Sound in the Garden 2026, Tag 2 // Space Afrika (DJ), Dopplereffekt (live)

From August 12–16, 2026, Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie will once again present the open-air concert series “Sound in the Garden,” featuring ambitious live concerts specially tailored to the venue and a multi-generational lineup that transcends genre boundaries. After four nights of live concerts, Sunday will be dedicated to special sound installations created in honor of Japanese artist Fujiko Nakaya, who is presenting a site-specific fog sculpture in the sculpture garden of the Neue Nationalgalerie.

Drawing inspiration from Afrofuturism as well as the cellular rhythms of biology and physics, Dopplereffekt’s icy, dystopian synth lines weave a hypnotic, high-concept universe of Blade Runner-esqueennui and energy. Elements of Detroit electro mutate into a calculated alien funk, strict drum machine patterns, and unsettling synthesizer melodies.

It’s a universe perfectly in tune with the rain-slick industrial textures and slowly shifting atmospheric collages of the Manchester/Berlin-based duo Space Afrika. Unspooling a special site-specific DJ set, their soot-stained melodies are built from muffled urban field recordings; operating like audio documentarians, deep dub basslines trap the ghosts of the city within dense layers of reverb and industrial static: soundtracks for walking alone through a decaying concrete necropolis.