Berghain Nights: A Journey Through Techno and Berlin Club Culture

One of the Books of the Year 2025 at The Irish Times

A pulsing, personal, and fabulous ride through the music and culture of an iconic nightclub scene.

Fascinated by Berlin nightclub Berghain’s strange techno and stranger goings-on, Liam Cagney journeys through techno’s history, from Detroit to Tokyo, and explores Berlin club culture in all its color and intensity. Berghain Nights is the result. From kinky parties in the labyrinthine KitKat Club to the smoky gloom of Tresor’s repurposed bank vault, to the psychedelic lab of Cocktail d’Amore, Berghain Nights not only captures the excitement of Berlin club culture but also asks how techno in a queer club context can help people strip away their inherited hang-ups to find a truer self.

Berghain Nights is about spiritual frenzy and soulful music, countercultural urgency, and capitalistic cash-ins. It’s a story of the most notorious club in the world and of a scene that, enthralling thousands every weekend, feeds billions annually into Berlin’s economy. In the midst of it all is the story of a person who, having gone through life feeling like an alien, finds himself in the most alien place imaginable--and feels at home there.

Liam Cagney is a novelist and musicologist who lives in Berlin. His writing has been described by the Irish Times as ＂stunningly strange and powerful.＂