ADE across a whole former prison.
For the first time Intercell runs several connected rooms inside Bajes at once: BASHKKA's tough, flirty house and techno with ballroom edits, Chloé Caillet's house and disco from her SMIILE parties, and D Stone's live-instrument house. The week's last big night.
For fans of Honey Dijon, Peggy Gou
Times, lineups and tickets are on each event's ADE programme page. Songpot is independent of the festival.