Rewind, selecta
Welcome to Rennmeister Pirate Radio, broadcasting live tonight from the the Duke of London headquarters on the Brentford Riviera. But before we turn up the base, let’s rewind the record for a quick trip back in time: During the 1980s and 1990s, London and its suburban areas like Brentford were the epicentre for a new and exciting cultural movement. Every weekend, DJs and partygoers united at underground raves and illegal warehouse parties to celebrate to the fast-paced beats of acid house, jungle, breakbeat, drumnbass and techno. All across Europe, electronic music was on the rise. And areas like Brentford, Hackney or Tottenham with their old industrial warehouses and abandoned parking garages offered the perfect setting for these clandestine gatherings.
Rave on Thursday, Race on Sunday
Here you could party all night long (and often longer) without neighbours complaining and policemen switching on the lights. And while West London promoters alerted the scene about the next rave or garage party with self-made flyers, pirate radio DJS and MCs broadcasted the latest bangers straight to the radio cassette decks of the tuned Ford Fiestas and Vauxhall Astras of the party crowd, making sure they would go wild when hearing them again on the dancefloor on an ecstatic, sweat-drenched early Sunday morning.
Besides gallons of water drunken straight from the tab throughout the night to stay hydrated, the preferred refreshment of the rave and jungle scene was Jägermeister. After all, the little green bottles easily fit into your vintage Adidas trainer jacket – and they were the perfect drink for a quick talk with your mate about last weekend’s touring car championship races during a break for fresh air outside the warehouse with your mate.
A trip back in time
With Rennmeister Pirate Radio, Jägermeister and Classic Driver’s creative agency CD Works went full circle, putting floor to the floor (quite literally) with the defining Jägermeister Racing cars of the era and paying homage to those iconic nightlife moments that formed club culture in these exciting times.
It was the first time that we brought the iconic orange Jägermeister racing cars to the UK since the start of the Rennmeister project in 2021 – and for this special occasion, we picked the most iconic of them all. Claiming their space on the dance floor were three DTM legends – the iconic BMW E30 M3 “Sport Evolution” raced by Armin Hahne in 1992, the alluring Alfa Romeo 155 V6 Ti driven by Michael Bartels between 1994 and 1996 and the Opel Astra V8 from the early 2000s, Jägermeister Racing’s swan song. But just like electronic music, Jägermeister’s racing heritage goes back to the 1970s and 1980s, so we brought two more track veterans to West London, the brutalist BMW E21 320 Group 5 – often referred to as a BMW 3-Series on steroids – and the Porsche 935 sporting its period flat-nose body.
The cars were certainly the stars of the night. But to create a fully immersive 1990s clubbing experience, we added a few more period-correct details to Duke of London’s boiler room: Visual artist James Martin had been commissioned to create a series of animations inspired by animé classics like Akira and Ghost in the Shell, letting the Jägermeister racing cars through grainy VHS dreamscapes, while graphic designer Sokue had not only created an invite and poster reminiscent of Mid-1990s Corel-Draw-to-copyshop party flyers, but also a fanzine celebrating the eclectic and experimental DIY spirit of the era.
And while London’s IT crowd sipped Jägermeister Manifest drinks and post for selfies with a helmeted stag frozen in the headlights of a racecar, it was time for us to close our eyes for just one moment, feel the beat pumping through our bodies – and simply enjoy this trip back in time that has defined so many of us in our taste of cars, music and culture. Rave on Thursday, Race on Sunday, they say. We couldn’t agree more.
Photos: Nikos Karampotis
