I think it should be mentioned that when the Belleville Three began making techno, they (probably) didn't set out to make 'black music'. However, when techno began gaining popularity and acclaim, they saw the potential it had to bring further musical prestige to the black community and claimed it as such.
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by Domesticated
I think it should be mentioned that when the Belleville Three began making techno, they (probably) didn't set out to make 'black music'. However, when techno began gaining popularity and acclaim, they saw the potential it had to bring further musical prestige to the black community and claimed it as such.
that's known to be somewhat true, especially in the case of derrick may, who is a self-described 'primadonna artist'.
But I think you are looking at the situation the wrong way - it wasn't so much that they saw it had the potential to bring prestige to the black community, it was that they had a detroit community and they felt detroit's contribution was under-appreciated (they still feel like this)
actually the fact that dj bone/subject detroit is mentioned above is interesting because bone has pretty strong opinions on the treatment of detroit artists versus history.
What I still don't get is why people are so fixated on 'the belleville three'. this 'holy trinity' is just the most popular three first wave detroit techno deejays, and the most easy to group.
there are many other first wave detroit techno deejays like blake baxter, anthony shakir, etc.
what people don't realize is there was a larger underground community of people in detroit and a tradition of deejaying and dance music even since the early 80s. anthony shakir had been producing for years already as well as engineering for juan atkins, blake baxter had been deejaying for years.
detroit techno didn't just appear out of nowhere - it came out of an existing musical/cultural tradition.
so it's not as simple as saying 'the bellville three' and meaning some ground-zero of techno.
also, a number of later (but still early) artists should be credited with helping to develop detroit techno and turn it into what it is. One group I haven't mentioned yet that ought to be mentioned is DREXCIYA.
read their biography ;)
quote:
Detroit electro-techno outfit Drexciya was conceived in 1989, but first came into the public eye in 1994 with "Aquatic Invasion" - the first of a thematic series of releases. Drexciya's James Stinson and Gerald Donald remained hidden behind their alias for much of the group's existence, communicating a complex personal mythology of a "Drexciyan" race of underwater dwellers descended from pregnant slave women thrown overboard during trans-Atlantic deportation. Within this fiction, their music - which they claimed was recorded "live in the studio" rather than programmed - was imagined as a "dimensional jumphole" between their black African roots and the contemporary USA.
(ps their number one myspace friend is Sun-ra)
and here is an art exhibition inspired by Drexciya:
http://www.recirca.com/reviews/2007/texts/eg.shtml
and for those interested, here is the actual text of the drexicyan myth found in the liner notes of 'the quest' (which btw is selling for 135 euro, jesus)
quote:
Back inside cover reads:
Could it be possible for humans to breath underwater? A foetus in its mothers womb is certainly alive in an aquatic environment.
During the greatest holocaust the world has ever known, pregnant America-bound African slaves were thrown overboard by the thousands during labour for being sick and disruptive cargo. Is it possible that they could have given birth at sea to babies that never needed air?
Recent experiments have shown mice able to breathe liquid oxygen. Even more shocking and conclusive was a recent instance of a premature infant saved from certain death by breathing liquid oxygen through its undeveloped lungs. These facts combined with reported sightings of Gillmen and swamp monsters in the coastal swamps of the South-Eastern United States make the slave trade theory startlingly feasible.
Are Drexciyans water breathing, aquatically mutated descendants of those unfortunate victims of human greed? have they been spared by God to teach us or terrorise us? Did they migrate from the Gulf of Mexico to the Mississippi river basin and on to the great lakes of Michigan?
Do they walk among us? Are they more advanced than us and why do they make their strange music?
What is their Quest?
These are many of the questions that you don’t know and never will.
The end of one thing...and the beginning of another.
Out - The Unknown Writer
Schadenfreude
eddie fowlkes killed my family:(
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by Schadenfreude
eddie fowlkes killed my family:(
sorry to hear that :( but thanks for mentioning him :p
SYSTEM-J
quote:
Originally posted by nefardec
What I still don't get is why people are so fixated on 'the belleville three'. this 'holy trinity' is just the most popular three first wave detroit techno deejays, and the most easy to group.
Probably because they loudly (and often erroneously) took the credit for everything.
But if you want to emphasise the lack of clear turning point from techno to electro, in my opinion you only undermine this idea of techno as black music, given how electro is essentially experimental European electronic music. People tend to view the Belleville trio, for better or worse, as the ones who historically made the switch from electro to techno. They changed the gameplan and did something differently.
Again, this depends on your notion of genre classification. Going on the "inner form" methodology, a genre is defined by a core ethos or essence, and so techno was born the moment the music developed a seperate core notion to electro. Which, historically, is grounded with the Belleville trio. If you're going to say techno bled from electro and is just electro as made for Detroit/Chicago tastes then you basically have to turn techno into a list of audible genre elements.
Domesticated
quote:
Originally posted by nefardec
But I think you are looking at the situation the wrong way - it wasn't so much that they saw it had the potential to bring prestige to the black community, it was that they had a detroit community and they felt detroit's contribution was under-appreciated (they still feel like this)
No, I agree with this as well as my original statement.
It's gotten a bit silly now - a lot of Detroit natives seem to think that any music made outside of there isn't real techno.
Existo22
quote:
Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
You know you've won an argument when Existo disagrees with you.
Your smooth and eloquent word play here is reminiscent of the work of Sir William Shakespeare.
SYSTEM-J
Actually I'd say it's closer to watered down Wildean irony, but thanks for demonstrating you don't know what "word play" means.
Schadenfreude
this thread needs less arguing and more "classic" tech.
white people did this one.
Schadenfreude
and some awesome negro tech for nef.
des becs seulement.
and just because i love this
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Probably because they loudly (and often erroneously) took the credit for everything.
But if you want to emphasise the lack of clear turning point from techno to electro, in my opinion you only undermine this idea of techno as black music, given how electro is essentially experimental European electronic music. People tend to view the Belleville trio, for better or worse, as the ones who historically made the switch from electro to techno. They changed the gameplan and did something differently.
I don't think I agree with that. Electro has many influences just like techno, and european electronic music was just one (and I would argue not the dominant influence). By and large the influence was from funk and the isolation of the breakbeat, and the development of the roland 808.
quote:
Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Again, this depends on your notion of genre classification. Going on the "inner form" methodology, a genre is defined by a core ethos or essence, and so techno was born the moment the music developed a seperate core notion to electro. Which, historically, is grounded with the Belleville trio. If you're going to say techno bled from electro and is just electro as made for Detroit/Chicago tastes then you basically have to turn techno into a list of audible genre elements.
I'm disagreeing with you here because 'the belleville' trio is just a convenient mental concept. There were people involved all along the way in the process - engineers, colleagues, fans, friends, family, etc
I just don't like that term and how it has some sort of holy grail connotation. I don't personally find them that mystifying or special, and I don't understand it for the sake of history, either.
These others basically got the short end of the stick, and the 'bellville three' is the equivalent of the schoolhouse story of benjamin franklin inventing electricity or something.
Anyway's that's a smaller bone to pick.
As far as genre goes, I don't think that the core notion of detroit techno was much different than that of electro, except for the fact that the people who made detroit techno were from detroit.
Could you clarify 'core notion', though? I am confused as to whether this presupposes conscious intent on the part of the artist or otherwise.
Existo22
quote:
Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Probably because they loudly (and often erroneously) took the credit for everything.
But if you want to emphasise the lack of clear turning point from techno to electro, in my opinion you only undermine this idea of techno as black music, given how electro is essentially experimental European electronic music. People tend to view the Belleville trio, for better or worse, as the ones who historically made the switch from electro to techno.
