Rotterdam, 1997… a regular wednesday in the small Clone Record store. Our imports shipment from the USA arrived… the highlight of the week!!! New releases that have been ordered from a fax list from the American distributors. In these days it was just phone calls and infosheets rolling from the faxmachine! New records from Detroit, New York, Chicago that I ordered but never heard before. Labels and artists that were unknown… just trusting your gut feeling while reading the description on the fax list and seeing the artist name and track titles. It felt like gambling with scratchcards… hit or miss! This shipment had a bunch of records that looked kinda obscure inbetween the many NY house records and harder acid and techno listed. The names looked cool so I ordered some copies… “Cybonix – Cybonix in Effect”, “DJ Assault – Tec De France” on D-bass Records, “D.I.E. – The Men You’ll Never See” were listed with restocks of old Incognito titles such as Tronikhouse… could be something nice!?

About 5 copies of each title arrived… I broke the seal on my baggy Stussy pants, put the needle on… and there it goes Boom Pack, Boom Boom Pack, Boom Pack, Boom Boom Pack… That’s the shit… That’s some energy going on right here…wait… what’s that?? A guy with a mic?? Bang, that quirky sharp bassline drops…. wooowww!!! “To all the people in the house, I’ve got two things to say and that’s… Get Up!” Crazy stuff… I like it! Flipping over to the other side… Cosmic Cars vibes… killer! These guys knew their classics, it sounded like a cover version of Cybotron’s Cosmic Cars???! I could tell from the music… I like these guys!. Ok… Last tune… Deep Space Detroit Techno Electro… I got all exited. This is the shit!!! This whole record is gold! “Driving in my car… Making techno tracks… People try to stop me… But I keep on going because I’m the man you’ll never see!” Goose bumps!!! That’s us… The Men You’ll Never See… just a bunch of freaks making techno tracks, playing them in the car with friends, at small parties hosted by ourselves or even imaginary parties in our bedroom. Not looking for fame or trying to make shitloads of money. We preferred music from DIY labels and anonymous producers… let the music do the talking… as pure as it could be! “We’re The Men You’ll Never see” that’s our vibe and D.I.E. made the perfect theme to that vibe!

The regulars came in for their thursday and friday round of record shopping looking for the latest techno and house imports, the latest bangers for their regular dj gigs at the local clubs. Sure, no worries… I got their back! No shortage of good records from all over the place in my little recordstore! Axis, Kanzleramt, Prescription, 7th city, Strictly Rhythm, Soul City, UR etc. etc.
I did put a small stack aside with these electro 12’s for the saturday morning when the out of town regulars from Alkmaar and The Hague plus the local guys with a day job came in; Pim Pametex, Electronome, Edo8, Cosmic Force, I-f, Duplex etc.
Everything sold out after a couple days… I had work to do. I needed restocks so I started faxing to the number on the records. Long story short… a longtime friendship was started and we did a remix ep on Clone Records with killer remixes by Adult. I-f and Electronome all going against the stream showing their love for Wave and Electro and delivering superb tracks.

Now it’s 2018… The world did change… Nobody is a man or woman you’ll never see… everyone’s got a camera in their hand and is a voyeur looking at other peoples lives. It’s all about seeing and being seen these days… Facebook and Instagram and their algorithms are setting the rules and often it seems that music is of secondary importance. But the music is still here… We are still here and we’re still making techno tracks. At the end the music is the only truth!
Needless to say it’s a proud moment to be able to offer 20 years after the initial release.., the official re-release of “The Men You’ll Never See – Part 1 and Part 2”

Peace,
Serge

The Men You’ll Never See pt.1

The Men You’ll Never See pt.2