The Mid-90s – Moscow's First Clubs. The Monster Music Store

DJ Kolya:
"Then the club 'Pilot' appeared, the first DJ championship, when we saw for real how genuine DJs work with vinyl. We got terribly fired up by the whole thing and, again, it was Vanya who, by some miracle, got hold of real turntables. We practised hard at home, and once we were even allowed to play at 'Pilot'. This was already the time of the dawn of Moscow's house culture. Zhenya Zhmakin was already doing Mondays at Manhattan Express; Penthouse, 'Ptyuch' and LSDance were up and running. The scene was one big thing and everyone went round the clubs in one friendly crowd. You hardly needed any money. You could always find a crack to squeeze into a club through, saving on the ticket. You could whine for hours at the door, begging that same DJ Volodya to let us into the club. And usually it worked. Once inside, we had no need to buy anything at the bar or urgently get hold of drugs. Everyone was content with the very fact that the club existed and that you were at the party. The demands were different, and no one was bothered by bad lighting, bad sound or a 'low-quality crowd'. Nothing weighed on us. Back then people got ready for parties. A month ahead everyone already knew that so-and-so — Fonar or Volodya or Yozh — would be playing there, everyone talked about it and started looking for a way to 'blag' their way into the event. So on the appointed day so many people would gather that there was a real risk of not getting into the party. Because the club was simply physically unable to hold everyone who wanted in. People waited outside in huge queues, and there was always the risk that the doors would simply close right in front of your nose.
DJs were gods. People worshipped them, tried to help them in everything. It seems to me that the foundation of today's popularity of Fonar, Spider and Fish was laid precisely then. They did so much that today it's simply indecent not to respect them. They were the first. And whoever was first will never become second, or third, or fourth.
At night I played at 'Titanik', at Manhattan Express, I was a resident at 'Justo', and by day I worked at the Monster Music store, where I got to know all the DJs. A lot depended on me back then. I could set aside a needed record for someone, give a tip, since some things DJs simply didn't notice, flicking past them automatically. But I knew every record, and I knew exactly what Fonar or Groove or Spider needed."