Put yo’ hands up for Detroit

I haven’t paid much attention to Detroit techno in the past. I own just one record regarded as a typical example from one of the pioneers of techno in the motor city; Jeff Mills. I go back to his record a lot more regularly nowadays, and each time I end up nagging myself to dig a little bit more into a genre of music with an intriguing history.

Techno was born in 1980s Detroit, following the city’s struggles to recover from the aftermath of devastating riots in the 60’s – a turbulent mix of racism, crime, suburbanization and the gradual but crushing decline of the city’s identity: the motor industry. The sounds borne from these ashes were driven by a curious sense of otherworldliness, futurism and the sci-fi visions of a technological wonder city – the kind of language that was thrown in Detroit’s general direction back in the day, such was its place at the epicentre of technological innovation. In the early days, the heaving, industrial strains of the techno sound encapsulated the mechanised echoes of that cutting edge industry – the repetition of the robotic, steel against steel, chipping, sparking, drilling.

The result, as you’d expect, is a stirring mix. It’s at once jarring but beautifully exact and well-defined. In fact, it’s so industrial and of it’s time and environment, that it’s hard to imagine this sound coming from anywhere else. In many respects, it’s a pitch-perfect aural representation of a mega city – which Detroit was in the first half of the twentieth century, as the fourth-largest and most rapidly growing city in the US.

While techno wasn’t born of the age, it encapsulates much of this pioneering spirit with a piercing sci-fi sound and a twist of blind optimism, the kind I imagine the people of Detroit to have been infected by before the rioting, the retreat of the middle-class to the suburbs, and the whimpers of the dying automotive industry.

Detroit is a sad city to read about and contemplate now. The decline in population has been so pronounced, that the city’s inhabitants now stand at half of its 1950 peak of 1.8m. Just 900k now inhabit a city that appears to have been built for 4m, such is the grandeur of its downtown avenues and squares.

But just recently, there’s been a hint that things may be about to change, with a few quite alluring developments in what appears to be an enormously driven and dedicated effort to rebuild the city into something with a social purpose and vision. I won’t go into too much detail, but a lot of examples and ideas are in the links below. It’s fascinating to see how much of the latest influx of creators, artists, environmentalists and designers are looking to Detroit as an opportunity to learn from the mistakes of the past. Without wishing to jinx the whole affair, it seems as though with the slate wiped clean, Detroit can rebuild and redefine.

http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/09/26/t-magazine/26remix-detroit-t.html

http://detroit.blogs.time.com/2010/07/06/rebuilding-detroit-a-community-effort/

http://detroitworksproject.com/

All of which gives me a relentless itch to actually do something – like actually book a ticket and go. And I think I just might. But I can’t imagine what my parents are going to think when I tell them I’m thinking of taking a holiday in Detroit.