The Most Mysterious Song On The Internet

2007Internet mystery / lost mediaclassic

Also known as: TMS · Like the Wind · Blind the Wind · Check It In Check It Out · Subways of Your Mind

The Most Mysterious Song On The Internet is an unidentified mid-1980s post-punk track recorded from German radio and uploaded in 2007, sparking a 17-year global hunt solved in 2024 as "Subways of Your Mind" by FEX.

"The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet" is the nickname for an unidentified post-punk track recorded from German radio in the mid-1980s that triggered a 17-year global hunt to discover who made it. First uploaded to music forums in 2007, the song blew up into a worldwide investigation after hitting Reddit and YouTube in 20191. In November 2024, Reddit user marijn1412 finally identified it as "Subways of Your Mind" by FEX, a little-known German new wave band from Kiel2.

TL;DR

"The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet" is the nickname for an unidentified post-punk track recorded from German radio in the mid-1980s that triggered a 17-year global hunt to discover who made it.

Overview

The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet is a roughly four-minute post-punk track with male vocals, guitar, bass, drums, and a cheap-sounding synthesizer3. The recording quality is murky, likely captured from a demo tape broadcast on radio, and the lyrics are nearly impossible to make out even for native English speakers. The singer is believed to be a non-native English speaker, adding another obstacle for anyone attempting a transcription.

For years, listeners argued over whether key lines said "like the wind," "blind the wind," "check it in, check it out," or "subways of my mind"3. Musically, the track was standard early-1980s new wave, drawing comparisons to Depeche Mode, The Cure, and Sisters of Mercy. What made it extraordinary wasn't the music itself but the fact that no music database, recognition software, or rights registry could produce a match1.

The story starts in the mid-1980s in Wilhelmshaven, Germany. A teenager named Darius S. routinely recorded songs off the radio onto cassette tapes from NDR broadcasts1. One of his cassettes, which also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, captured an unknown song most likely from a program called *Musik für junge Leute* ("Music for Young People") hosted by British DJ Paul Baskerville3. Darius had a habit of trimming DJ chatter between songs for cleaner recordings, which is probably why no song title or station identification survived on the tape.

The cassette sat untouched for over two decades. On March 18, 2007, Darius's sister uploaded the track to the music forums spiritofradio.ca and best-of-80s.de under the username "bluuue," explaining it had been recorded from German radio in the 1980s and asking if anyone could identify it5. Nobody could, and the post barely registered.

Origin & Background

Platform
spiritofradio.ca, best-of-80s.de (first upload), Reddit / YouTube (viral spread)
Key People
Lydia / "bluuue", Gabriel Vieira, Justin Whang
Date
2007 (first upload), 2019 (viral spread)
Year
2007

The story starts in the mid-1980s in Wilhelmshaven, Germany. A teenager named Darius S. routinely recorded songs off the radio onto cassette tapes from NDR broadcasts. One of his cassettes, which also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, captured an unknown song most likely from a program called *Musik für junge Leute* ("Music for Young People") hosted by British DJ Paul Baskerville. Darius had a habit of trimming DJ chatter between songs for cleaner recordings, which is probably why no song title or station identification survived on the tape.

The cassette sat untouched for over two decades. On March 18, 2007, Darius's sister uploaded the track to the music forums spiritofradio.ca and best-of-80s.de under the username "bluuue," explaining it had been recorded from German radio in the 1980s and asking if anyone could identify it. Nobody could, and the post barely registered.

How It Spread

The song drifted in obscurity for years. A YouTube upload from April 2011, titled "Unkonow Song," collected about 7,100 views over eight years.

Everything changed in 2019. Brazilian music enthusiast Gabriel Vieira, who had known about the track since 2006, uploaded it to his YouTube channel in April and began posting it across dozens of music subreddits. On July 1, 2019, he created the dedicated community r/TheMysteriousSong, which grew to tens of thousands of members. That same month, YouTuber Justin Whang posted a deep-dive video about the song, and the search went international.

German radio station Radio Eins played the track on air in August 2019, and coverage spread to major outlets including *Rolling Stone* and *Zeit Online*. The original uploader, now going by "Lydia," reconnected with the search community around this time and confirmed the backstory about her brother's recordings. She provided higher-quality versions of the audio in both MP3 and FLAC.

A Wikipedia article about the song was created in December 2019. But despite years of organized effort and contact with hundreds of defunct bands from the era, the track stayed unidentified.

How to Use This Meme

The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet is not a traditional meme template. It functions as a cultural reference point for internet mysteries and collaborative investigation. People typically invoke it in a few ways:

- As shorthand for an unsolvable puzzle: When someone encounters unidentified media with no known source, comparing it to "the most mysterious song on the internet" signals the depth of the mystery. - In lostwave communities: The song is the flagship example of "lostwave," a label for music of unknown or obscure origins. Finding a new unidentified track is often framed as "the next most mysterious song." - As a case study in crowdsourced research: The 17-year investigation and its eventual resolution are frequently cited in conversations about the power of distributed internet detective work.

Cultural Impact

The search for the Most Mysterious Song became one of the internet's longest collaborative investigations. The subreddit r/TheMysteriousSong attracted tens of thousands of members, and the story drew coverage from CBS News, *Der Spiegel*, *Rolling Stone*, *Zeit Online*, and other outlets worldwide. The identification in November 2024 generated a fresh wave of international media attention.

The track is widely considered the defining example of "lostwave," a community-coined term for unidentified music with obscure origins. The story showed how a combination of online community organization, newspaper archive research, and old-fashioned detective work could solve a puzzle that automated tools like Shazam and professional music databases could not.

For FEX, the resolution brought unexpected fame four decades after their regional heyday. Hädrich told CBS News that the attention came "suddenly" for the band after a lifetime of obscurity. Their planned reunion and re-recording represent a rare case where solving an internet mystery directly revived a forgotten artist's career.

Full History

The investigation that cracked the Most Mysterious Song was one of the internet's most organized crowdsourced detective efforts, spanning forums, newspaper archives, radio stations, and private cassette collections.

After the 2019 viral surge, r/TheMysteriousSong and its linked Discord server operated as coordinated command centers. Volunteers split up tasks: some analyzed instrumentation, others pored over lyrics in a dedicated channel, and still others tracked down obscure band names from the early-1980s German new wave scene. An early investigative thread focused on Paul Baskerville, the British DJ who hosted NDR's *Musik für junge Leute*. Baskerville cooperated with the searchers and even played the track on his own show in 2019, but he could not confirm the song had ever been in his rotation.

Dead ends were constant. The investigation cast a wide net across 1980s German music, contacting band members and vocalists from the era, but none recognized the recording. Shazam was useless: a teenager had uploaded the song to Spotify as his own, poisoning the recognition software's database. And GEMA, Germany's performance rights organization, had no record of the track.

The breakthrough arrived on November 4, 2024. Reddit user marijn1412 announced the song was "Subways of Your Mind" by a band called FEX from Kiel. The discovery grew out of research into Hörfest, an annual showcase for local bands organized by a Hamburg public broadcaster in the early 1980s. While combing through regional newspaper archives, marijn1412 found an article in the *Nordwest Zeitung* describing FEX as a band playing "Rock with Wave and Pop influences" that won a talent contest in Bremen in September 1984.

One name stuck out: Michael Hädrich, a FEX member who was also connected to a band called Phret that had performed at Hörfest in 1983. After reaching out, Hädrich shared a collection of old FEX recordings, one of which unmistakably matched the mystery song.

Hädrich, 68 and still active as a musician, had no idea the song he and his friends recorded over 40 years ago had attracted such a devoted following. "I thought it was amazing that someone was interested in music by a band that was only successful regionally, if at all, and that was over 40 years ago," he told CBS News. At his request, marijn1412 held off on the public announcement until the band members reconnected and registered the song with GEMA.

The full recording history turned out to be surprisingly rich. FEX first recorded "Subways of Your Mind" in June 1984 at a rehearsal space in Heikendorf with bassist Jörg Lemcke. A second version, the one broadcast on NDR, was recorded at Löffelstudios in Ganderkesee. A third, polished studio take was made in November 1984 at Hawkeye Studios and appeared on a 1985 EP sold at concerts. Each version differs slightly in lyrics and arrangement.

The song was composed by lead vocalist Ture Rückwardt. In a 2024 interview, keyboardist Hädrich explained its emotional core: "It is the mixture of the 'no future' atmosphere at that time. Remember, it was the Cold War in the eighties, everyone thought eventually someone is going to hit the red button. So the song had this 'sun will never shine' parts in it, but also 'the young and restless dreamers.' I think this contrast, this mixture of positive and fear, makes the song so attractive".

Following the identification, FEX announced plans to reunite, re-record "Subways of Your Mind," and produce a music video. For Hädrich, the fame arrived without warning after four decades of total obscurity. "For us, it has just come suddenly," he told CBS News.

Fun Facts

The cassette that started everything also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, placing the mystery track squarely in early-1980s new wave radio.

Shazam could not help for years because a teenager had uploaded the song to Spotify as his own, poisoning the software's identification database.

The original recorder Darius noted the title as "Blind the Wind" on the cassette, but the community agreed the lyric more likely said "Like the Wind" or something else entirely.

FEX had never registered "Subways of Your Mind" with GEMA, which is why the song never appeared in Germany's comprehensive music rights database.

Despite attracting a global investigation and enormous online attention, the band members had no idea about any of it until a Reddit user emailed them in 2024.

Derivatives & Variations

FEX reunion project:

The identification directly led to the band announcing plans to reunite, re-record "Subways of Your Mind," and produce a music video for the song[2].

Further "lost song" investigations:

The community behind the search, energized by their success, pivoted to hunting other unidentified tracks from the same era[2].

Media deep-dive coverage:

The story attracted multiple long-form articles and video essays from outlets including CBS News, *Der Spiegel*, and *Rolling Stone*, establishing a template for internet mystery journalism[1].

Frequently Asked Questions

The Most Mysterious Song On The Internet

2007Internet mystery / lost mediaclassic

Also known as: TMS · Like the Wind · Blind the Wind · Check It In Check It Out · Subways of Your Mind

The Most Mysterious Song On The Internet is an unidentified mid-1980s post-punk track recorded from German radio and uploaded in 2007, sparking a 17-year global hunt solved in 2024 as "Subways of Your Mind" by FEX.

"The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet" is the nickname for an unidentified post-punk track recorded from German radio in the mid-1980s that triggered a 17-year global hunt to discover who made it. First uploaded to music forums in 2007, the song blew up into a worldwide investigation after hitting Reddit and YouTube in 2019. In November 2024, Reddit user marijn1412 finally identified it as "Subways of Your Mind" by FEX, a little-known German new wave band from Kiel.

TL;DR

"The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet" is the nickname for an unidentified post-punk track recorded from German radio in the mid-1980s that triggered a 17-year global hunt to discover who made it.

Overview

The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet is a roughly four-minute post-punk track with male vocals, guitar, bass, drums, and a cheap-sounding synthesizer. The recording quality is murky, likely captured from a demo tape broadcast on radio, and the lyrics are nearly impossible to make out even for native English speakers. The singer is believed to be a non-native English speaker, adding another obstacle for anyone attempting a transcription.

For years, listeners argued over whether key lines said "like the wind," "blind the wind," "check it in, check it out," or "subways of my mind". Musically, the track was standard early-1980s new wave, drawing comparisons to Depeche Mode, The Cure, and Sisters of Mercy. What made it extraordinary wasn't the music itself but the fact that no music database, recognition software, or rights registry could produce a match.

The story starts in the mid-1980s in Wilhelmshaven, Germany. A teenager named Darius S. routinely recorded songs off the radio onto cassette tapes from NDR broadcasts. One of his cassettes, which also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, captured an unknown song most likely from a program called *Musik für junge Leute* ("Music for Young People") hosted by British DJ Paul Baskerville. Darius had a habit of trimming DJ chatter between songs for cleaner recordings, which is probably why no song title or station identification survived on the tape.

The cassette sat untouched for over two decades. On March 18, 2007, Darius's sister uploaded the track to the music forums spiritofradio.ca and best-of-80s.de under the username "bluuue," explaining it had been recorded from German radio in the 1980s and asking if anyone could identify it. Nobody could, and the post barely registered.

Origin & Background

Platform
spiritofradio.ca, best-of-80s.de (first upload), Reddit / YouTube (viral spread)
Key People
Lydia / "bluuue", Gabriel Vieira, Justin Whang
Date
2007 (first upload), 2019 (viral spread)
Year
2007

The story starts in the mid-1980s in Wilhelmshaven, Germany. A teenager named Darius S. routinely recorded songs off the radio onto cassette tapes from NDR broadcasts. One of his cassettes, which also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, captured an unknown song most likely from a program called *Musik für junge Leute* ("Music for Young People") hosted by British DJ Paul Baskerville. Darius had a habit of trimming DJ chatter between songs for cleaner recordings, which is probably why no song title or station identification survived on the tape.

The cassette sat untouched for over two decades. On March 18, 2007, Darius's sister uploaded the track to the music forums spiritofradio.ca and best-of-80s.de under the username "bluuue," explaining it had been recorded from German radio in the 1980s and asking if anyone could identify it. Nobody could, and the post barely registered.

How It Spread

The song drifted in obscurity for years. A YouTube upload from April 2011, titled "Unkonow Song," collected about 7,100 views over eight years.

Everything changed in 2019. Brazilian music enthusiast Gabriel Vieira, who had known about the track since 2006, uploaded it to his YouTube channel in April and began posting it across dozens of music subreddits. On July 1, 2019, he created the dedicated community r/TheMysteriousSong, which grew to tens of thousands of members. That same month, YouTuber Justin Whang posted a deep-dive video about the song, and the search went international.

German radio station Radio Eins played the track on air in August 2019, and coverage spread to major outlets including *Rolling Stone* and *Zeit Online*. The original uploader, now going by "Lydia," reconnected with the search community around this time and confirmed the backstory about her brother's recordings. She provided higher-quality versions of the audio in both MP3 and FLAC.

A Wikipedia article about the song was created in December 2019. But despite years of organized effort and contact with hundreds of defunct bands from the era, the track stayed unidentified.

How to Use This Meme

The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet is not a traditional meme template. It functions as a cultural reference point for internet mysteries and collaborative investigation. People typically invoke it in a few ways:

- As shorthand for an unsolvable puzzle: When someone encounters unidentified media with no known source, comparing it to "the most mysterious song on the internet" signals the depth of the mystery. - In lostwave communities: The song is the flagship example of "lostwave," a label for music of unknown or obscure origins. Finding a new unidentified track is often framed as "the next most mysterious song." - As a case study in crowdsourced research: The 17-year investigation and its eventual resolution are frequently cited in conversations about the power of distributed internet detective work.

Cultural Impact

The search for the Most Mysterious Song became one of the internet's longest collaborative investigations. The subreddit r/TheMysteriousSong attracted tens of thousands of members, and the story drew coverage from CBS News, *Der Spiegel*, *Rolling Stone*, *Zeit Online*, and other outlets worldwide. The identification in November 2024 generated a fresh wave of international media attention.

The track is widely considered the defining example of "lostwave," a community-coined term for unidentified music with obscure origins. The story showed how a combination of online community organization, newspaper archive research, and old-fashioned detective work could solve a puzzle that automated tools like Shazam and professional music databases could not.

For FEX, the resolution brought unexpected fame four decades after their regional heyday. Hädrich told CBS News that the attention came "suddenly" for the band after a lifetime of obscurity. Their planned reunion and re-recording represent a rare case where solving an internet mystery directly revived a forgotten artist's career.

Full History

The investigation that cracked the Most Mysterious Song was one of the internet's most organized crowdsourced detective efforts, spanning forums, newspaper archives, radio stations, and private cassette collections.

After the 2019 viral surge, r/TheMysteriousSong and its linked Discord server operated as coordinated command centers. Volunteers split up tasks: some analyzed instrumentation, others pored over lyrics in a dedicated channel, and still others tracked down obscure band names from the early-1980s German new wave scene. An early investigative thread focused on Paul Baskerville, the British DJ who hosted NDR's *Musik für junge Leute*. Baskerville cooperated with the searchers and even played the track on his own show in 2019, but he could not confirm the song had ever been in his rotation.

Dead ends were constant. The investigation cast a wide net across 1980s German music, contacting band members and vocalists from the era, but none recognized the recording. Shazam was useless: a teenager had uploaded the song to Spotify as his own, poisoning the recognition software's database. And GEMA, Germany's performance rights organization, had no record of the track.

The breakthrough arrived on November 4, 2024. Reddit user marijn1412 announced the song was "Subways of Your Mind" by a band called FEX from Kiel. The discovery grew out of research into Hörfest, an annual showcase for local bands organized by a Hamburg public broadcaster in the early 1980s. While combing through regional newspaper archives, marijn1412 found an article in the *Nordwest Zeitung* describing FEX as a band playing "Rock with Wave and Pop influences" that won a talent contest in Bremen in September 1984.

One name stuck out: Michael Hädrich, a FEX member who was also connected to a band called Phret that had performed at Hörfest in 1983. After reaching out, Hädrich shared a collection of old FEX recordings, one of which unmistakably matched the mystery song.

Hädrich, 68 and still active as a musician, had no idea the song he and his friends recorded over 40 years ago had attracted such a devoted following. "I thought it was amazing that someone was interested in music by a band that was only successful regionally, if at all, and that was over 40 years ago," he told CBS News. At his request, marijn1412 held off on the public announcement until the band members reconnected and registered the song with GEMA.

The full recording history turned out to be surprisingly rich. FEX first recorded "Subways of Your Mind" in June 1984 at a rehearsal space in Heikendorf with bassist Jörg Lemcke. A second version, the one broadcast on NDR, was recorded at Löffelstudios in Ganderkesee. A third, polished studio take was made in November 1984 at Hawkeye Studios and appeared on a 1985 EP sold at concerts. Each version differs slightly in lyrics and arrangement.

The song was composed by lead vocalist Ture Rückwardt. In a 2024 interview, keyboardist Hädrich explained its emotional core: "It is the mixture of the 'no future' atmosphere at that time. Remember, it was the Cold War in the eighties, everyone thought eventually someone is going to hit the red button. So the song had this 'sun will never shine' parts in it, but also 'the young and restless dreamers.' I think this contrast, this mixture of positive and fear, makes the song so attractive".

Following the identification, FEX announced plans to reunite, re-record "Subways of Your Mind," and produce a music video. For Hädrich, the fame arrived without warning after four decades of total obscurity. "For us, it has just come suddenly," he told CBS News.

Fun Facts

The cassette that started everything also contained tracks by XTC and The Cure, placing the mystery track squarely in early-1980s new wave radio.

Shazam could not help for years because a teenager had uploaded the song to Spotify as his own, poisoning the software's identification database.

The original recorder Darius noted the title as "Blind the Wind" on the cassette, but the community agreed the lyric more likely said "Like the Wind" or something else entirely.

FEX had never registered "Subways of Your Mind" with GEMA, which is why the song never appeared in Germany's comprehensive music rights database.

Despite attracting a global investigation and enormous online attention, the band members had no idea about any of it until a Reddit user emailed them in 2024.

Derivatives & Variations

FEX reunion project:

The identification directly led to the band announcing plans to reunite, re-record "Subways of Your Mind," and produce a music video for the song[2].

Further "lost song" investigations:

The community behind the search, energized by their success, pivoted to hunting other unidentified tracks from the same era[2].

Media deep-dive coverage:

The story attracted multiple long-form articles and video essays from outlets including CBS News, *Der Spiegel*, and *Rolling Stone*, establishing a template for internet mystery journalism[1].

Frequently Asked Questions