Last month, inside a repurposed parking structure in downtown Los Angeles, a 1,500-strong crowd erupted in euphoria as MCR-T dropped "My Barn My Rules," his hit with horsegiirL. Dancers at the queer party TUNNEL waved their fur-lined fans in the foggy air, as everyone on the dance floor––wearing everything from ball gags and chain-mail hoods to elbow-length silk gloves and camouflage trucker hats––sang the lyrics to the equestrian rave anthem like a choir: "I walk, I trot, I lope, I gallop." The song, which was released by the Berlin-based label Live From Earth in 2022, gained viral traction on TikTok in 2023 and has since aggregated more than 17 million plays on Spotify alone.

MCR-T was one of many Live From Earth affiliates on the lineup that night, following opening sets by TUNNEL founder Daniel Osahon (AKA OZA), River Moon and Toccorocco. Before MCR-T's face-melting closing set, which included live vocals, DJ Gigola evoked a similarly explosive response when she dropped a remix of Rune's Y2K banger "Calabria." Earlier that night, DBBD had brought out his and MCR-T's collaborator Miss Bashful as a surprise guest. In a pair of zebra-print rimmed sunglasses and boots with leopard fur (a hopefully intentional reference to Flo Rida's "Low"), she sang some of the "slut tech" songs that have quickly ushered her into the spotlight. At one point, she asked why no one was fucking on the dance floor.

"There's a wild party energy that I don't think I've ever seen in LA," local resident and nightlife aficionado Sap Majumdar told me. "I feel like I've been transported into Berlin."

That said, the fun-loving, anything-goes atmosphere at TUNNEL was significantly different to what comes to mind when thinking of a stereotypical techno party in Live From Earth's hometown. Remixes of "Smack That" and "Tokyo Drift (Fast and Furious)" would be considered heresy by millennial purists who view clubs like Berghain––with their ravers dressed in often eerily similar, all-black uniforms––as sanctified underground temples. But this inversion of expectations of what constitutes Berlin nightlife is precisely what Live From Earth set out to achieve.

The Live From Earth Agenda

Since launching in 2014, Live From Earth has evolved from a punk, left-wing YouTube channel into one of the most influential independent labels in electronic music. Defined by its anti-establishment and DIY ethos, it has long embraced principles that defied norms and challenged industry moulds. Now, its defining, once-contrarian characteristics––genre-fluidity, a pioneering, post-internet aesthetic and a shared commitment to levity and humor––has set trends within the broader landscape of dance music. Live From Earth has both shaped and infected the contemporary zeitgeist in club culture.

Artists on the roster like DJ Gigola, MCR-T, Brutalismus 3000, horsegiirL, ascendent vierge and MRD have emerged as some of the most memorable breakthrough acts in recent years, proving themselves to be the harbingers and ambassadors of a global, generational vibe (and tempo) shift in nightlife. Despite its worldwide resonance, Live From Earth embodies the mythos of its pre-gentrified hometown: a "do it now, ask questions later sort of attitude," in the words of MCR-T, that prioritises artistic freedom and risk-taking over profit-driven motives and pandering to the mass market.

Like many great thrillers in popular culture, Live From Earth's story begins with the meeting of strangers on a train. Lorenz Wirth, Max Rüting and Elias Hermann first crossed paths in 2009. Five years later, they would all leave their respective jobs—Wirth working for a film company, Rüting a reporter for a mainstream news outlet and Hermann completing a carpentry apprenticeship—to start the label.

What sparked that initial conversation between the three of you?

Lorenz Wirth: I was smoking a cigarette on the train while on my way back to Berlin from an anti-Nazi demonstration in Dresden. At the time I was living in a punk squat and was very involved in the left-wing movement and scene in Berlin––so this was a very typical Sunday for me! On the train, the police came looking for the person who was smoking. I hid beneath the chairs where Max and Elias were sitting––they were also on their way back from the demo. From the day we met, we knew we were all similar in that we didn't want to sit around and smoke weed all day long. We all wanted to do something, whether it was filming what was happening at demonstrations or throwing illegal raves. We did this outside in parks or in abandoned factories, bunkers or basements––there were plenty of places in Berlin at that time that aren't here anymore. One time we played music on the street for people in prison in Moabit. We used to make portable sound systems by drilling holes into stolen trash cans. We would put amplifiers inside and power them with car batteries.

And this eventually evolved into the creation of a YouTube channel with the name "Live From Earth"?

Lorenz Wirth: We wanted to create a news channel that showed what was really going on at demonstrations from a left-wing perspective. We took GoPros and a Canon and went to demos and documented everything. It was exciting for us because we had a mission, but we quickly learned that what we were doing wasn't respected or wanted, from either side. The autonomous left said we were exposing strategies and crimes––even though we blurred the faces, hands and shoes of everyone we filmed.

Didn't the videos perform quite well online? My understanding is that you built a loyal fanbase from the get-go.

Lorenz Wirth: Oh yeah, of course. It was new to see things like this in Germany at the time, especially on YouTube. In shooting and editing the videos, Max somehow created this new, punky style, which was the aesthetic that we became known for. Eventually, we were approached by rap musicians who wanted us to shoot their music videos. We were already confident breaking into subway stations at night and playing loud music everywhere, and we had lots of footage from demos and riots that we were able to incorporate. We were kind of fearless and I think this attitude was transported into the way we filmed and produced. It allowed us to make music videos without any budget that felt authentic.

How did you jump from making music videos to releasing music?

Lorenz Wirth: The artists we were working with wanted us to be more than just their music video platform; they asked us to also be their management, label and publishing company. We didn't have a clue how to do any of that, but we knew we wanted to work with those artists––so we did what we always did and said "yes," and figured out how to do it ourselves. We tried to find people to consult us, but they could only advise us on the old way of doing things. This wasn't helpful at all because we refused to do something simply because that's the way it has always been done. We were successful with the videos because we were doing something that no one had done before. We knew we had to do the same thing in the music industry.

From the Cloud to the Klub

While Live From Earth's early videos for MC Bomber, Shacke One, LGoony and Crack Ignaz gained decent traction online, it was the long-term collaboration with Austrian rapper Yung Hurn that proved hugely consequential. After the music video for "Nein" went viral, Live From Earth's platform expanded rapidly as Yung Hurn's career soared. Upon his request, Live From Earth began releasing his music in 2015, and in the following years, released records by other German-speaking rappers, like RIN and Caramelo. In the process, Live From Earth expanded its cult following and established itself as a formidable presence in a growing niche.

Behind the scenes, Live From Earth maintained its multidisciplinary interests by continuing to throw parties and events and by expanding its in-house line of merch and apparel. In 2014, 2016 and 2017 respectively, new artists like Jacob Bauerfeind, DJ Gigola and MCR-T joined the collective and helped evolve its internal culture, outlook and ambitions. In 2018, together with the founders, they helped establish the sub-label Live From Earth Klub, which would focus less on rap and more on cross-genre dance music.

Design: Tim Lindacher, Johannes Schreiner and Annika Bohn

MCR-T: Live From Earth has been in my life since 2014, firstly as a fan of the earlier rap artists they worked with like MC Bomber and Yung Hurn. They were some of the first artists to do humoristic, art house cloud rap, and their sound also helped shape the look of Live From Earth. No other label at the time had this aesthetic––everything looked very fashion-y but also new and cutting edge. They were able to package it all together in a way that didn't take itself too seriously but also maintained a semi-political and socially justifiable narrative. In the process, Live From Earth helped birth a lot of the German tastemakers who would go on to switch labels and start their own things. When I started making music in 2015, I couldn't imagine releasing it anywhere else.

DJ Gigola: I was brought into the collective to help grow the fashion and merch side of things, but was eventually invited to DJ at their parties. I wasn't interested in playing techno or hip-hop at these events; I wanted to challenge the space in between. I also have a huge thing for trance and Love Parade tracks, and mixing all of these together felt fresh and provocative—not to me, but that's how it was perceived at the time. Even though it was never my intention to be a DJ, I quickly received bookings and grew into this DJ Gigola persona. But because, in the beginning, we didn't have any money and always had the mentality of saying "yes," everyone in the collective ended up working in several different positions.

Tim Lindacher: I've been working with Live From Earth since 2017. I started making graphics for Yung Hurn before I was asked to join the team in Berlin full-time. My role has changed over the years but right now, as art director, my job is to secure the visual language of the collective, together with Yosh (Johannes Schreiner) and Annika Bohn. Live From Earth's approach—and aesthetic—has always been anti-establishment and contradictory to whatever was popular at the time. We used to make fun of this full-on techno scene with everybody dressed in all black. We've always wanted to break that mould. You can hear the Live From Earth spirit perfectly in DJ Gigola's music––mixing amazing and stupid Gigi D'Agostino tracks with hard techno beats was pretty much unheard of at that time. We hope to achieve the same things with the graphics. We want them to be colourful and playful, but also meticulous and well-crafted.

MCR-T: Initially, Live From Earth was a rap-focused label but around 2018 we had a change of heart. Many of us felt rap wasn't totally representative of our moral compass, so we decided to focus on our shared background in electronic music and started revamping things into Live From Earth Klub.

Jacob Bauernfiend: I started working with Live From Earth as a DJ back in its earliest years, but now I do artist management and events. I remember having a eureka moment in 2018 when DJ Gigola played a Eurodance set at Humboldthain. The whole room was on fire. I thought to myself: why aren't more people doing this? When we started Live From Earth Klub, we all sensed that this was the new direction that music was going in. Our ideas definitely fell on fertile ground! We realise now that people not only wanted but needed a space where good music didn't have to be so serious.

RA Exchange · EX.705 horsegiirL

Changing of the Guard

In many ways, the artists affiliated with Live From Earth Klub epitomise the new values and trends that have defined post-pandemic nightlife. Although they're diverse in their sound, artists like DJ Gigola and MCR-T, alongside newer acts on the roster like Brutalismus 3000, ascendent vierge, MRD and horsegiirL, are linked in their fusion of hard, fast techno with influences from extraneous genres like hip-hop, new wave and pop with catchy, witty lyrics. Armed with Live From Earth's deep understanding of internet culture and its 360-degree multimedia and world-building approach to music, this hoard of "new-school" artists was perfectly situated to resonate with Gen Z and shine in a musical landscape shaped by algorithms and catalysed by virality.

DJ Gigola: For many old heads who came of age before the explosion of social media, conforming to a certain sound or style was important to find your peer group. Gen Z grew up in a multimedia world and has access to everything, everywhere, all the time. They are genre-fluid by default. Live From Earth represents that reality and caters to the feeling of fluidity that's created by being online all the time––that's why we share that proximity.

MRD: After the pandemic, a new generation came into the scene––the Spotify generation, who listen to Drake and gabber and who want to play a blend of everything. As a label, Live From Earth has a free, open mind and is always curious to work with new producers. Last year, for example, I started listening to a lot of blink-182 and thought it would be cool to blend that with trance. I showed it to people at Live From Earth and we're now building an EP around it. I love that you can't put Live From Earth into any kind of box.

The Live From Earth Agenda

From the Cloud to the Klub

Changing of the Guard

Behind the Scenes

The Revenge Arc