JOHN ROBB & MARK REEDER - 50 Jahre Punk - Talk mit Gästen, Projektionen und Fotoausstellungen

Special Guests: Alexander Hacke, Malka Spigel, Colin Newman, Annette Benjamin, Pauline Murray, and others

John Robb and Mark Reeder talk with each other and their guests about 50 years of punk—when, where, and how they were swept up by the New Wave and its energy—sharing experiences and anecdotes, and above all, discussing just how formative those times of upheaval—not just musically—ultimately were for them and their lives. The event will feature rare visual displays (photos, posters, artifacts), as well as an on-tour photo exhibition with images by documentary photographer Sabine Schwabroh.

If the term “jack-of-all-trades” applies to anyone, it’s definitelyJOHN ROBB, the British musician who grew up in Blackpool and lives in Manchester. He says that punk rock saved his life and has titled his autobiography, due out in 2026, “Punk Rock Ruined My Life.” Robb is a bestselling author (“Punk Rock,” “The Stone Roses,” “Oasis,” “Madchester,” etc.), founder of the annual music and book festival “Louder Than Words” (Manchester), a journalist (The Guardian, Melody Maker, Sounds, The Independent…), a presenter, TV and radio talk show host, environmental activist, and musician (The Membranes, Goldblade). He was the first journalist to interview Nirvana, and is credited with coining the term “Britpop.”

MARK REEDER(The Frantic Elevators, Die Unbekannten, Shark Vegas), a musician born and raised in Manchester, DJ, remixer (New Order, Depeche Mode, John Foxx, Pet Shop Boys, Anne Clark, Blank & Jones, Die Toten Hosen), label founder & producer, filmmaker (“B-Movie, Lust & Sound in West Berlin,” 2015), and podcaster (“Grenzgänger,” ARD/RBB), has lived in Berlin since 1978. In the mid-1970s, Mark Reeder worked at the Virgin Records store in Manchester, where he got to know musicians from the city’s emerging punk scene, from Joy Division to the Buzzcocks and Magazine. Upon arriving in Berlin, Reeder became the representative for the label Factory Records and the band Joy Division. He organized the influential band’s performance at Berlin’s Kant Kino.

Born in 1947, documentary photographer and trained commercial artistSABINE SCHWABROH(Hamburg) is considered a leading punk photographer, particularly in Hamburg, Berlin, Düsseldorf, Hanover, and Frankfurt, as well as in England and Switzerland. As early as the beginning of 1977, she was photographing the early concerts of English bands (The Vibrators, The Clash, Ian Dury & The Blockheads, The Slits, Johnny Moped, Ultravox, Wayne County…) and, shortly thereafter, the first bands of the emerging German and Swiss scenes, such as Male, S.Y.P.H., Hans-a-Plast, Kleenex, TNT, ZK, Salinos, D.A.F., Mittagspause (Charly’s Girls, Fehlfarben), Materialschlacht, Mania D. (Malaria), KFC, Fehlfarben, Big Muff (Abwärts), Razors, Buttocks, etc.