Der Prenzlauer Berg Sessions: Three Hours of Dark & Dirty Berlin Techno
James
DJ & Curator | 🇦🇺 Melbourne | 🇩🇪 Berlin
Formerly Jimmy Strat | @dj_jimmystrat
The Story Behind the Mix
My friend was flying in late from London. Early signs of Berlin’s biting winter were in the wind. We were to meet at my regular, Haliflor; a cosy refuge. She arrived just before midnight - “late” by British standards - clubbing hour in this city.
In Sydney in the 1980s, I never went out before midnight. Things only came alive when the creatures of the dark emerged to play. Like so many, this nocturnal world became central to my life. The night was like a black hole - its gravitational pull was so strong that we had no choice but to willingly dance deeper into the darkness.
I was usually alone, and sober. Just dancing. Losing myself in the sea of bodies moving together, entranced by the divinity of a shared experience. The Greeks might have called it Dionysus. Durkheim called it Collective Effervescence - a social fabric that binds people together after sharing an experience together. I’d stay until the fiery light of dawn appeared. Then, accompanied by birdsong, I’d ride home, fuelled by echos of the beat pulsing through my veins.
This night was no different, except that this time I wasn’t alone. Soon after she arrived, clad in what looked almost like a down-filled sleeping bag, we headed straight to the club: Tresor.
It was a Monday night. No line. The men on the door were relaxed, ushering us through without subjecting us to the usual silent examination. Or perhaps it was simply obvious what we were there for.
Only once we were properly inside could we make out the muffled bass — like some enormous beast trapped deep underground, pummelling against the earth.
We descended the shallow ramp into the main chamber. Suddenly the bass engulfed us. The air was thick with heat and smoke. Bodies moved in silhouette through the darkness, broken only by faint flashes of red light. This subterranean den could easily have been lifted from Dante’s Inferno. Only this was no punishment for the damned. This was our destination of choice. Our pilgrimage into this heart of darkness.
We danced for hours, broken up only by the need for more air and to share a kiss. There’s something special about the surreal stillness of a kiss in a sea of movement; like being in the eye of the storm.
As children we fear the dark. Very early on it becomes the repository of our anxieties; the place where monsters wait unseen. Death seems to dwell there. I knew that darkness as a child. Some of the tormentors were imaginary. Some were not. And over the decades that followed I would become intimately familiar with other dark nights — depression, grief, despair.
But here on the dance floor, in the raw power of music, elemental, we reclaim the darkness. What once inspired fear is transformed into power. With every pulsing beat we move deeper into communion. Into transcendence. Darkness slowly giving way to light.
This collection of music is, in many ways, a series of sketches — maps, even — attempts to chart the dark, to drill into its core. They are love letters to the strange power that resides there.
In my own journeys into darkness I learned to trust the act of remaining present within it; of perceiving clearly rather than turning away. To stay with the discomfort long enough for something else to emerge.
Because these pieces are so focused, they remain intentionally incomplete. Normally, as a DJ, I would reward the room for coming with me by eventually guiding us back into the light. But not yet.
For now, simply come with me on this journey to the heart of darkness.
Prenzlauer Berg Sessions
For enquiries or bookings, contact Shibumi Records, or email shibumirecords@gmail.com
