Thilo Schmied is exuberantly recalling his teenage years in the shadow of the Wall that divided West Berlin and his home in East Berlin.
Pop music was making life bearable for him and his school friends, so he was beside himself with excitement when in March, 1988 his favourite band, Depeche Mode, was invited by the cultural minister to play in East Berlin.
The Communist government was attempting to appease its citizens by holding concerts of everybody from Shakin' Stevens to Bruce Springsteen, while the Stasi fearfully watched on as young people craned their necks to catch concerts on the other side by Michael Jackson, David Bowie and Pink Floyd.
"Music is not completely responsible for the Wall coming down," Schmied says. "But it's connected politically."
We are in the vast, former ballroom, which is still part of the Hansa Studios in West Berlin. With 15 metre-high coffered ceilings, wooden patterned floorboards, heavy red curtains and chandeliers, Studio 2 or the "Great Hall by the Wall" started as a chamber music hall in 1913, with many uses over the years including as a venue for Gestapo parties. Musicians speak of the magic of its acoustics.
In November this year it will be 25 years since the fall of the Wall (155 km of barbed wire and concrete watched over by towers), and Berlin is celebrating with special events and exhibitions that recognise the division of the city, the Cold War and the events leading up to peaceful reunification in 1989-1990.
The Köthener Strasse 38, in Kreuzberg, known as the Meistersaal, just down the road from the now reconstructed train station of Potzdammer Platz, gives you a feel for those times.
It's where many ground-breaking albums were recorded, particularly in the mid `70s to early `90s, including four by Depeche Mode.
Schmied, a former sound engineer who has exclusive access to the studios, has brought us to Studio 2 via the foyer filled with old photos of rock stars and producers and up a sweeping staircase.
When the Wall went up only metres away in 1961 the building was relegated to the fringes of no man's land, surrounded by fields, rubbish and gypsy camps.
But in 1964 it was bought by the German record label Ariola and then in 1976 by Meisel Music Publishers, with Hansa being one of their subsidiaries.
Not only were the studios a lot cheaper than ones like Abbey Road in London, artists loved the freedom of Studio 2, with only a remote TV camera linking them to the control room down the hallway.
Close your eyes and you can start to imagine its most famous artist, David Bowie, in his elegant style, singing here during the three years in the late `70s he spent in Berlin.
Inspired by German Expressionism, the art movement that exploded there in the early 20th century, writer Christopher Isherwood and the Weimar Republic as well as the theatre of Bertolt Brecht, Bowie did some of his most creative work here, recording the albums known as the Berlin Trilogy - Low and Heroes, while Lodger was completed in Montreux and New York. He also produced The Idiot and Lust for Life for his friend and sometime flatmate, Iggy Pop (the godfather of punk).
On his 66th birthday, January 8, 2013, Bowie came out with his ode to Berlin, Where Are We Now, the wistful single of his first album in 10 years, The Next Day.
We move to the studio's café or green room which was once the control room, where the Wall and watchtowers could once be seen through the window, now blocked by a brick wall of a neighbouring building.
And Schmied tells a story about how one of the sound engineers, Eduard Meyer, flashed one of the lamps at the border guards, as if to say: "We're here."
"Iggy and David yelled, 'Stop, stop they will shoot on us'," he says.
U2's Achtung Baby with the song they composed here, One, was the last big Studio 2 recording in 1991. In a salute to Germany they gave it the facetious title, possibly inspired by Mel Brooks' The Producers.
Renovated in the `80s, Hansa Studio has had a renaissance and is now an active space with musicians from chamber music groups to the bands, R.E.M, Killing Joke, Snow Patrol and The Hives recording here.
IF YOU GO
GETTING THERE: Singapore Airlines flies to Frankfurt via Singapore. Return economy flights start from $2199 ($2150 return from Perth and $1918 from Darwin) inclusive of taxes/surcharges. Call 131011 or visit: singaporeair.com. Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines offer daily flights from Frankfurt connecting to more than 100 destinations in Europe. Call 1300655727 or see lufthansa.com/austrian.com.
STAYING THERE: The Hollywood Media Hotel Berlin is a comfortable four star hotel, conveniently located right on the Kurfürstendamm, which pays homage to the movie world. Visit: filmhotel.de
PLAYING THERE: For more information about Berlin Music Tours: email info@musictours-berlin.de and to book: order@musictours-berlin.de
For information on Berlin Wall celebrations, from November 9, visit: visitBerlin.de
For more information on Germany see: germany.travel
* The writer travelled as a guest of the German National Tourist Office, visitBerlin, Singapore Airlines and Lufthansa.
