Detroit Enterprise

Sebastian Meissner is a writer and a producer of features for German Public Radio. He is also a sound and music producer who releases his works for German electronic music labels such as Mille Plateaux and Kompakt. Since his first visit to Detroit in 1993, he has returned numerous times and studied its contemporary life and its history. 


In “Detroit Enterprise” - his first publication in eBook format - Meissner combines his writings on the city with interviews, conversations, photography, audio field-recordings and an original music score that he composed for this release. The result is a mixture between an interactive documentary audio book, photojournalistic ebook feature and an podcast


On his exploration of the city, he meets Gary Zimnicki who creates guitars out of abandoned houses; visits the centres of local bicycle culture: The Hub & Back Alley Bikes and joins the local bike party Slow Roll on a trip through Detroit’s East Side; he has the Detroit Techno legend Mike Banks show him his private Detroit; visits Underground Resistance’s home base: Submerge; attends public transport demonstrations at the Rosa Parks Bus Terminal; visits Christians in addiction recovery at a storefront church on Chene Street. in the nearly abandoned Poletown neighbourhood; he  visits the many urban art projects in town and dives into Detroit’s rich blues scene. Together with his local friend, writer and journalist, Walter Wasacz he explores, reflects and meditates on the changes now going on in the city since his first visit in 1993.


This eBook is based on the same titled radio feature for German public broadcaster WDR3, which was aired in October 2014.