Nestled in the basement of what used to be Dub's pub near the U of M campus, the Minneapolis dance-music scene's favorite watering hole feels like 2:00 a.m. at any time of day or night. The Dinkytowner, by its windowless design, could only
really cater to one of three groups: vampires, U students nursing hangovers likely to be amplified by the sun,
and techno kids. The latter have christened the place as their clubhouse over the
last four years, as anyone who has frequented the club on a Friday night can attest. They know that showing up sober right around last call is no good. That'd be like barging in on some secret society's weekly world-domination meeting on a night someone brought peppermint schnapps; you never know what kind of rambunctiousness you'll be interrupting, and you need to be prepared.
Being privy to this little tidbit of knowledge, I still showed up a few Fridays ago around 1:00 a.m., descending the shaky flight of stairs that almost always pulls down equilibrium-challenged patrons on their way out. Making my way past a herd of ratty leather couches, a DJ booth that looks like a fort made out of two-by-fours, and the most short-staffed bar in Dinkytown, I got an eyeful of probably the grossest scene ever to go down--er, up?--at the not exactly genteel establishment. Some blond chick, after indiscriminately hitting on my friend, began throwing up into her four empty drink glasses on the table. She did it in this eerily precise way that suggested routine. No one within
10 feet of the display has craved a Bloody Mary since.
Of course, the intoxicating Friday-night fodder at the Dinkytowner is certainly a different kind of fun than the warehouse-party days of yore in the Twin Cities. Just to bring you up to speed, the train tagged "Minneapolis Rave" didn't up and take off without you, nor does it have its sneaky eye on your defenseless youngster. The local underground is still mostly dead, and don't expect a Princess Bride-style revival any time soon. It's the "mostly" part, though, that tastemakers and beat-lovers should make note of: Brewing beneath the surface at the Dinkytowner and in various art and music studios across the city is a dynamic DIY movement that's giving Minneapolis quite the ego boost. No longer is it the sulking middle child next to Chicago and Detroit. The attention is coming from the Twin Cities' version of microhouse, the most unlikely sound--or perhaps the most cyclically logical--to derive from over-the-top rave culture's entrails. Throw some change in the dryer, or tap a shoe with a nail in its sole on a hardwood floor--you're halfway to making your own microhouse track. Just as improbable is the emerging minimal techno subgenre's local hero, the man responsible for Dinkytowner Fridays. Meet 28-year-old JP Hungelmann, a.k.a. jamespatrick. These days, he's a self-professed minimal-techno-loving nerd, sober in all things save for his love of Richie Hawtin EPs, unpronounceable studio equipment, and longtime techno buddies. But just a few years ago he found himself a heroin addict in jail, struggling to find his place as "a speck in the universe."
"A really crucial part of my story involves partying too much as a kid," Hungelmann relays openly from his studio, referred to as the "Batcave," a room in his massive Wayne Manorish house of music makers in Prospect Park. "I was doing heroin and speed every day [a handful of years ago]. I was in and out of jail enough times to where the judge was saying, 'Next time you're going to go to prison' each time. I pushed my luck enough and could feel it coming. I had many, many, many warrants. When I turned myself in, I had over 40 cases."
The Chanhassen-raised JP is wafer-thin by dint of biological makeup. It's painful to imagine someone who looks so inherently fragile in the thick of drug abuse. Nervously taking the forward-facing Kangol hat resting just above his glasses on and off, JP ruffles his fine brown hair, and looks up cautiously, probably anticipating a few gasps from his guest. Being a rave scene patron for years and having brushed shoulders with many an upsetting comedown, I manage an empathetic smile.
"I have no shame in any of this," he adds, sounding like he's said this many times before to not-so-understanding people. "I was a careless kid, and one thing led to another. We were buying, selling, and making the stuff. When you're in treatment for drugs, most people in there have nothing and are products of abusive homes. As soon as they get out they're going to go back with the same people and they have no fucking chance. For me, that was not the case. For six months I thought [only] about my amazing family, and about how I have the deepest connection with experimental electronic music."
After Hungelmann was put on work release in 2000, he went through the halfway-house process and started working at Vital Vinyl, a dance-music record store his friends Mike Tadros and Ryan Simatic opened in 2001. Putting in 60 hours of volunteer work a week, Hungelmann discovered a new vice in the form of music that experimented with deep, funky basslines, wide-open spaces, clicks, static, household objects, and just straight-up noise. "Microhouse" was to become techno's sleeker, more stylish cousin, and JP stocked the store with its most intricate cuts. He started a section at the store with one vinyl divider labeled "MINIMAL" which, before long, started to expand thanks to Hungelmann taking on the role of the genre's local hypeman. Before long, a promoter friend gave him her night at the 'Towner to showcase the sound, and Hungelmann and his nerd posse (DJs Daniel Paul, Josh Thomas, Reid, Jon Hester, Mike Dialect, DVS1, Toy, and Christian James) began pushing a style of music that would have emptied out a '90s rave like a high school fire drill in springtime.
