German dance duo The Unknown Cases made a mark in club dancefloors with their “afro-cosmic” debut single Masimbabele in 1983.

I don’t remember hearing The Unknown Cases before, which I suppose is rather apt in view of their name. And I don’t remember this brilliant tune at all.

Masimba Bele featured prominently in Peel’s 1984 Festive Fifty and was apparently a big dancefloor favourite in that pre-House, pre-EDM era. 

The Unknown Cases, it transpires, were a pair of German electronic musicians, Helmut Zerlett and Stefan Krachten, from Cologne.

This, their afro-cosmic debut single, was a  collaboration with the Ghanaian percussionist Reebop Kwaku Baah, who had worked with Traffic, Can and Nick Drake.

Tragically, he died just 11 days after its release on New Year’s Day in 1983 so he never got to see what a phenomenon it became, spawning further versions like this.