Ronald in the mix at Chic Nightclub, 1st of December 1984
Tracklist:
1. The Flirts – Helpless
2. Ken Laszlo – Hey Hey Guy
3. Depeche Mode - Master & Servant
4. Binary – The Meaning
5. Vicio Latino – Que me pasa? Que me pasa?
6. Laserdance – Laserdance (Vocoder Dub Remix)
7. Hypnosis – Argonauts
8. Sparks – With All My Might (Disconet Edit)
9. The Earons – Land of Hunger
10. Murray Head – One Night in Bangkok
11. Hall & Oates – Out of Touch (12 inch version)
12. Billy Ocean – European Queen
13. Peter Brown – (Love is Just) The Game
14. Fox The Fox – Precious Little Diamond
15. Sandy Marton – People from Ibiza
Recorded from tape by Synthauri H. in Dolby C 16th of October 2019
Bild von Synthauri H.
Text von Markus Schneider, The Robot Scientists, 30th of March 2020
These live recordings are from the 1st of December 1984 (part 1) and the of 19th February 1984 (part 2). The CHIC nightclub was located in the late 1970s until the late 1980s in Völklingen/Saar. Back in those days, Völklingen was one of the richest cities in the West Germany because it was home of one of the largest steelworks the country had. The Völklinger Hütte was closed in 1986 and today is a UNESCO world cultural heritage site. The resident DJ’s name was Ronald Springer. Ronald used to work mostly as engineer first at a pirate radio station on an mysterious island in the English Channel off the British coast, then at the BBC and later on in the Studio 54 in New York where he also started DJing before he came to live and work as DJ in the Saarland. He had great connections to record stores in Rotterdam - where he was born - and in Belgium, and the local record store „Musiktruhe“, due to the hundreds of Chic-goers who wanted to play his music at home as well, also had Italian „Il Disc“ and other import records available. His musical background made his club music selection truly legendary, an eclectic and quality-focused DJ style, hit-oriented in the early hours of the night, more club and underground in the later hours, somewhere between Italo Disco, HiNRG, Synthpop, New Wave and EBM. The club featured one of the biggest show lasers at that time in Germany, the laser shows were exceptional, accompagnied by atmospheric electro tracks like Newcleus – Automan (Dub). Many people say that apart from the Dorian Gray in Frankfurt, the CHIC was the best club in the whole South-West of Germany, a region with more than 20 million inhabitants. Weekends with 2000 guests were not rare in the heyday of the steelworks. People had money and loved to party, Poppers, Wavers, New Romantics, sometimes even Punks showed up and had amazing nights together. Italo Disco acts like Den Harrow or Ago had live performances there, there were fashion shows, model and dance contests. The club also featured an own restaurant and cinema.
Ronald established our (The Robot Scientists) love for underground club music. Much later on, around 2008, we became personal friends with Ronald and we played some nights together in cocktail bars, icecream parlors and clubs in their hometown Saarbrücken, he also joined us when we supported Giorgio Moroder in Luxemburg and was really happy to meet him in person. Unfortunately, Ronald Springer died very suddenly and far too early at the age of 63 the 3rd of March 2018.
This live recording thus is a tribute to an outstanding and highly influential DJ who shaped the youth and musical taste of thousands of CHIC goers. Through him, they had a great time listening to outstanding electronic music.
