Broke Magazine reads Tresor: True Stories

Broke Magazine introduces Tresor 31; the iconic institution’s first archive book, which includes 400+ pictures, works by 20 photographers, and 40 tales, some of which have never been told before.

The characters represented in the book originated or observed the background and effects of the ‘big bang’ that introduced techno to Berlin in the early 1990s. It also includes pictures from Tresor’s personal collection, such as archival photographs, flyers, papers, press clippings, record covers, and much evidence from the raw rave floor.

The pages Tresor narrate on, showcase the flamboyant, grudge and rebelling attitude of the rave scene within the most iconic moment in history (for that social group). The book is a triumphant peek inside days which cannot, and will not be relived, only recreated in modern times. As people get swayed back into the rave, and DJ culture, especially with the next current boom of techno, this book is a perfect reflection on the birth of raving.

In the book, they recount the history of Tresor in minute detail, beginning with the discovery of the abandoned vaults of the Wertheim department store by Dimitri Hegemann, Achim Kohlberger, and Johnnie Stieler.

The book also includes personal testimonies of the women who shaped Tresor, such as Carola Stoiber, who ran Tresor Records and A&Red Underground Resistance’s “X-101.”

These colourful anecdotes weave their way through the pages. The late Regina Baer, the co-founder of Kraftwerk and Tresor, ran from 1991 to 2005. She tells tales of her travels to Berlin, her anecdotes from the club’s formative days, and the shift from its initial site to the famous space on Köpenicker Straße in 2005, some of which are among the final documented remarks from Baer, who recently passed.

Other contributors to this oral history include UR co-founders Jeff Mills, “Mad” Mike Banks, Carola Stoiber, Electric Indigo, Mark Reeder, Alexandra Dröhner, and many more.

All credits:

Contributors (oral history): Alexandra Dröhner, Annie Lloyd, Arne Grahm, Barbara Freitag, Blake Baxter, Carola Stoiber, Charlyn Green, Christoph Dreher, Daniel Bell, Daniel Miller, Danielle de Piciotto, Dimitri Hegemann, DJ Rok, Electric Indigo, Ellen Allien, Eric de la Cruz, Frank Quickstern, Hille Saul, Jeff Mills, Johnnie Stieler, Jonzon, Mac Folkes, “Mad” Mike Banks, Mark Owen, Mark Reeder, Mike Huckaby, Pamela Schobess, Regina Baer, Simone Kroll, Stefan “Zappa”, Steve Dessauer, Susanne Deeken, Tanith, Terrible, Thomas Fehlmann, Tilman Brembs, Uwe Reineke

Photography credits: Gustav Volker Horst, Oliver Wia, Tilman Brembs, Wolfgang Brückner, Anja Rosendahl, Camille Blake, Carlos Alberto Heinz, Carola Stoiber, Daffy, Eberle & Eisfeld, Ernst Stratmann, Frankie Casillo, Jan Hillebrecht, Jörg Blank, Helge Birkelbach, Marie Staggat , Martin Holkamp, Norbert Smuda, Susanna Kubernus, Susanne Deeken, Uwe Reineke.