Compilation Review: ‘Berghain 06 – Norman Nodge’ (Ostgut Ton)

★★★★☆

Just from the titles, this is techno on a guided tour through a weapons catalog and stockroom of spare parts for when your inner hard drive fails you. The mythical Berghain aura, given an almost fantastical scope by Norman Nodge, foretells a back entrance through vaporous winds and storage of broken hopes. This is before the dance floor arrives at your feet, 4/4s nearing until they scythe through an impressively processed atmosphere, the beast awoken when Patrick Gräser’s ‘From Foreign Territories’ locks on with radar-circling beats.

The mystical entrance disappearing into a mirage, Nodge resets, pursues murk and pinballs beats from Staffan Linzatti, before Silent Servant hits the accelerator and fully clears the fog so you can now see the attacker rampaging towards you. Then embarking on a long stretch that grinds away with grim procedure, ribs are jabbed until your heart pulls the emergency exit lever on your chest. As the mix races down one single corridor, dodging nuclear fallout as it goes, Mark Broom tampering with the combination to “Vault 5” diverts attention with tingles to the backbone, a longed-for shade of depth looking down at the void with a slightly different focus. Chancellor recommences the pummelling that won’t have its head turned, but some concluding divergence involving Tim Taylor & DJ Slip, Radioactive Man and Legowelt suddenly turns the mix into the model three-headed monster of start-middle-end.

File under: Prosumer, Marcel Fengler, Mike Denhert