Techno

Hearing about techno as it used to be firstly conceived—as a response to inner-city decay, as byproduct of African-American struggle, as a structure of protest — served as a crucial reminder of the roots of this dance music, and that the name Underground Resistance was once in no way a euphemism, however a reality. To the outsider — in this writer’s case, a white teen from the suburbs of Texas — it may be difficult to conceive of the oft-wordless techno as revolutionary music. 

It definitely wasn’t the relentless sound of Underground Resistance. At that nascent stage, Detroit techno (and Chicago house) was being packaged and introduced as the smiley-face song of Berlin, Madchester, and Belgium — the sound of Europeans and Ecstasy. Rather than Marshall Jefferson’s “Move Your Body”, my era was once as a substitute indoctrinated with its Belgian rewrite, Technotronic’s “Pump Up the Jam”. Even then, techno’s blunt force used to be being lightened.

Notable Detroit area record labels…

• 430 West Records
• Detroit Techno Militia
• Axis Records
• Fragile
• Metroplex
• Minus Records
• Planet E Communications
• Plus 8
• Transmat
• Underground Resistance