Today we’d like to take a closer look at the real leadership team behind Rave The Planet, so we’ve arranged an interview with our Managing Director, Timm Zeiss.

Timm also keeps Rave The Planet gGmbH running smoothly behind the scenes and, as a commercial lawyer, entrepreneur, Managing Director and demonstration coordinator, has been working alongside the management team since early 2022 to oversee the legal, financial and organisational foundations of the demonstration and the entire organisation as a whole.

Anyone who thinks that sounds a bit conservative is mistaken, because Timm has been a techno activist for decades and has a long-standing connection to electronic music culture. From the famous Stammheim in Kassel to Berlin’s Lichtpark and night-time negotiations with the authorities, the police and the fire service, his path has taken him through a wide variety of areas within the scene.

Plenty of reasons to put him in the spotlight a little in our interview series, to ask him some questions and to talk to him about spontaneous decisions with far-reaching consequences, responsibility for hundreds of thousands of people, the relationship between idealism and economic reality, and the question of why the work is still worthwhile in the end.

From Stammheim to Lichtpark

RTP: You’re a commercial lawyer and entrepreneur, yet you’ve also been closely involved with Berlin’s club scene for many years. How did you end up in this role in the first place, and which stages of your journey were particularly formative for you?

Timm Zeiss: I’m afraid I’ll have to go back a bit further: Basically, I returned to the club scene around 2010 through my work – rather by chance, if it was chance at all. Before that, I’d only ever experienced it from the other side of the bar, as a guest. I lived in Kassel until 2008. I still have a base there today and, for professional reasons, I stay there for a few days at least twice a month. From 1994 to 2001, the club there was called ‘Aufschwung Ost’; later it was renamed ‘Stammheim’. I was practically part of the furniture there. When I gradually moved to Berlin from around 2008 onwards, I was mainly involved in setting up companies. One of our clients was an event organiser in the Berlin area and had set up a company through us for his activities. At some point, he approached me and explained that he wanted to legally run the Lichtpark site on Michaelkirchstraße in Berlin-Mitte as an open-air club. Previously, he had repeatedly organised the ‘Licht und Liebe’ party series there – if I remember correctly – as part of a more or less illegal temporary occupation. Together with his partner at the time, I then drove to an auction for the site at the Mitte Local Court. The property was acquired by a mortgagee from Nicolas Berggruen’s business circle. Immediately after the auction, we approached the managing director or authorised signatory who was present and asked if we could rent the site for 500 euros a month. He agreed straight away.

RTP: Okay, that sounds like a pretty cool deal you managed to negotiate.

Timm Zeiss: Yes, but to be perfectly honest, we weren’t entirely straightforward about it. We’d phrased our intention to run a techno club there in very vague terms.

RTP: Oh dear, did that cause any trouble?

Timm Zeiss: There was some trouble later on, including with our well-known neighbour at the time, Kater Holzig. But that’s water under the bridge now. In the end, we ran the Lichtpark – which was eventually renamed RAMPE – for about five years. It was a wonderful and turbulent time, but it was a temporary project from the outset. Everything comes to an end, except for sausages – they have two ends.

RTP: And did you then move straight on to new projects on the scene?

Timm Zeiss: After that, things quietened down again for a while as far as me and my love of electronic clubs were concerned. I was still involved with a radio station for electronic music and got thoroughly ripped off in the process, but that’s another story. After that, I thought to myself: back to basics. I’m going back to specialising solely in insolvency law.

RTP: But your roots are still very much in the electronic music scene, and as we know, you didn’t stop at insolvency law – since early 2022, you’ve been the managing director of Rave The Planet, initially on a voluntary basis. How did it come about that you, of all people, took on this role?

Timm Zeiss: Yes, I haven’t been working entirely on a voluntary basis for a few months now. I now receive a very modest salary as part of a mini-job. That allows me to treat my family to a meal every now and then, to make up for my activities and my frequent absences.

RTP: Well, that’s something at least! *laughs*

Timm Zeiss: But joking aside: I actually stumbled into this role quite by chance. I think I’d known Motte since 2013 from the Lichtpark. He’d DJed there from time to time for free, and we’d regularly have nice chats. Later on, I also got to know his wife, Ellen – probably at the Lichtpark too. Motte and I had been chatting at the bar over a few cold drinks about reviving the Love Parade. But back then, I didn’t take it seriously. After all, 99 per cent of what people say when they’re out partying consists of, let’s call it, party chatter.

RTP: I see.

Timm Zeiss: Graf, one of the former managers of the Stammheim in Kassel, was also there and kept bringing it up with me over the following years. Incidentally, he’s been living in Berlin for a long time now and works at our law firm as an insolvency administrator.

RTP: Well, you’re starting to get the feeling that your law firm’s full of ravers …

Timm Zeiss: Now that you mention it … Well, after Lichtpark was over, I only had occasional contact with Ellen and Motte. I became a father in 2017, and naturally my priorities shifted away from keeping in touch with the techno family. But we never completely lost touch. Ellen and Motte had founded Rave The Planet gGmbH in 2019. At the time, I wasn’t involved and only found out about it through the press. The first two planned parades fell victim to the coronavirus pandemic. The chemistry between the founding partners wasn’t right either.

RTP: What was going on there? Could you explain that briefly?

Timm Zeiss: Let’s just say this: as well as Ellen and Motte, there were two other people involved. And it didn’t work out well. There was no bad blood, but they were simply on different wavelengths. That’s how it goes sometimes.

RTP: Right, but did things carry on after that?

Timm Zeiss: Then either Ellen or Motte approached me – I can’t quite remember which. I was asked to ensure that the shares in Rave The Planet gGmbH were consolidated in their names and that the other co-shareholders stepped down. The main points had already been discussed, but a few details still needed to be negotiated. And suddenly I found myself on board too. Ellen then sent me out to look for a new managing director. Anyone who knows Ellen knows that the list of requirements was long and her expectations were high. The only problem was – and this severely limited my options – that there really wasn’t any money available at the time to pay someone properly. After this failed mission, I found myself sitting at their home in Wedding at some point, trying to break the news to them as gently as possible: mission impossible. Ellen then remarked quite casually that they’d actually been thinking of me myself, rather than a third party. That might sound strange now, but it hadn’t crossed my mind at all at that moment, nor in the weeks leading up to it. Nevertheless, I accepted on the spot.

RTP: Wow, so it was purely a knee-jerk reaction?

Timm Zeiss: No. It’s true that on the whole journey home I was thinking about how I was going to break the news to my wife Kerstin and what on earth I’d been thinking when I agreed so rashly. I don’t usually make decisions like that on the spur of the moment. But I made this decision out of conviction.

Between the desk and crisis mode

RTP: That’s how quickly you can become part of the team. I imagine many people picture working for Rave The Planet as being a bit different from what it actually is. What’s your day-to-day life like behind the scenes, and what tasks do you usually end up doing?

Timm Zeiss: My day-to-day work certainly doesn’t look the way people might imagine. I don’t sit in the office with loud Schranz music playing in the background.

RTP: … which, by the way, I find a bit amusing, this sort of idea. But what is it really like, the reality of day-to-day life?

Timm Zeiss: Basically, I see myself as the spearhead when it comes to pushing through Rave The Planet’s interests – especially when we’re flying through rough patches. In situations like that, I sometimes really spring into action. That’s just my nature. I’m not saying that I get bored when everything goes to plan. That’s never going to be entirely the case anyway.

RTP: No, it won’t. *laughs*

Timm Zeiss: Anyone responsible for an event of this scale and with such political and security implications is constantly facing headwinds. After all, I’ve been the parade leader since the first parade in 2022. Of course, I’d still prefer it if those headwinds remained nothing more than a gentle breeze.

RTP: Yes, of course, that makes sense. In any case, it sounds as though passion alone isn’t enough. How much legal, political and economic expertise does club culture need in order to survive in the long term?

Timm Zeiss: That brings us back to my role. Without these skills, it’s almost impossible to get by these days. You also need to be well connected. That’s often even more important than purely theoretical knowledge. But even more important are reliability and a willingness to stand by your word. I think we’ve built up a great deal of trust with the authorities and many of our partners in this way. People know they can rely on our word. Only then can you expect to be treated with the same respect. That’s why my pulse sometimes races a little when individual staff members from the local authority try to tell me that water flows uphill. Fortunately, that happens very rarely these days. We maintain a good partnership with the police and security authorities, even though we don’t always see eye to eye, of course.

When suddenly everything was hanging in the balance

RTP: Just how important these skills are became particularly clear in 2023. Rave The Planet was under enormous pressure, the funding situation was uncertain and there was a great deal of public attention. How did you find those days?

Timm Zeiss: Looking back, that period feels like a film to me. On the one hand, I was tallying up the donations received together with Ellen. At the same time, I was sitting with Sissy Kraus at the Hotel Berlin, dictating applications to the Administrative Court. She holds a PhD and is a specialist lawyer in criminal law, and she’s part of our team.

RTP: That sounds awful, unfortunately.

Timm Zeiss: Yes, just wait – there’s more to come. In between, I went outside and held an impromptu press conference, for which I was utterly unprepared. After that, it was back to the keyboard and the dictaphone. There are some things I can barely remember today.

RTP: Phew. And then?

Timm Zeiss: At times, I was negotiating late into the night with senior officers from the police and the fire service. In between, I was on the phone to various Berlin politicians and other well-known figures who were supporting us, including Albrecht Broemme, the honorary president of the Federal Agency for Technical Relief. Former political leaders also supported us and put us in touch with key contacts. The then Senator for Culture, Joe Chialo, and his predecessor, Tim Renner, were also involved. Other serving politicians and MPs did their utmost to help and act as intermediaries. However, as long as they are still in office, their names should not be made public here. Besides, I would then run the risk of failing to mention everyone who helped.

RTP: Fair enough!

Timm Zeiss: In any case, I found it very encouraging to see how much support we received in that situation. I remain grateful for that to this day, on behalf of the whole team. I turned down most press enquiries because they couldn’t solve the immediate problem. At the same time, the press naturally played an important role in our success. That’s why I had to engage with them in a measured way.

Responsibility for hundreds of thousands

RTP: In principle, all these strategic decisions and the way we deal with both good and bad situations are essential. Rave The Planet is, after all, a demonstration, a cultural project, a political message and a massive logistical operation all at once. What does responsibility in such a structure mean to you, in concrete terms?

Timm Zeiss: That’s a very abstract question, because a great deal hinges on this responsibility.

RTP: Okay, let’s move on to what is perhaps your most important area of responsibility.

Timm Zeiss: The most important specific aspect of my responsibility is definitely the safety of the participants. The abstract threat level is currently very high, given the political tensions in Germany and around the world. That causes me great concern, but not fear. As we all know, fear is a poor guide.

RTP: What exactly do you have in mind?

Timm Zeiss: Very general, unforeseeable events that could jeopardise the event. But I think that’s very unlikely. Our security plan is very good and well-developed, and it’s updated every year.

RTP: It has now grown into an event with hundreds of thousands of people, dozens of floats, countless performers and huge expectations. How does that change your own perspective on leadership and decision-making?

Timm Zeiss: The very short answer is: not at all. Otherwise, I’d be the wrong person for this job. You have to manage such a large gathering with the same composure as you would a small event. You mustn’t let it drive you mad. Viewed from space, everything is small.

Cultural heritage with a sleep deficit

RTP: Let’s talk about this achievement for the scene – namely, the milestone of Berlin’s techno culture being recognised as intangible cultural heritage. You were also present at the presentation of the certificate. How did that moment make you feel?

Timm Zeiss: I was very proud when I heard about this decision. After all, that was well before the actual handover ceremony. On the day in question in Wiesbaden, I must admit I was absolutely knackered. Together with Ellen, Motte and two other people involved in the project, I took the train from Berlin to the award ceremony.

RTP: And looking back, how was it for you?

Timm Zeiss: I thought the event was a great success. We had the chance to meet some interesting people, including the Hessian Minister for Culture and representatives of other groups and associations whose traditions and ideals had also been included in the national register of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Germany. But as I said: I was really tired and so very glad that I didn’t have to say much more on stage than ‘Thank you very much!’. Motte took the floor. I have days like that too. You can’t always be at your very best.

RTP: Despite its scale, Rave The Planet explicitly sees itself not merely as an event, but as a demonstration with a stance. What, would you say, needs to be kept in mind time and again to ensure that this political stance remains clearly recognisable in the long term?

Timm Zeiss: The political ethos must remain clearly evident in our demands, speeches and the overall organisation of the demonstration. However, I do not wish to go into the details of our legal and strategic considerations in public at this stage.

RTP: Techno culture talks a lot about freedom, respect, diversity and community. At the same time, one sees commercialisation, marginalisation and pronounced egos. Where do you see the greatest contradictions at the moment?

Timm Zeiss: Wherever people are involved, such developments are to be expected. Nevertheless, not everything is necessarily at odds with one another.

RTP: Can you explain that?

Timm Zeiss: Commercialisation is often viewed as entirely negative. At the same time, culture also needs a certain degree of economic viability. The key is to strike a balance and not to lose sight of the core values of techno culture: freedom, respect, diversity and community. We must continually uphold these values so that they do not fade away.

Between the stage and the engine room

RTP: Despite your role, you’re not really in the spotlight as a person. Instead, Rave The Planet is strongly associated with Dr Motte. How would you describe your own role within the overall structure: more in the background, more of a driving force, or somewhere in between?

Timm Zeiss: Not in the background at all, but not always in the foreground either. I simply don’t have enough time to be constantly visible to the outside world. I can’t attend every event I’m invited to. Motte is a visionary. His wife Ellen is our production manager and ensures that everything comes together under her supervision and that everything actually happens at the right moment. I see my role primarily as filtering out what’s feasible from those visions and putting it into practice. In doing so, I sometimes have to keep Motte and the team happy and explain that 50 per cent is better than nothing, even if 100 per cent isn’t always possible, unfortunately.

RTP: In good times and bad.

Timm Zeiss: When things go wrong, it’s my job to maintain the framework so that the project can continue. In situations like that, I enjoy the team’s trust. I then try to take as much of the pressure off the rest of the management team as possible and keep them out of the disputes.

RTP: Drawing on your extensive experience, do you have any advice for young collectives, event organisers or activists who want not only to enjoy culture but also to support it in the long term?

Timm Zeiss: Things work no differently in the techno scene than in any other business or cultural sector. One shouldn’t naively believe that special rules apply here, or that one is exempt from responsibility and liability. Good intentions are no substitute for legal certainty or sound business judgement. That may be a shame, but it’s the reality.

RTP: What would you fundamentally like to see from politicians and the authorities in their approach to electronic music culture, including beyond Rave The Planet? What needs to be discussed publicly as a matter of urgency?

Timm Zeiss: In my view, electronic music culture still has a very hard time when it comes to politics and public administration. This is also reflected in public perception. In some quarters, it is still assumed that techno is inextricably linked to drug use. Sometimes, the entire techno culture is even reduced to that.

RTP: Annoying, but unfortunately true, yes.

Timm Zeiss: That’s just as unfair as labelling every visitor to the Oktoberfest an alcoholic or every stadium-goer a hooligan. Politicians and the authorities should regard our music culture as equal to other forms of culture and put an end to this distorted image. To some extent, this is already happening, or at least things are moving in the right direction. However, I don’t feel comfortable in the role of a victim. That’s why we’re staying on the ball with our demands.

‘There’s another side to it, too’

RTP: Let’s wrap up and move on to the question: What makes all the work involved in Rave The Planet worthwhile for you?

Timm Zeiss: We can proudly say that we’ve created something truly great. We’re not the Love Parade, but we carry on its values and spirit from the early days. The world isn’t just made up of senseless wars, conflicts, political irresponsibility and power fantasies. There’s another side to it too. We try to bring out the positive in people – at every level we can reach. And if, through our parades and other activities, we can make the world even a little bit more peaceful – even if only within a tiny microcosm – then the work is worthwhile for all of us, and therefore for me personally too. That was quite a lot of pathos for me, though.

RTP: Thank you very much, Timm, for all these insights, and all the best with the planning for Imagine Love! Thank you for the interview!