Techno

Techno is a genre of electronic music which is generally produced for use in a continuous DJ set, with tempos being in the range from 120 to 150 beats per minute (bpm). The central rhythm is

Detroit techno#

In exploring Detroit techno’s origins, writer Kodwo Eshun maintains that “Kraftwerk are to techno what Muddy Waters is to the Rolling Stones: the authentic, the origin, the real.” Juan Atkins has acknowledged that he had an early enthusiasm for Kraftwerk and Giorgio Moroder, particularly Moroder’s work with Donna Summer and the producer’s own album E=MC 2 . Atkins also mentions that “around 1980, I had a tape of nothing but Kraftwerk, Telex, Devo, Giorgio Moroder and Gary Numan, and I’d ride around in my car playing it.” Derrick May identified the influence of Kraftwerk and other European synthesizer music in commenting that “it was just classy and clean, and to us it was beautiful, like outer space. Living around Detroit, there was so little beauty… everything is an ugly mess in Detroit, and so we were attracted to this music. It, like, ignited our imagination!”. May has commented that he considered his music a direct continuation of the European synthesizer tradition. He also identified Japanese synth-pop act Yellow Magic Orchestra, particularly member Ryuichi Sakamoto, and British band Ultravox, as influences, along with Kraftwerk. YMO’s song “Technopolis” (1979), a tribute to Tokyo as an electronic mecca, is considered an “interesting contribution” to the development of Detroit techno, foreshadowing concepts that Atkins and Davis would later explore with Cybotron. Kevin Saunderson has also acknowledged the influence of Europe but he claims to have been more inspired by the idea of making music with electronic equipment: “I was more infatuated with the idea that I can do this all myself.”

School days#

Prior to achieving notoriety, Atkins, Saunderson, May, and Fowlkes shared common interests as budding musicians, “mix” tape traders, and aspiring DJs. They also found musical inspiration via the Midnight Funk Association, an eclectic five-hour late-night radio program hosted on various Detroit radio stations, including WCHB, WGPR, and WJLB-FM from 1977 through the mid-1980s by DJ Charles “The Electrifying Mojo” Johnson. Mojo’s show featured electronic music by artists such as Giorgio Moroder, Kraftwerk, Yellow Magic Orchestra and Tangerine Dream, alongside the funk sounds of acts such as Parliament Funkadelic and dance oriented new wave music by bands like Devo and the B-52’s. Atkins has noted: Despite the short-lived disco boom in Detroit, it had the effect of inspiring many individuals to take up mixing, Juan Atkins among them. Subsequently, Atkins taught May how to mix records, and in 1981, “Magic Juan”, Derrick “Mayday”, in conjunction with three other DJ’s, one of whom was Eddie “Flashin” Fowlkes, launched themselves as a party crew called Deep Space Soundworks (also referred to as Deep Space). In 1980 or 1981, they met with Mojo and proposed that they provide mixes for his show, which they did end up doing the following year. allowed the young promoters to develop and nurture a local dance music scene. As the local scene grew in popularity, DJs began to band together to market their mixing skills and sound systems to clubs that were hoping to attract larger audiences. Local church activity centers, vacant warehouses, offices, and YMCA auditoriums were the early locations where the musical form was nurtured.

Juan Atkins#

Of the four individuals responsible for establishing techno as a genre in its own right, Juan Atkins is widely cited as “The Originator”. In 1995, the American music technology publication Keyboard Magazine honored him as one of 12 Who Count in the history of keyboard music. In the early 1980s, Atkins began recording with musical partner Richard Davis (and later with a third member, Jon-5) as Cybotron. This trio released a number of rock and electro-inspired tunes, the most successful of which were Clear (1983) and its moodier followup, “Techno City” (1984). Atkins used the term techno to describe Cybotron’s music, taking inspiration from Futurist author Alvin Toffler, the original source for words such as cybotron and metroplex. Atkins has described earlier synthesizer based acts like Kraftwerk as techno, although many would consider both Kraftwerk’s and Juan’s Cybotron outputs as electro. Atkins viewed Cybotron’s Cosmic Cars (1982) as unique, Germanic, synthesized funk, but he later heard Afrika Bambaataa’s “Planet Rock” (1982) and considered it to be a superior example of the music he envisioned. Inspired, he resolved to continue experimenting, and he encouraged Saunderson and May to do likewise. Eventually, Atkins started producing his own music under the pseudonym Model 500, and in 1985 he established the record label Metroplex. The same year saw an important turning point for the Detroit scene with the release of Model 500’s “No UFO’s,” a seminal work that is generally considered the first techno production. Of this time, Atkins has said:

Chicago#

The music’s producers, especially May and Saunderson, admit to having been fascinated by the Chicago club scene and influenced by house in particular. May’s 1987 hit “Strings of Life” (released under the alias Rhythim Is Rhythim sic ) is considered a classic in both the house and techno genres. Juan Atkins also believes that the first acid house producers, seeking to distance house music from disco, emulated the techno sound. Atkins also suggests that the Chicago house sound developed as a result of Frankie Knuckles’ using a drum machine he bought from Derrick May. He claims: In the UK, a club following for house music grew steadily from 1985, with interest sustained by scenes in London, Manchester, Nottingham, and later Sheffield and Leeds. The DJs thought to be responsible for house’s early UK success include Mike Pickering, Mark Moore, Colin Faver, and Graeme Park (DJ).

Detroit sound#

The early producers, enabled by the increasing affordability of sequencers and synthesizers, merged a European synth-pop aesthetic with aspects of soul, funk, disco, and electro, pushing EDM into uncharted terrain. They deliberately rejected the Motown legacy and traditional formulas of R&B and soul, and instead embraced technological experimentation. The resulting Detroit sound was interpreted by Derrick May and one journalist in 1988 as a “post-soul” sound with no debt to Motown, May described the sound of techno as something that is “…like Detroit…a complete mistake. It’s like George Clinton and Kraftwerk are stuck in an elevator with only a sequencer to keep them company.” One of the first Detroit productions to receive wider attention was Derrick May’s “Strings of Life” (1987), which, together with May’s previous release, “Nude Photo” (1987), helped raise techno’s profile in Europe, especially the UK and Germany, during the 1987–1988 house music boom (see Second Summer of Love). It became May’s best known track, which, according to Frankie Knuckles, “just exploded. It was like something you can’t imagine, the kind of power and energy people got off that record when it was first heard. Mike Dunn says he has no idea how people can accept a record that doesn’t have a bassline.”

Acid house#

By 1988, house music had exploded in the UK, and acid house was increasingly popular. dance music. Acid house party fever escalated in London and Manchester, and it quickly became a cultural phenomenon. MDMA-fueled club goers, faced with 2 A.M. closing hours, sought refuge in the warehouse party scene that ran all night. To escape the attention of the press and the authorities, this after-hours activity quickly went underground. Within a year, however, up to 10,000 people at a time were attending the first commercially organized mass parties, called “raves”, and a media storm ensued. The success of house and acid house paved the way for wider acceptance of the Detroit sound, and vice versa: techno was initially supported by a handful of house music clubs in Chicago, New York, and Northern England, with London clubs catching up later; but in 1987, it was “Strings of Life” which eased London club-goers into acceptance of house, according to DJ Mark Moore.

The New Dance Sound of Detroit#

The mid-1988 UK release of Techno! The New Dance Sound of Detroit, an album compiled by ex-Northern Soul DJ and Kool Kat Records boss Neil Rushton (at the time an A&R scout for Virgin’s “10 Records” imprint) and Derrick May, introduced of the word techno to UK audiences. The compilation’s working title had been The House Sound of Detroit until the addition of Atkins’ song “Techno Music” prompted reconsideration. Rushton was later quoted as saying he, Atkins, May, and Saunderson came up with the compilation’s final name together, and that the Belleville Three voted down calling the music some kind of regional brand of house; they instead favored a term they were already using, techno. Derrick May views this as one of his busiest times and recalls that it was a period where he Commercially, the release did not fare as well and failed to recoup, but Inner City’s production “Big Fun” (1988), a track that was almost not included on the compilation, became a crossover hit in fall 1988. According to May, ZTT label boss Trevor Horn had envisaged that the trio would be marketed as a “black Petshop Boys.” Despite Virgin Records’ disappointment with the poor sales of Rushton’s compilation, the record was successful in establishing an identity for techno and was instrumental in creating a platform in Europe for both the music and its producers. Ultimately, the release served to distinguish the Detroit sound from Chicago house and other forms of underground dance music that were emerging during the rave era of the late 1980s and early 1990s, a period during which techno became more adventurous and distinct.

Music Institute#

In mid-1988, developments in the Detroit scene led to the opening of a nightclub called the Music Institute (MI), located at 1315 Broadway in downtown Detroit. The venue was secured by George Baker and Alton Miller with Darryl Wynn and Derrick May participating as Friday night DJs, and Baker and Chez Damier playing to a mostly gay crowd on Saturday nights. The club closed on 24 November 1989, with Derrick May playing “Strings of Life” along with a recording of clock tower bells. May explains: Though short-lived, MI was known internationally for its all-night sets, its sparse white rooms, and its juice bar stocked with “smart drinks” (the Institute never served liquor). The MI, notes Dan Sicko, along with Detroit’s early techno pioneers, “helped give life to one of the city’s important musical subcultures – one that was slowly growing into an international scene.”

German techno#

In 1982, while working at Frankfurt’s City Music record store, DJ started to use the term techno to categorize artists such as Depeche Mode, Front 242, Heaven 17, Kraftwerk and New Order, with the word used as shorthand for technologically created dance music. Talla’s categorization became a point of reference for other DJs, including Sven Väth. Talla further popularized the term in Germany when he founded at Frankfurt’s No Name Club in 1984, which later moved to the Dorian Gray club in 1987.

Frankfurt tape scene#

Inspired by Talla’s music selection, in the early 80s several young artists from Frankfurt started to experiment on cassette tapes with electronic music coming from the City Music record store, mixing the latest catalogue with additional electronic sounds and pitched BPM. This became known as the Frankfurt tape scene. The Frankfurt tape scene evolved around the early and experimental work done by the likes of Tobias Freund, Uwe Schmidt, Lars Müller and Martin Schopf. Some of the work done by Andreas Tomalla, Markus Nikolai and Thomas Franzmann evolved in collaborative work under the Bigod 20 collective. While this early work was strongly characterized as experimental electronic music fused with strong EBM, krautrock, synth-pop and technopop influences, the later work during the mid and late 1980s clearly transitioned to a clear techno sound.

Influence of Chicago and Detroit#

By 1987 a German party scene based around the Chicago sound was well established. In the late 1980s, acid house also established itself in West Germany as a new trend in clubs and discotheques. In 1988, the Ufo opened in West Berlin, an illegal venue for acid house parties, which existed until 1990. In Munich at this time, the Negerhalle (1983–1989) and the ETA-Halle established themselves as the first acid house clubs in temporarily used, dilapidated industrial halls, marking the beginning of the so-called “hall culture” in Germany. In July 1989 and Danielle de Picciotto organized the first Love Parade in West Berlin, just a few months before the Fall of the Berlin Wall.

Growth of the German scene#

Following the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989 and the German reunification in October 1990, free underground techno parties mushroomed in East Berlin. In the now reunified Berlin, several locations opened near the foundations of the Berlin Wall in the former eastern part of the city from 1991 onwards: the Tresor (est. 1991), the Planet (1991–1993), the Bunker (1992–1996), and the E-Werk (1993–1997). It was in Tresor at this time that a trend in paramilitary clothing was established (amongst the techno fraternity) by DJ Tanith; possibly as an expression of a commitment to the underground aesthetic of the music, or perhaps influenced by UR’s paramilitary posturing. In the same period, German DJs began intensifying the speed and abrasiveness of the sound, as an acid infused techno began transmuting into hardcore. DJ Tanith commented at the time that “Berlin was always hardcore, hardcore hippie, hardcore punk, and now we have a very hardcore house sound.” Changes were also taking place in Frankfurt during the same period but it did not share the egalitarian approach found in the Berlin party scene. It was instead very much centered around discothèques and existing arrangements with various club owners. In 1988, after the opened, the Frankfurt dance music scene was allegedly dominated by the club’s management and they made it difficult for other promoters to get a start. By the early 1990s Sven Väth had become perhaps the first DJ in Germany to be worshipped like a rock star. He performed center stage with his fans facing him, and as co-owner of Omen, he is believed to have been the first techno DJ to run his own club. One of the few real alternatives then was The Bruckenkopf in Mainz, underneath a Rhine bridge, a venue that offered a non-commercial alternative to Frankfurt’s discothèque-based clubs. Other notable underground parties were those run by and & from Playhouse records (). By 1992 & Torsten Fenslau were running a Sunday morning session at Dorian Gray, a plush discothèque near the Frankfurt airport. They initially played a mix of different styles including Belgian new beat, Deep House, Chicago House, and synth-pop such as Kraftwerk and Yello and it was out of this blend of styles that the Frankfurt trance scene is believed to have emerged. In 1993–94 rave became a mainstream music phenomenon in Germany, seeing with it a return to “melody, New Age elements, insistently kitsch harmonies and timbres”. This undermining of the German underground sound lead to the consolidation of a German “rave establishment,” spearheaded by the party organisation Mayday, with its record label Low Spirit, WestBam, Marusha, and a music channel called VIVA. At this time the German popular music charts were riddled with Low Spirit “pop-Tekno” German folk music reinterpretations of tunes such as “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” and “Tears Don’t Lie”, many of which became hits. At the same time, in Frankfurt, a supposed alternative was a music characterized by Simon Reynolds as “moribund, middlebrow Electro-Trance music, as represented by Frankfurt’s own Sven Väth and his Harthouse label.” Illegal raves, however, regained importance in the German techno scene as a countermovement to the commercial mass raves in the mid-1990s.

Tekkno versus techno, i.e. Detroit techno versus techno#

In Germany, fans started to refer to the harder techno sound emerging in the early 1990s as (or Brett).

Frankfurt techno definition versus Berlin techno definition#

At some point tension over “who defines techno” arose between scenes in Frankfurt and Berlin. DJ Tanith has expressed that Techno as a term already existed in Germany but was to a large extent undefined “or rather there were two schools”: techno meaning music from Front 242 and the like (as defined in Frankfurt) and the new techno (as defined in Berlin), see In the end the Frankfurt definition had to give way to the Berlin definition of “techno”.

American exodus#

In the United States during the early 90s, apart from regional scenes in Detroit, New York City, Chicago and Orlando, interest in techno was limited. Many Detroit based producers, frustrated by the lack of opportunity in the US, looked to Europe for a future livelihood. This first wave of Detroit expatriates was soon joined by a so-called “second wave” that included Carl Craig, Octave One, Jay Denham, Kenny Larkin, Stacey Pullen, and UR’s Jeff Mills, Mike Banks, and Robert Hood. In the same period, close to Detroit (Windsor, Ontario), Richie Hawtin, with business partner John Acquaviva, launched the techno imprint Plus 8 Records. A number of New York producers also made an impression in Europe at this time, most notably Frankie Bones, Lenny Dee, and Joey Beltram . These developments in American-produced techno between 1990 and 1992 fueled the expansion and eventual divergence of techno in Europe, particularly in Germany. In Berlin, the club Tresor which had opened in 1991 for a time was the standard bearer for techno and played host to many of the leading Detroit producers, some of whom had relocated to Berlin. The club brought new life to the careers of Detroit artists such as Santonio Echols, Eddie Fowlkes and Blake Baxter, who played there alongside established Berlin DJs such as Dr. Motte and Tanith. According to Dan Sicko, “Germany’s growing scene in the early 1990s was the beginning of techno’s decentralization”, and “techno began to create its second logical center in Berlin”. At this time, the now reunified Berlin also began to regain its position as the musical capital of Germany. Although eclipsed by Germany, Belgium was another focus of second-wave techno in this time period. The Ghent-based label R&S Records embraced harder-edged techno by “teenage prodigies” like Beltram and C.J. Bolland, releasing “tough, metallic tracks…with harsh, discordant synth lines that sounded like distressed Hoovers,” according to one music journalist. In the United Kingdom, Sub Club which opened in Glasgow in 1987, and Trade which opened its doors to Londoners in 1990, were venues which helped bring techno into the country. Trade has been referred to as the ‘original all night bender’.

A Techno Alliance#

In 1993, the German techno label Tresor Records released the compilation album Tresor II: Berlin & Detroit – A Techno Alliance, a testament to the influence of the Detroit sound upon the German techno scene and a celebration of a “mutual admiration pact” between the two cities.

Minimal techno#

As techno continued to transmute a number of Detroit producers began to question the trajectory the music was taking. One response came in the form of so-called minimal techno (a term producer Daniel Bell found difficult to accept, finding the term minimalism, in the artistic sense of the word, too “arty”). It is thought that Robert Hood, a Detroit-based producer and one time member of UR, is largely responsible for ushering in the minimal strain of techno. Hood describes the situation in the early 1990s as one where techno had become too “ravey”, with increasing tempos, the emergence of gabber, and related trends straying far from the social commentary and soul-infused sound of original Detroit techno. In response, Hood and others sought to emphasize a single element of the Detroit aesthetic, interpreting techno with “a basic stripped down, raw sound. Just drums, basslines and funky grooves and only what’s essential. Only what is essential to make people move”. Hood explains:

Genre family: American styles of music, Electronic dance music genres, German styles of music