Love Parade
Encyclopedia
The Love Parade was a popular electronic dance music
festival
and parade
that originated in 1989 in West Berlin
, Germany
. It was held in Germany annually between 1989 and 2003 in Berlin
, and then from 2006 to 2010 in the Ruhr
region. The 2004 and 2005 events in Berlin
and the 2009 event in Bochum
were cancelled.
On 24 July 2010, a crowd rush at the Love Parade
caused the death of 21 people, with at least 500 others injured. As a consequence of this, the organiser of the festival announced that no further Love Parades would be held and that the festival was permanently cancelled.
in 1989. It was started by the Berlin underground at the initiative of Matthias Roeingh (also known as "Dr Motte") and his then girlfriend Danielle de Picciotto
. It was conceived as a political demonstration for peace and international understanding through love and music. It was supposed to be a bigger birthday party for Roeingh, later "Dr Motte", and the motto Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen (in English — Peace, Joy, Pancakes) stood for disarmament
(peace), music (joy) and a fair food production/distribution (pancakes). Roeingh dissociated himself from the parade in 2006 because of the commercialization
of the event.
The parade was held on the Berlin Kurfürstendamm
(avenue) until 1996. Because of overcrowding on the Kurfürstendamm, the festival moved to the Straße des 17. Juni
in the Tiergarten
park in the center of Berlin. The festival became centered around the Siegessäule in the middle of the park; and the golden angel atop the column became the parade's emblem.
Many people from Germany and abroad traveled to Berlin to take part in the Parade — over a million attended in the years 1997 through 2000 and 800,000 in 2001. Attendance at the 2001 festival was significantly lower because the date of the parade was changed with little advance notice. 2002 and 2003 also saw lower figures, and in 2004 and 2005 the parade was cancelled because of funding difficulties and coordinated opposition from most of Germany's green parties. The parade had inspired opposition because of the damage to the Tiergarten by participants, who were provided with insufficient toilet facilities. Opponents allegedly complicated matters for organisers by booking their own events in Berlin and so to exclude the parade from being able to register with city police. In 2004, however, a scaled-down version took place which served more as a mini-protest and was promoted with the title Love Weekend. Dozens of clubs promoted the weekend-long event all over the city, with various clubs staying open for three days straight without closing. In 2006, the parade made a comeback with the help of German exercise studio McFit
.
The Love Parade 2007 was planned for 7 July 2007 in Berlin. However, the Berlin event was cancelled in February because the Senate of Berlin
did not issue the necessary permits at that time. After negotiations with several German cities, on 21 July, it was announced that the parade would move to the Ruhr Area
for the next five years. The first event took place in Essen
on 25 August. The parade in Essen saw 1.2 million visitors in comparison to the 500,000 who attended the 2006 parade in Berlin.
In 2008, the festival took place in Dortmund
on 19 July on the Bundesstraße 1
under the motto Highway of Love. The event was planned as a "Love Weekend", with parties throughout the region. For the first time the Turkish electronic scene was represented by its own float, called "Turkish Delights
". The official estimate is that 1.6 million visitors attended, making it the largest parade to date.
The 2009 event, planned for Bochum, was cancelled; a year later, the deaths of twenty-one attendees at the Duisburg venue prompted the parade's organiser Rainer Schaller to declare an end to the festival. "The Love Parade has always been a peaceful party, but it will forever be overshadowed by the accident, so out of respect for the victims the Love Parade will never take place again," Schaller said.
The parade was one of the oldest and largest festivals of electronic music, together with Zurich's Streetparade, Mayday and Nature One
.
— in this case mainly trance
, house
, techno, and schranz
music. Attempts to introduce other music styles, such as hip hop
, have failed. Hardcore and gabber music were part of the parade in early years, but were later removed. They are now celebrated separately on a counter-demonstration called "Fuckparade
".
The parade was seen to be louder and more crowded than most concerts. With its water-cooled sound systems on every truck, the parade produced an extremely loud sound floor. After the 2001 arrangement, veterinarian
s at the Berlin Zoo blamed the parade for giving more than half of its animals diarrhea
. Chairman Heiner Kloes said veterinarians told him the heavy bass was to blame for disturbing the animals. The parade consisted of the sound trucks that usually featured local, or important, clubs and their DJs. It had become a rule that only trucks that had sponsors from a techno-related field, such as clubs, labels or stores, were allowed, but advertising space was increased after the 2006 event to offset the high costs of equipping a truck. The trucks were usually open on top and feature dancers, with box-systems mounted on the side or rear.
The parade was a place where some exhibited and enjoyed other people's exhibitionist tendencies. Some attendees enjoyed carrying around toys such or other items such as dummies (pacifiers) or face masks. Often the crowd was imaginative in terms of clothing (or lack thereof) and appearance.
One famous picture from the parade is people sitting and dancing on streetlamps, trees, commercial signs, telephone booths, which gave the event's nickname "the greatest amateur circus on earth".
The finale of the demonstration is by the so-called "Abschlusskundgebung" which are half-hour sets of the world's leading top DJs such as DJ Tiesto, Paul Van Dyk
, Carl Cox
, Armin Van Buuren, DJ Rush, DJ Hell
, Westbam
, Drum Connection
, Miss Djax, Marusha
or Chris Liebing
. During this time all trucks (usually about 40) are connected to each other and set online to the statue of victory where the turntables
are. This is one of the few chances a DJ can ever have to play for a crowd of about one million people.
During the weekend of the parade many clubs held special events and parties and booked well-known DJs. Parties ranged from clubs with one hundred, mostly exclusive guests, to almost rave
s with several floors and ten thousand dancers. Many people used to come to Berlin only for the parties and miss the parade in order to sleep. Or they enjoyed it with other "ravers" in the park right next to the parade route.
crimes and most other incidents feature mostly people passing out due to dehydration or hyperthermia
. In 2000, after the parade, a girl under the influence of ecstasy was run over by an S-Bahn
after she had been leaning on the door too hard.
So far nobody has been held financially responsible for this tragic event and gathering of at least twice the capacity of people at the Duisburg grounds, and German authorities are no longer searching for those who took large profits.
Safety experts and a fire service investigator had previously warned that the site was not suitable for the numbers expected to attend. Rainer Schaller
, the festival's organizer and chief executive officer, later said the festival would not continue in future, thus ending the festival.
A preliminary investigation of the ministry of the interior placed heavy blame on the organizers around Rainer Schaller. Schaller in turn claimed that errors by the police in controlling streams of visitors led to the accident.
's Street Parade
, Geneva
's Lake Parade
, Rotterdam
's FFWD Dance Parade and Love Parades in Vienna
. In 1997 a Love Parade was held in Sydney, Australia. Unlike its overseas counterparts, however, it was a smaller "rave
party" version of the festival, held at the infamous Graffiti Hall of Fame in Redfern. On Saturday 8 July 2000 a Love Parade was held in Roundhay Park
, Leeds
, United Kingdom
sponsored by BBC Radio 1
. In 2001, the official UK parade had moved to Newcastle upon Tyne
which was to have seen a parade through the streets of Newcastle before ending up on Town Moor
but was cancelled after the police refused a license: BBC Radio 1
still hosted a more contained event, however. Since then no Love Parade had taken place in the United Kingdom.
After being held in the North-American Continent for the first time in Mexico (2002), in the fall of 2004, the Love Parade was held in San Francisco. They had held their inaugural Parade in September 2004 with 37,000 attending. The parade was held again in San Francisco in September 2005 as a rousing success drawing over 50–60,000 people. In 2006, the parade was held on September 23 and was renamed Love Fest because the Loveparade Berlin organization did not renew any of their worldwide licenses not already under contract so they could focus on their own event. 2009 was the biggest success of LOVEVOLUTION (formerly Lovefest/Love Parade) with over 100,000 people. The first Love Parade in Santiago was held in 2005 and gathered over 100,000 people; the 2006 version gathered over 200,000 people. The first Love Parade in Caracas was held in June 2007 and gathered over 25,000 people.
Internationally, spin-off Love Parades have taken place in:
The Love Parade was initially held as a "political demonstration" to save costs; however it is organized by two companies set up just for the Love Parade. The name of the demonstration, Love Parade, is a registered trademark and the organizing companies have been busy getting license fees for the use of their name. This not only included merchandise and CDs but also fees for participating clubs, vendors of soft drinks and the like along the streets and even broadcasting fees for the TV stations MTV
and Germany's counterpart, VIVA, along with, for the first time, Germany's RTL 2. Love Parade 2006 was the first time in that Berlin's RBB did not broadcast direct from the Siegessäule
.
Due to this there was a dispute between the organizers and the city of Berlin every year about the status of the Love Parade and who should bear what costs. Finally in 2001, the courts ruled that the Love Parade had to be held as commercial event. In 2004, the organizers claimed they do not have the necessary funds anymore to host it again. Since there are numerous other Love Parade-like but commercial events in Germany, there are speculations that the funding is not, or at least is not the only reason, for the cancellation, the other being the fast dropping number of participants.
.
The "Participants" figure is the estimate given by the organizers. Police estimates have been as much as 30% lower. The numbers of the Ruhr Love Parades have probably been tripled. Accurate counts are not available since entry is free and uncontrolled. The mayor of Dortmund and the police confirmed the number of participants in Dortmund.
Electronic dance music
Electronic dance music is electronic music produced primarily for the purposes of use within a nightclub setting, or in an environment that is centered upon dance-based entertainment...
festival
Festival
A festival or gala is an event, usually and ordinarily staged by a local community, which centers on and celebrates some unique aspect of that community and the Festival....
and parade
Parade
A parade is a procession of people, usually organized along a street, often in costume, and often accompanied by marching bands, floats or sometimes large balloons. Parades are held for a wide range of reasons, but are usually celebrations of some kind...
that originated in 1989 in West Berlin
West Berlin
West Berlin was a political exclave that existed between 1949 and 1990. It comprised the western regions of Berlin, which were bordered by East Berlin and parts of East Germany. West Berlin consisted of the American, British, and French occupation sectors, which had been established in 1945...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. It was held in Germany annually between 1989 and 2003 in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, and then from 2006 to 2010 in the Ruhr
Ruhr
The Ruhr is a medium-size river in western Germany , a right tributary of the Rhine.-Description:The source of the Ruhr is near the town of Winterberg in the mountainous Sauerland region, at an elevation of approximately 2,200 feet...
region. The 2004 and 2005 events in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and the 2009 event in Bochum
Bochum
Bochum is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, western Germany. It is located in the Ruhr area and is surrounded by the cities of Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Herne, Castrop-Rauxel, Dortmund, Witten and Hattingen.-History:...
were cancelled.
On 24 July 2010, a crowd rush at the Love Parade
Love Parade stampede
On 24 July 2010, a stampede at the 2010 Love Parade electronic dance music festival in Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, caused the death of 21 people. At least 510 more were injured....
caused the death of 21 people, with at least 500 others injured. As a consequence of this, the organiser of the festival announced that no further Love Parades would be held and that the festival was permanently cancelled.
History
The parade first occurred just months before the fall of the Berlin WallBerlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was a barrier constructed by the German Democratic Republic starting on 13 August 1961, that completely cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin...
in 1989. It was started by the Berlin underground at the initiative of Matthias Roeingh (also known as "Dr Motte") and his then girlfriend Danielle de Picciotto
Danielle de Picciotto
Danielle de Picciotto is an American born artist, musician and film maker. She was born in Washington, USA, but now lives and works in Berlin, Germany...
. It was conceived as a political demonstration for peace and international understanding through love and music. It was supposed to be a bigger birthday party for Roeingh, later "Dr Motte", and the motto Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen (in English — Peace, Joy, Pancakes) stood for disarmament
Disarmament
Disarmament is the act of reducing, limiting, or abolishing weapons. Disarmament generally refers to a country's military or specific type of weaponry. Disarmament is often taken to mean total elimination of weapons of mass destruction, such as nuclear arms...
(peace), music (joy) and a fair food production/distribution (pancakes). Roeingh dissociated himself from the parade in 2006 because of the commercialization
Commercialization
Commercialization is the process or cycle of introducing a new product or production method into the market. The actual launch of a new product is the final stage of new product development, and the one where the most money will have to be spent for advertising, sales promotion, and other marketing...
of the event.
The parade was held on the Berlin Kurfürstendamm
Kurfürstendamm
The Kurfürstendamm, known locally as the Ku'damm, is one of the most famous avenues in Berlin. The street takes its name from the former Kurfürsten of Brandenburg. This very broad, long boulevard can be considered the Champs-Élysées of Berlin — full of shops, houses, hotels and restaurants...
(avenue) until 1996. Because of overcrowding on the Kurfürstendamm, the festival moved to the Straße des 17. Juni
Straße des 17. Juni
The Straße des 17. Juni is a street in central Berlin, the capital of Germany. It is the western continuation of the Unter den Linden. It runs east-west through the Tiergarten, a large forest park to the west of the city centre. At the eastern end is the Brandenburg Gate and at the western end is...
in the Tiergarten
Tiergarten
Tiergarten is a locality within the borough of Mitte, in central Berlin . Notable for the great and homonymous urban park, before German reunification, it was a part of West Berlin...
park in the center of Berlin. The festival became centered around the Siegessäule in the middle of the park; and the golden angel atop the column became the parade's emblem.
Many people from Germany and abroad traveled to Berlin to take part in the Parade — over a million attended in the years 1997 through 2000 and 800,000 in 2001. Attendance at the 2001 festival was significantly lower because the date of the parade was changed with little advance notice. 2002 and 2003 also saw lower figures, and in 2004 and 2005 the parade was cancelled because of funding difficulties and coordinated opposition from most of Germany's green parties. The parade had inspired opposition because of the damage to the Tiergarten by participants, who were provided with insufficient toilet facilities. Opponents allegedly complicated matters for organisers by booking their own events in Berlin and so to exclude the parade from being able to register with city police. In 2004, however, a scaled-down version took place which served more as a mini-protest and was promoted with the title Love Weekend. Dozens of clubs promoted the weekend-long event all over the city, with various clubs staying open for three days straight without closing. In 2006, the parade made a comeback with the help of German exercise studio McFit
McFit
The McFit GmbH is the largest fitness center chain in Germany with over 140 studios in Germany, Austria and Spain and over one million members. The company's headquarter is located in Schlüsselfeld...
.
The Love Parade 2007 was planned for 7 July 2007 in Berlin. However, the Berlin event was cancelled in February because the Senate of Berlin
Senate of Berlin
The Senate of Berlin is the executive body governing the city of Berlin, which at the same time is a state of Germany. According to the Constitution of Berlin the Senate consists of the Governing Mayor of Berlin and up to eight Senators appointed by the Governing Mayor, two of whom are appointed ...
did not issue the necessary permits at that time. After negotiations with several German cities, on 21 July, it was announced that the parade would move to the Ruhr Area
Ruhr Area
The Ruhr, by German-speaking geographers and historians more accurately called Ruhr district or Ruhr region , is an urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With 4435 km² and a population of some 5.2 million , it is the largest urban agglomeration in Germany...
for the next five years. The first event took place in Essen
Essen
- Origin of the name :In German-speaking countries, the name of the city Essen often causes confusion as to its origins, because it is commonly known as the German infinitive of the verb for the act of eating, and/or the German noun for food. Although scholars still dispute the interpretation of...
on 25 August. The parade in Essen saw 1.2 million visitors in comparison to the 500,000 who attended the 2006 parade in Berlin.
In 2008, the festival took place in Dortmund
Dortmund
Dortmund is a city in Germany. It is located in the Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the Ruhr area. Its population of 585,045 makes it the 7th largest city in Germany and the 34th largest in the European Union....
on 19 July on the Bundesstraße 1
Bundesstraße 1
The Bundesstraße 1 or B1 is a German federal highway running in an east-west direction from the Dutch border near Aachen to the Polish border at Küstrin-Kietz on the Oder River.-Route description:...
under the motto Highway of Love. The event was planned as a "Love Weekend", with parties throughout the region. For the first time the Turkish electronic scene was represented by its own float, called "Turkish Delights
Turkish Delights (music project)
Turkish Delights is a Turkish musical project founded in 2008 by Max van der Rose.Together with his partner Ferhat Albayrak he compiled the first Turkish float in the history of the Loveparade 2008 in Dortmund, Germany....
". The official estimate is that 1.6 million visitors attended, making it the largest parade to date.
The 2009 event, planned for Bochum, was cancelled; a year later, the deaths of twenty-one attendees at the Duisburg venue prompted the parade's organiser Rainer Schaller to declare an end to the festival. "The Love Parade has always been a peaceful party, but it will forever be overshadowed by the accident, so out of respect for the victims the Love Parade will never take place again," Schaller said.
The parade was one of the oldest and largest festivals of electronic music, together with Zurich's Streetparade, Mayday and Nature One
Nature One
Nature One is one of the largest European open air Electronic music festivals, featuring many renowned DJs from Germany and all over the world. In significance it is not as big as Mayday nor as old, having started 3 years later than the Mayday festival...
.
Setup
The music played at the events was predominantly electronic dance musicDance music
Dance music is music composed specifically to facilitate or accompany dancing. It can be either a whole musical piece or part of a larger musical arrangement...
— in this case mainly trance
Trance music
Trance is a genre of electronic dance music that developed in the 1990s.:251 It is generally characterized by a tempo of between 125 and 150 bpm,:252 repeating melodic synthesizer phrases, and a musical form that builds up and breaks down throughout a track...
, house
House music
House music is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in Chicago, Illinois, United States in the early 1980s. It was initially popularized in mid-1980s discothèques catering to the African-American, Latino American, and gay communities; first in Chicago circa 1984, then in other...
, techno, and schranz
Schranz
Schranz is a European style of music derived from techno. It originated in Germany.-Etymology:The term emerged in 1994 when Frankfurt-based DJ Chris Liebing and The Advent described a certain type of techno while searching for records at the now closed "Boy Records" store. The next time he visited...
music. Attempts to introduce other music styles, such as hip hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
, have failed. Hardcore and gabber music were part of the parade in early years, but were later removed. They are now celebrated separately on a counter-demonstration called "Fuckparade
Fuckparade
The Fuckparade is an annual summer techno demonstration in Berlin. The event began in 1997 as a demonstration against the increasing commercialisation of culture and public life and the misuse of the right of assembly by purely commercial ventures, in particular the Love Parade...
".
The parade was seen to be louder and more crowded than most concerts. With its water-cooled sound systems on every truck, the parade produced an extremely loud sound floor. After the 2001 arrangement, veterinarian
Veterinarian
A veterinary physician, colloquially called a vet, shortened from veterinarian or veterinary surgeon , is a professional who treats disease, disorder and injury in animals....
s at the Berlin Zoo blamed the parade for giving more than half of its animals diarrhea
Diarrhea
Diarrhea , also spelled diarrhoea, is the condition of having three or more loose or liquid bowel movements per day. It is a common cause of death in developing countries and the second most common cause of infant deaths worldwide. The loss of fluids through diarrhea can cause dehydration and...
. Chairman Heiner Kloes said veterinarians told him the heavy bass was to blame for disturbing the animals. The parade consisted of the sound trucks that usually featured local, or important, clubs and their DJs. It had become a rule that only trucks that had sponsors from a techno-related field, such as clubs, labels or stores, were allowed, but advertising space was increased after the 2006 event to offset the high costs of equipping a truck. The trucks were usually open on top and feature dancers, with box-systems mounted on the side or rear.
The parade was a place where some exhibited and enjoyed other people's exhibitionist tendencies. Some attendees enjoyed carrying around toys such or other items such as dummies (pacifiers) or face masks. Often the crowd was imaginative in terms of clothing (or lack thereof) and appearance.
One famous picture from the parade is people sitting and dancing on streetlamps, trees, commercial signs, telephone booths, which gave the event's nickname "the greatest amateur circus on earth".
The finale of the demonstration is by the so-called "Abschlusskundgebung" which are half-hour sets of the world's leading top DJs such as DJ Tiesto, Paul Van Dyk
Paul van Dyk
Matthias Paul, better known by his stage name Paul van Dyk is a German Grammy Award-winning Electronic Dance Music DJ, musician and record producer...
, Carl Cox
Carl Cox
Carl Cox is a British techno and house music DJ.-Biography:Cox grew up in Oldham, Lancashire, before attending Glastonbury High Boys secondary modern school on Glastonbury Road in Morden. Cox began his career as a hardcore and rave DJ in the mid 1980s...
, Armin Van Buuren, DJ Rush, DJ Hell
DJ Hell
This article is about Helmut Josef Geier. You may also be looking for Darryl Hell.Helmut Josef Geier, professionally known as DJ Hell is a German house-techno DJ...
, Westbam
WestBam
WestBam, real name Maximilian Lenz , is techno DJs in Germany. His brother is Fabian Lenz, also known as DJ Dick....
, Drum Connection
Drum Connection
Drum Connection is a German musical ensemble and pop group.The group was founded 1995 by Max van der Rose and had its first gig at the legendary Dance Of Elements....
, Miss Djax, Marusha
Marusha
Marusha, real name Marusha Aphrodite Gleiß is a German Techno, Happy hardcore, Breakbeat and Eurodance artist/DJ, who was on the hit lists in the mid '90s....
or Chris Liebing
Chris Liebing
Chris Liebing is dj, producer, radio host of a weekly show and the driving force behind the labels CLR and Spinclub Recordings. His sound has continuously evolved during his dj career, always true to his Techno roots. He was one of the first djs that used the new possibilities in the course of the...
. During this time all trucks (usually about 40) are connected to each other and set online to the statue of victory where the turntables
Phonograph
The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...
are. This is one of the few chances a DJ can ever have to play for a crowd of about one million people.
During the weekend of the parade many clubs held special events and parties and booked well-known DJs. Parties ranged from clubs with one hundred, mostly exclusive guests, to almost rave
Rave
Rave, rave dance, and rave party are parties that originated mostly from acid house parties, which featured fast-paced electronic music and light shows. At these parties people dance and socialize to dance music played by disc jockeys and occasionally live performers...
s with several floors and ten thousand dancers. Many people used to come to Berlin only for the parties and miss the parade in order to sleep. Or they enjoyed it with other "ravers" in the park right next to the parade route.
Disturbances
The parade was quite peaceful for an event of its size, seeing few arrests. In 2008, for example, charges were pressed for six robberies, three sexually related offences and forty thefts. Twenty-three participants were caught with drugs and forty-nine were charged with bodily harm. There were 177 parade visitors provisionally arrested by the police. Arrests are usually related to drugDrug
A drug, broadly speaking, is any substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function. There is no single, precise definition, as there are different meanings in drug control law, government regulations, medicine, and colloquial usage.In pharmacology, a...
crimes and most other incidents feature mostly people passing out due to dehydration or hyperthermia
Hyperthermia
Hyperthermia is an elevated body temperature due to failed thermoregulation. Hyperthermia occurs when the body produces or absorbs more heat than it can dissipate...
. In 2000, after the parade, a girl under the influence of ecstasy was run over by an S-Bahn
S-Bahn
S-Bahn refers to an often combined city center and suburban railway system metro in Austria, Germany, Switzerland and Denmark...
after she had been leaning on the door too hard.
2010 accident
At the 2010 Love Parade in Duisburg, the number of people attending allegedly reached 1.4 million - the original expectation was around 800,000 -, whereas police believed around 400,000 people were present. 21 people were killed, and more than 500 injured, in an incident near an overcrowded tunnel leading into the festival. At least 20 casualties resulted from suffocation, caused by crowd pressure.So far nobody has been held financially responsible for this tragic event and gathering of at least twice the capacity of people at the Duisburg grounds, and German authorities are no longer searching for those who took large profits.
Safety experts and a fire service investigator had previously warned that the site was not suitable for the numbers expected to attend. Rainer Schaller
Rainer Schaller
Rainer Schaller is the president and chief executive officer of McFit GmbH, Lopavent GmbH, which since 2006 has been the organizing company of the Love Parade, an electronic dance music festival and parade, Loveparade Berlin GmbH and LoveParade.net GmbH.On 24 July 2010, at least 21 people were...
, the festival's organizer and chief executive officer, later said the festival would not continue in future, thus ending the festival.
A preliminary investigation of the ministry of the interior placed heavy blame on the organizers around Rainer Schaller. Schaller in turn claimed that errors by the police in controlling streams of visitors led to the accident.
Love Parade International
There are similar festivals in other cities like ZürichZürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
's Street Parade
Street Parade
The Street Parade is the most attended technoparade in Europe, since the end of Love Parade 2010. It takes place in Zurich, Switzerland. Comparable to Berlin's Love Parade, the Street Parade is one of the largest techno parties in the world and the largest annual event in Zurich...
, Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
's Lake Parade
Lake Parade
The Lake Parade is a large Technoparade which is organised every year from 1997, on month of July, in Geneva on the quay of Lake Geneva.-History:The Lake Parade has been one of the main Geneva events of the last ten years from when it was first organised...
, Rotterdam
Rotterdam
Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam on the Rotte river, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre...
's FFWD Dance Parade and Love Parades in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. In 1997 a Love Parade was held in Sydney, Australia. Unlike its overseas counterparts, however, it was a smaller "rave
Rave
Rave, rave dance, and rave party are parties that originated mostly from acid house parties, which featured fast-paced electronic music and light shows. At these parties people dance and socialize to dance music played by disc jockeys and occasionally live performers...
party" version of the festival, held at the infamous Graffiti Hall of Fame in Redfern. On Saturday 8 July 2000 a Love Parade was held in Roundhay Park
Roundhay Park
Roundhay Park in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, is one of the biggest city parks in Europe. It has over of parkland, lakes, woodland and gardens which are owned by Leeds City Council. The park is one of the most popular attractions in Leeds, nearly a million people visit each year...
, Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
sponsored by BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
. In 2001, the official UK parade had moved to Newcastle upon Tyne
Newcastle upon Tyne
Newcastle upon Tyne is a city and metropolitan borough of Tyne and Wear, in North East England. Historically a part of Northumberland, it is situated on the north bank of the River Tyne...
which was to have seen a parade through the streets of Newcastle before ending up on Town Moor
Town Moor, Newcastle upon Tyne
The Town Moor is a large area of common land in Newcastle upon Tyne. It covers an area of around 400ha, and is larger than Hyde Park and Hampstead Heath combined, stretching from the city centre and Spital Tongues in the south out to Cowgate/Kenton Bar to the west, Gosforth to the north and...
but was cancelled after the police refused a license: BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
still hosted a more contained event, however. Since then no Love Parade had taken place in the United Kingdom.
After being held in the North-American Continent for the first time in Mexico (2002), in the fall of 2004, the Love Parade was held in San Francisco. They had held their inaugural Parade in September 2004 with 37,000 attending. The parade was held again in San Francisco in September 2005 as a rousing success drawing over 50–60,000 people. In 2006, the parade was held on September 23 and was renamed Love Fest because the Loveparade Berlin organization did not renew any of their worldwide licenses not already under contract so they could focus on their own event. 2009 was the biggest success of LOVEVOLUTION (formerly Lovefest/Love Parade) with over 100,000 people. The first Love Parade in Santiago was held in 2005 and gathered over 100,000 people; the 2006 version gathered over 200,000 people. The first Love Parade in Caracas was held in June 2007 and gathered over 25,000 people.
Internationally, spin-off Love Parades have taken place in:
- SydneySydneySydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area... - ViennaViennaVienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, AustriaAustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the... - Rio de JaneiroRio de JaneiroRio de Janeiro , commonly referred to simply as Rio, is the capital city of the State of Rio de Janeiro, the second largest city of Brazil, and the third largest metropolitan area and agglomeration in South America, boasting approximately 6.3 million people within the city proper, making it the 6th...
, BrazilBrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people... - SantiagoSantiago, ChileSantiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level...
, ChileChileChile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far... - LeedsLeedsLeeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
, EnglandEnglandEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... - BudapestBudapestBudapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, HungaryHungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The... - Tel AvivTel AvivTel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
, IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
- Mexico CityMexico CityMexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
and AcapulcoAcapulcoAcapulco is a city, municipality and major sea port in the state of Guerrero on the Pacific coast of Mexico, southwest from Mexico City. Acapulco is located on a deep, semi-circular bay and has been a port since the early colonial period of Mexico’s history...
, MexicoMexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of... - OsloOsloOslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
, NorwayNorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million... - Cape TownCape TownCape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
, South AfricaSouth AfricaThe Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans... - GenevaGenevaGeneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
and ZurichZürichZurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
, SwitzerlandSwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition.... - CaracasCaracasCaracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...
, VenezuelaVenezuelaVenezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south... - Little Rock, ArkansasArkansasArkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
; and San Francisco, CaliforniaCaliforniaCalifornia is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
, United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Legal issues
Under German law the state has to pay for security during political demonstrations as well as cleaning up the streets after the demonstration. In the case of a commercial event however, the organizer must cover these expenses. For a large event like the Love Parade the costs are quite high: an estimated €300,000 to €400,000.The Love Parade was initially held as a "political demonstration" to save costs; however it is organized by two companies set up just for the Love Parade. The name of the demonstration, Love Parade, is a registered trademark and the organizing companies have been busy getting license fees for the use of their name. This not only included merchandise and CDs but also fees for participating clubs, vendors of soft drinks and the like along the streets and even broadcasting fees for the TV stations MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
and Germany's counterpart, VIVA, along with, for the first time, Germany's RTL 2. Love Parade 2006 was the first time in that Berlin's RBB did not broadcast direct from the Siegessäule
Berlin Victory Column
The Victory Column is a monument in Berlin, Germany. Designed by Heinrich Strack after 1864 to commemorate the Prussian victory in the Danish-Prussian War, by the time it was inaugurated on 2 September 1873, Prussia had also defeated Austria in the Austro-Prussian War and France in the...
.
Due to this there was a dispute between the organizers and the city of Berlin every year about the status of the Love Parade and who should bear what costs. Finally in 2001, the courts ruled that the Love Parade had to be held as commercial event. In 2004, the organizers claimed they do not have the necessary funds anymore to host it again. Since there are numerous other Love Parade-like but commercial events in Germany, there are speculations that the funding is not, or at least is not the only reason, for the cancellation, the other being the fast dropping number of participants.
Anthems
Every German parade has had its own anthemAnthem
The term anthem means either a specific form of Anglican church music , or more generally, a song of celebration, usually acting as a symbol for a distinct group of people, as in the term "national anthem" or "sports anthem".-Etymology:The word is derived from the Greek via Old English , a word...
.
| Year | Artist | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 1997 | Dr. Motte and WestBam | Sunshine |
| 1998 | Dr. Motte and WestBam | One World One Future |
| 1999 | Dr. Motte and WestBam | Music Is the Key |
| 2000 | Dr. Motte and WestBam | Love Parade 2000 |
| 2001 | The Love Committee | You Can't Stop Us |
| 2002 | The Love Committee | Access Peace |
| 2003 | The Love Committee | Love Rules |
| 2006 | WestBam & the Love Committee | United States of Love |
| 2007 | WestBam & the Love Committee | Love Is Everywhere (New Location) |
| 2008 | WestBam & the Love Committee | Highway to Love |
| 2010 | Anthony Rother | The Art of Love |
List of Love Parades
| Year | Location | Motto | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1989 | Berlin | Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen(Eng.) Peace, Joy, Pancakes | 150 |
| 1990 | Berlin | The Future Is Ours | 2,000 |
| 1991 | Berlin | My House Is Your House And Your House Is Mine | 6,000 |
| 1992 | Berlin | The Spirit Makes You Move | 15,000 |
| 1993 | Berlin | The Worldwide Party People Weekend | 31,000 |
| 1994 | Berlin | Love 2 Love | 110,000 |
| 1995 | Berlin | Peace on Earth | 280,000 |
| 1996 | Berlin | We Are One Family | 750,000 |
| 1997 | Berlin | Let the Sunshine In Your Heart | 1,000,000 |
| 1997 | Sydney | ||
| 1998 | Berlin | One World One Future | 800,000 |
| 1999 | Berlin | Music Is The Key | 1,500,000 |
| 2000 | Berlin | One World One Loveparade | 1,300,000 |
| 2000 | Leeds Leeds Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial... |
Radio One – One Love | 300,000 |
| 2001 | Berlin | Join The Love Republic | 800,000 |
| 2001 | Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne is a city and metropolitan borough of Tyne and Wear, in North East England. Historically a part of Northumberland, it is situated on the north bank of the River Tyne... (cancelled) |
||
| 2002 | Berlin | Access Peace | 750,000 |
| 2002 | Mexico City Mexico City Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole... |
||
| 2003 | Berlin | Love Rules | 750,000 |
| 2004 | San Francisco | ||
| 2005 | San Francisco | ||
| 2005 | Santiago Santiago, Chile Santiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level... |
Sal a la calle y baila (eng. Get out there and dance) | 100,000 |
| 2006 | Berlin | The Love is Back | 1,200,000 |
| 2006 | San Francisco (as LoveFest) | ||
| 2006 | Santiago | El Baile es de Todos | 200,000 |
| 2007 | Essen Essen - Origin of the name :In German-speaking countries, the name of the city Essen often causes confusion as to its origins, because it is commonly known as the German infinitive of the verb for the act of eating, and/or the German noun for food. Although scholars still dispute the interpretation of... |
Love is everywhere | 1,200,000 |
| 2007 | Caracas Caracas Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range... |
Live the Love! | 80,000 |
| 2007 | San Francisco | as LoveFest | 89,000 |
| 2008 | Dortmund Dortmund Dortmund is a city in Germany. It is located in the Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the Ruhr area. Its population of 585,045 makes it the 7th largest city in Germany and the 34th largest in the European Union.... |
Highway to love | 1,600,000 |
| 2008 | Rotterdam Rotterdam Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam on the Rotte river, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre... |
Olympic Edition | 500,000 |
| 2008 | San Francisco | as LoveFest | 120,000 |
| 2008 | Caracas | Keep the Love Alive! | |
| 2009 | Bochum Bochum Bochum is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, western Germany. It is located in the Ruhr area and is surrounded by the cities of Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Herne, Castrop-Rauxel, Dortmund, Witten and Hattingen.-History:... (cancelled) |
||
| 2009 | San Francisco | as LovEvolution | 150,000 |
| 2010 | Duisburg Duisburg - History :A legend recorded by Johannes Aventinus holds that Duisburg, was built by the eponymous Tuisto, mythical progenitor of Germans, ca. 2395 BC... |
The Art of Love | 1,400,000 |
The "Participants" figure is the estimate given by the organizers. Police estimates have been as much as 30% lower. The numbers of the Ruhr Love Parades have probably been tripled. Accurate counts are not available since entry is free and uncontrolled. The mayor of Dortmund and the police confirmed the number of participants in Dortmund.
See also
- FuckparadeFuckparadeThe Fuckparade is an annual summer techno demonstration in Berlin. The event began in 1997 as a demonstration against the increasing commercialisation of culture and public life and the misuse of the right of assembly by purely commercial ventures, in particular the Love Parade...
- 2009 Birmingham Millennium Point stampede
- Love Parade disaster
External links
- Love Parade 2008 in Dortmund – Official Site
- Berlin Life: 'The Death of Dance?' A history of the Berlin Love Parade
- San Francisco Love Fest (formerly Love Parade San Francisco)
- 2005 Lovefest Gallery
- Festivalpigs Love Parade and Euro Techno & Trance Festivals info
- What is Love Parade
- Wolfgang Sterneck: Love, Party and Profit - The History of the Love Parade.