Sometime during lockdown, I stumbled upon a movie called Decoder via Tubi and streamed it not knowing what to expect. By the time I reached the end, I wondered, how did I not know this film existed? Released in 1984, Decoder is a German sci-fi film with serious counterculture cred. It stars F.M. Einheit, then a member of Einsturzende Neubauten, and Christiane F. and also features appearances from Genesis P-Orridge and William Burroughs. P-Orridge composed the film’s main theme with Dave Ball of Soft Cell, whose song “Seedy Films” is featured prominently in the movie, alongside music from Neubauten, Einheit and The The.

The Decoder soundtrack, which was just re-released on CD via U.K. label Cold Spring, is killer, which one might expect with that caliber of contributors. The movie, though, is even better. In it, Einheit plays a young man who realizes that the muzak playing in the fast food restaurant is a form of mind control and that he can manipulate the sounds to elicit a completely different response from the public.