Techno

For the comic book character previously known as Techno, see Fixer (comics). For the prefix, see techno-.

Techno is a form of electronic dance music that had its early beginnings in Western Europe in the late 1970s and later developed and established as a genre in Detroit, Michigan during the 1980s. It was influenced by Chicago house, electro, New Wave, funk and futuristic fiction themes that were prevalent and relative to modern culture during the end of the Cold War in industrial America at that time. Following the initial success of Detroit techno as a musical culture — at the very least on a regional level — an expanded and related subset of genres in the 1990s emerged globally.

The term "techno" is derived from the word technology. Music journalists and fans of the genre are generally selective in their use of the term, careful not to conflate it with related but distinct genres, such as house, trance and hardcore. At the same time, "techno" is commonly confused with general terms such as electronic music and dance music. Techno is characterized by heavy use of percussion, electronic sounds and often a minimal amount of melody.

History

Origins

Juan Atkins of the Belleville Three during a live performance

In the United States, techno was primarily developed by "The Belleville Three", a cadre of men who were attending college, at the time, near Detroit, Michigan. The budding musicians, former high school friends and mix tape traders Juan Atkins, Derrick May, and Kevin Saunderson, found inspiration in Midnight Funk Association, an eclectic, 5-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 heavy doses of electronic sounds from the likes of Giorgio Moroder, Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream, among others.

Techno has since been retroactively defined to encompass, among others, works dating back to "Shari Vari" (1981) by A Number Of Names, the earliest compositions by Cybotron (1981), Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder's "I Feel Love"(1977), "From Here to Eternity" (1977), and the more dancefloor-orientated selections from Kraftwerk's repertoire between 1977 and 1983. These electro-disco tracks share with techno a dependence on machine-generated beats and dancefloor popularity.

Techno became more of a phenomenon in Europe than in the United States; American artists such as Moby and The Crystal Method who started their careers making techno were initially successful in Europe, but did not gain a presence in the US until branching out into other styles such as breakbeat and electronica. The popularity of the techno movement peaked in the late 90's, particularly in 1999 at the Berlin Love Parade with an attendance of over one and a half million techno enthusiasts.

Developments

The Roland TB-303 bassline synthesizer

In the late 1980s, different subgenres of techno music began to emerge, including hardcore techno, an intensified style typified by a fast tempo (around 160 bpm) and the rhythmic use of distorted and atonal industrial-like beats and samples, and ambient techno, with artists such as The Orb and Aphex Twin producing dub music and ambient influenced techno that later had an influence on artists dabbling in the minimal techno and what was originally techno's experimental offshoot, IDM. Acid techno, influenced by the heavy use of the Roland TB-303 for bass and lead sounds in the style of acid house, enjoyed a surge of popularity in the mid-1980s and went on to influence acid trance. Tech house music came to prominence in the late 1990s and combines the basic structure of house music with elements from techno such as shorter, often distorted kicks, smaller hi-hats, noisier snares and more synthetic or acid sounding synth lines.

Less well-known styles related to techno or its subgenres include Yorkshire bleeps and bass or bleep, a regional variant which was prominent in the late 1980s; wonky techno; ghettotech, which combines some of the aesthetics of techno with hip-hop, house music, and Miami bass; and the subgenres of hardcore techno, including gabber, speedcore, terrorcore, breakcore and digital hardcore.

80s techno pioneers Underworld during a live performance

Techno had also a big influence on main-stream european disco-pop music from the late 80s with Technotronic, and the evolvement of euro-techno during the early and mid 90s, with artists such as 2 Unlimited, Snap!, Culture Beat and Corona.

In recent years, the publication of relatively accurate histories by authors Simon Reynolds (Generation Ecstasy aka Energy Flash) and Dan Sicko (Techno Rebels), plus mainstream press coverage of the Detroit Electronic Music Festival, have helped to diffuse the genre's more dubious mythology. Techno has further expanded into the charts as more artists such as Orbital and Underworld have made the style break through to the mainstream pop culture while producers and DJs such as Laurent Garnier, Dave Clarke, Richie Hawtin and Jeff Mills have continued to explore newer sounds.

Musicology

Techno features a largely percussive feel, like the synthetic sounds, studio effects used as principal instrumentation, and usually a regular 4/4 beat with a tempo of 130–140bpm, sometimes faster, but rarely slower. Some techno compositions have strong melodies and bass lines, but these features are not as essential to techno as they are to other styles of electronic dance music, and it is not uncommon for techno compositions to deemphasize or omit them. Techno is also very DJ-friendly, being mainly instrumental, and produced with the intention of being incorporated into continuous DJ sets wherein different compositions are played with very long, synchronized segues. Although several other dance music genres can be described in such terms, techno has a distinct sound that aficionados can pick out very easily.

There are many ways to make techno, but a typical techno production is created using a compositional technique that developed to suit the genre's sequencer-driven, electronic instrumentation. While this technique is rooted in a Western music framework (as far as scales, rhythm and meter, and the general role played by each type of instrument), it does not typically employ traditional approaches to composition such as reliance on the playing of notes, the use of overt tonality and melody, or the generation of accompaniment for vocals. Some of the most effective techno music consists of little more than cleverly programmed rhythmic foundations and musical phrases that interplay with different types of special signal processing and frequency filtering, mixed in such a way that it is not easy to distinguish the natural timbre of an instrument from the digital effects applied thereto.

Instead of employing traditional compositional techniques, the techno musician, usually acting as producer, treats the electronic studio as one large, complex instrument: an interconnected orchestra of machines, each producing timbres that are simultaneously familiar and alien. Each machine is encouraged to generate or complement continuous, repetitive sonic patterns that come relatively 'naturally' to them, given the capabilities and limitations of early sequencers — such sequencers, especially those built-in to old drum machines, tend to encourage the production of repeating 16-step patterns with a limited number of instruments being playable at once, yet they also allow sounds to be arranged in any order, regardless of whether live musicians could easily reproduce them. Rather than just mimicking arrangements playable by live musicians, the techno producer is free to prominently feature unrealistic combinations of sounds. Most producers, however, strive to achieve a listenable, dancefloor-friendly balance of realistic and unrealistic arrangements of mostly synthetic, semi-realistic timbres, rather than a demonstration of machine-powered extremes.

After an acceptable palette of compatible textures is collected in this manner, the producer begins again, this time focusing not on developing new textures but on imparting a more deliberate arrangement of the ones he or she already has. The producer "plays" the mixer and the sequencer, bringing layers of sound in and out, and tweaking the effects to create ever-more hypnotic, propulsive combinations.

Noted artists

• Adam Beyer
• Adam X
• Aphex Twin
• Basic Channel
• Booka Shade
• Carl Cox
• Carl Craig
• Chris Liebing
• Daniel Bell
• Dave Clarke

• Derrick May
• Dominik Eulberg
• Drexciya
• Frankie Bones
• James Pennington
• Jeff Mills
• John Acquaviva
• Juan Atkins
• Kevin Saunderson
• Laurent Garnier

• LFO
• Matthew Dear
• Mike Banks
• Pan sonic
• Ricardo Villalobos
• Richie Hawtin
• Robert Hood
• Sven Väth
• Vitalic

Bibliography

Works that comprehensively explore the subject of techno music and its related culture:

• Simon Reynolds: Energy Flash: a Journey Through Rave Music and Dance Culture (UK title, Pan Macmillan, 1998, ISBN), also published in abridged form as Generation Ecstasy: Into the World of Techno and Rave Culture (North American title, Routledge, 1999, ISBN)
• Dan Sicko: Techno Rebels: The Renegades of Electronic Funk, Billboard Books, 1999 ISBN

Filmography

• High Tech Soul

Catalog No.: PLX-029 Label: Plexifilm Released: 09/19/06 Director: Gary Bredow Length: 64 minutes Year: 2006

• Summary: HIGH TECH SOUL is the first documentary to tackle the deep roots of techno music alongside the cultural history of Detroit, its birthplace. HIGH TECH SOUL focuses on the creators of the genre -- Juan Atkins, Derrick May, and Kevin Saunderson -- and looks at the relationships and personal struggles behind the music. Artists like Richie Hawtin, Jeff Mills, Carl Craig, Eddie Fowlkes and a host of others explain why techno, with its abrasive tones and resonating basslines, could not have come from anywhere but Detroit.

See also

• Detroit Electronic Music Archive
• Freetekno
• List of electronic music genres

External links

• Sounds Like Techno – an online documentary exploring techno music, from its roots and early influences in the USA to its place in Australian music today.an exhibit at Detroit Historical Museum (Jan 2003 – Jun 2004)
• Piero Scaruffi's history of techno music
• Techno Music Style – Guide to techno music style; includes reviews of techno music and links to techno sites.