Up Close and Personal with Jon Cline

Cape Town’s electronic music scene has grown from strength to strength from the burgeoning scene that represented a small number of bass, house and techno heads of yester-year. Today, we all know Long street as one of the main arteries to the heart of Cape Town’s nightlife and psy-trance and techno revellers have limitless options both indoors and outdoors to enjoy music with other like-minded people.

This wasn’t always the case when underground bass music stalwarts like Jon Cline began places like Fiction bringing together alternative international and local music aficionados delivering a dizzying array of weekly acts.

Cline, alongside many other passionate bass music lovers were responsible for the development of epic annual events such as Afrikaburn and the Cape Town Music Festival as well as some of the live music events, concerts and festivals that continue to multiply today.

We caught up with the fascinating entrepreneur and creative, this is what he had to say:

How did your love for bass music start and how did you hone in that love in your early career?
I have a musically inclined family and I grew up with a love for the Beatles and in a house with older siblings who thrived on 80s music. During my formative years I was very much into the early 90s grunge and alternative rock revolution. Chemical Brothers and the Prodigy gave me an appreciation for electronic music and from there drum & bass was my first love jamming in Cape Town clubs like FUCT and the Piano Lounge.

What was your background before you started Fiction and Neighbourhood?
I did lots of things from film to design to clothing manufacturing. I even worked in the online advertising space before it became the big thing it is today. I maybe should’ve stuck around.

When you and Adam Klein opened Fiction, what was the main premise of the venue?
We wanted to open a venue that fit into the Long Street vibe at the time but would offer more. It was opened as a bar because charging an entrance fee on Long was unheard of at the time. Due to it becoming so popular so quickly we had to start charging people entry just to filter in a more respectful crowd of music lovers.

Who were some of the key players in ensuring your dream for this venue was kept alive?
Niskerone, Hyphen, Bruno Morphet, Ivan Turanjanin, Dank, Mix & Blend, Tommy Gunn. These are just a few of the names of the unbelievable supporters we had within the scene who would do anything to help us. We did everything on a hand shake and all became friends through the process.

Many venues, like music genres, have a certain lifespan, how did you guys make sure that bass music and venues like Fiction surpassed these nightlife lifespans?
We just stuck to our guns and tried to go with the times. The rise of cheesy electro music was a tough time for us because we always wanted to love the music we put on but the crowds started to dictate what they wanted.

There’s so many success stories from artists who first had their music platform at Fiction, who would you say is the biggest success story and why?
Probably Niskerone. I remember him coming in while we were still building. His dreads were short and we kept on reassuring him that we would be doing our weekly drum & bass night and he would be taking charge of it. He is now a recognisable figure wherever he goes in South Africa and is making a big name for himself overseas.

What is the biggest thing stifling growth for live music venues around Cape Town?
The numbers of people in Cape Town who are into the underground. I feel that two big parties on one night can kill both of their expected attendance. Unfortunately sometimes the amount of promoters isn’t balanced with the size of the market.

You were a director for AfrikaBurn, what did the job entail?
I was on a board of seven directors who were responsible for the day to day running of portfolios and to deliver the 2013 event. It was a great experience and I learnt a lot about the extraordinary event AfrikaBurn really is.

How did you get involved in LEDHedz and later AFrikaBurn?
Thought the life changing experience that AfrikaBurn and Burning Man gave me I wanted to engage this experience and give it my all. I can’t weld or build but I can motivate and organise, so I did what I could do within my skill set and put the right people together to make magic happen. I realised through the years one of my greatest skills is surrounding myself with people who make me look good.

There’s been a lot of criticism about festivals that began small with a communal and green ethos that have blown up in scale and attracted some unsavoury characters along the way, a case in point is Burning Man and the Silicon Valley clan bringing private chefs and landing jet planes and flying in models. How can our local festivals make sure that they keep growing but maintain the same ethos?
Change is inevitable and the experience is very much up to the individual. If you are letting something like models and private chefs ruin your experience, unfortunately in my view you are doing it wrong. Live by your own principles and let go the way you want to.

How do festivals like AfrikaBurn maintain a profit margin and still able to bring the best experience to its patrons?
AfrikaBurn is not your atypical festival. The only income stream is tickets. No sponsors or handouts and no profit is going into anyones pockets. I can’t really speak for the rest.

How does a club owner try to curb the growing amounts of drug abuse at club venues around the mother city?
People are gonna do what they want to do. Educating on responsible partying is probably the only route I would see being the way forward. Nobody likes to be preached at.

With festivals growing and being able to bring in a lot of international acts, how are we making sure that the local acts do not get overlooked for headlining acts and also continue to grow and cultivate a culture of support?
No matter what happens in this country the locals will always outnumber the internationals at larger festivals. Festivals can only afford to book two maybe three international headliners per festival due to the exchange rate. As far as electronic acts go, one thing I often hear is how the locals upstage the internationals almost every time. The reason for this being that the locals are far more in tuned with the sounds that people are responding to locally while overseas acts come with a weighted expectation of past performances that they just don’t do anymore.

The Cape Town music scene has grown exponentially over the past few years, what is key in ensuring that this growth goes back to feed artists and the city’s economy?
That’ll be up to the promoters and club owners how they want to engage the local community, if at all.

What are you involved in at the moment and what can people look forward to from you and your camp in 2015?
Right now I’ve taken some time off from AfrikaBurn. The LEDHEDz are taking a much needed break and will be back in full force for 2016. I’m still involved as a voting member for AfrikaBurn but I’ve had to take a step back to avoid ‘burn’ out.