At its core, since its birth in the ’80s Detroit underground, techno has always been about freedom, self-sufficiency and experimentation—creating sounds of the future to get people moving. In that sense, Luke Slater has always been techno. In his early DJ days in the late ’80s and early ’90s, he was part of the U.K. dance contingent popularizing Detroit-inspired techno across the pond.

In 1989 he dropped his debut single, “Momentary Vision” (under the name Translucent) as a white label on his own Jelly Jam Records, a grooving breakbeat techno number. It would be two years before he dropped more tracks to shake up the U.K. techno scene, but he’s been on roll ever since.

To him, techno is best defined by its Detroit roots that first inspired him to produce it himself.

“For me, as an artist, it goes right back to the origin of house and techno, especially people like Juan Atkins,” Slater explained. “[In] 1983, he did ‘Clear’ by Cybotron, which really didn’t fit in with hip-hop [or] electro at the time. That was probably the first techno record I ever heard. And there was this kind of melancholy thing about it, but it had a lot of rhythm.”

“And then when house came along at the end of the ’80s, that was really the connection for me, that rhythm can come from machines,” he continued. “I loved that. That really bore into my soul.”

The British DJ and producer has kept himself busy exploring and expanding the nuance and range of techno with a prolific output over the past three decades. He has done so under a handful of aliases including Planetary Assault Systems, Clementine, Morganisitic, and The 7th Plain, to name a few.

As clubs remained shuttered with COVID-19 running wild, he was understandably uninspired to make dance music. In the first months of the pandemic he savored time at home with his family and worked on an experimental collaborative project with Anthony Child (a.k.a. Surgeon), KMRU, Lady Starlight, Speedy J and Tom Moth (Florence + The Machine‘s harpist) called DIALOGUE.

The project is composed of four spacious ambient musical dialogues (15-24 minutes long) between the artists that reflect the distance and uncertainty we all felt in 2020. “It was kind of really fitting for the time, but after that was done, there had to be more,” Slater shared.

He went on, “It was a hunger I haven’t experienced since I first started… I was just dying to get back to the events, to play, just to be out there again. And so that’s really how the [latest] Planetary album came about.”

After vaccines were rolled out to the public in 2021 and the possibility of DJing finally appeared on the horizon again, the creative flame within Slater was reignited. “When things looked like they were opening up, I wanted to go back to the roots and just write,” he said.

Yet he didn’t know where to start. His wife Heidy Slater reminded him that people really liked his track “Give It Up” from his 2019 Planetary Assault System double EP, Straight Shooting. So, he started with that as an inspiration, building around that style and the TR-909, with a heavy sprinkling of rebellious energy.

In a sense, Slater made Straight Shooting as much for himself as for his fans. He crafted it “purely for imagining that things were gonna open, the festivals, everything. It was like, ‘When I play again, this is what I want to play. I want to be around this.'”

The result was his latest album (released October 2021) as Planetary Assault Systems, Sky Scraping, which he describes as “straight off the shovel.”

Planetary Assault Systems is one of his most active aliases and home to some of his hardest techno. For Slater, aliases offer a way to organize his music after he makes it, as he finds himself working on music much of the time, and multiple things at once.

“I think if I was just working on one thing, I’d overthink it too much,” he said. The aliases also represent different parts of him and offer more outlets for his creativity, keeping his sense of freedom in music alive, as he feels less limited by fans’ expectations for one specific sound.

“When I go out and play, people know me. And people have got a lot in their minds [lately], they’ve been through a lot, Slater explained. “They’ve had to deal with exactly the same kind of anxieties and changes in their life as me and everyone else. So if I’m going to do a gig, I’m not going to try and be teaching right now. They want to hear the records I make, so that’s exactly what I’m going to be playing. It’s not so much giving people what they want, but just being true to what you’re really good at and what you’re known for.”

Huge huge thanks to all @berghain over the weekend ! ??? Wow , coming together extraordinaire , can’t put into words that feeling with all ,after such a long break from the club . ???

— Luke Slater (@reallukeslater) November 2, 2021

While COVID-19 variants and vaccination challenges have kept a full return of nightlife at bay, in July 2021, Slater was finally able to get back to DJing. A few months later, in November, he had his first set back at the legendary Berghain.

“It was an amazing night, and I felt that everyone there had this kind of spirit of like ‘We’ve won. Yes, we are back.’ It was quite an emotional set to do, to be honest. I was super happy,” Slater beamed. “I’m glad I got to do it right before it shut down again.”

Back in the seemingly distant pre-pandemic days of late 2019 and early 2020, Slater worked with Berghain’s label, Ostgut Ton, to create Berghain Fünfzehn, a seven-track album made up entirely of sounds and samples from their catalogue, which dates back to 2005. The arduous creative process was inspired by a Richie Hawtin album from years ago where he took tracks apart to build new ones.

“It was one of my crazier ideas. (Laughs.) Ostgut sent me every single track they’ve ever released. And then I would take samples and loops from each set of 12 [tracks] and make a new track,” Slater recounted. “And I thought, ‘Well, that sounds like a challenge.’ So that’s exactly what I did. Someone at Ostgut helped, we had a kind of a Henry Ford system going… Daniel put everything into Ableton Live for me so I could go through and choose. On the album, there’s seven tracks, but I actually wrote, like, 34 tracks. It took about six months and yeah, it was mad.”

When asked how he feels that techno and the culture around it has shifted since he started producing it 33 years ago, Slater reminded us that change is constant. “It’s always changing. I was doing this before the internet (Laughs), so I’ve seen a lot of changes,” the “Engine One” producer said with a smile.

“Back in the day, the only time people would read anything that I said was if I did an interview. That’s how close you got to someone who was writing the music unless you hung around them, he recalled. “And it’s really different now, because everyone’s speaking, everyone’s on social media. I think that’s okay. I think it’s pretty cool…Things always change, always mutate. I try and embrace that.”

Even as techno and technology constantly morphs and mutates, to Slater, the essence of a great techno track is straightforward: “Rhythm. Capturing the rhythm. I think that’s the hardest thing to get right. It’s all about the beat.”

While the techno community continues to grapple with its “business techno” shadow—the DJs, promoters and brands that put profit above all else—Slater reminds us that no one can truly kill its essence.

“The other day, someone on Twitter with a lot of followers said, ‘Rest in peace techno.’ I’ve heard that so many times over the years,” he said. “Techno, the concept of it, of what dance music is, it’s not a phase or fad or a current trend. It’s a revolution that happened a long time ago, and it’s kind of embedded in all electronic music.”

European public service channel Arte will host the stream. Since 1992, Arte’s mission has been to promote culturally significant French and German programming.

Founded in 2005 by Berghain resident DJ Nick Hoppner, Ostgut Ton specializes in experimental house and techno. The label’s trademark sound was birthed in Berghain’s Panorama Bar. One of the legendary club’s smaller areas, Panorama Bar encourages artists to explore their sound in an intimate setting.

Ostgut Ton originally had plans to celebrate its 15-year anniversary with a multi-city tour beginning on February 7th of last year. Multiple Ostgut Ton artists such as Answer Code Request and Ben Klock were on the lineup. COVID-19 restrictions forced organizers to cancel the events, however.

With COVID-19 restrictions easing, Berghain began reopening with a pair of outdoor parties in its garden area, Klubgarten. Proof of vaccination was required for both shows.

As of July 20th, 2021, Germany sat at a seven-day average of 1,362 COVID-19 cases.

The event will feature performances from Ostgut Ton artists such as Paramida, Avalon Emerson, KMRU, and others. For more information head to Arte Concert’s YouTube Channel.

The legendary club’s dance floors have laid dormant since March due to COVID-19. In the absence of throngs of black-clad dancers, Studio Berlin has stood in to occupy the space. This was where the owners of Berghain’s imprint came across Ogboh’s work. His latest installation, Ayilara, expands on his work with the sounds of Africa’s most populous city, bringing visitors on an aural journey through its red-light district.

Not only were the staff of Ostgut overcome by Ogboh’s work – they were shocked to find that he didn’t fancy himself a producer and had thus never considered an album. Resident Advisor reports that Beyond The Yellow Haze will feature the sounds of the Nigerian artist’s first solo exhibition from 2018, No Condition Is Permanent. Lagos is a city that is awash in sound. Public markets, street conversations, and the din of traffic are the backdrop of the album, beautifully married with rumbling drum lines and ambient synths.

Ogboh’s work can be viewed as love notes to his city, one that he misses dearly. He normally splits his time between Germany and Nigeria, but due to COVID-19 travel restrictions has been stuck in Berlin since March. While he loves Berlin dearly, as he told TateShots in 2017, “Lagos is a city that is never silent, so when I first started living in Berlin I found it hard to sleep because it was quiet. In Lagos we live every day with, I stopped calling it noise, this is really like sound. The city composes. This really captivated me to work a lot with sound.”

Beyond The Yellow Haze is available for pre-order on the Berghain website.

The first stop of “Fünfzehn,” which is German for “fifteen,” brought an unannounced lineup to The Block in Tel Aviv, Israel on February 7th. The next six events take place in May and see unnamed label alumni visit cities like London, Paris, Dortmund and Brussels. After three more stops, the tour will conclude with a party at BASEMENT in Brooklyn, New York on December 5th.

Ostgut Origins

Ostgut Ton derives its name from Ostgut, which was the name of the club that occupied the space now called Berghain from 1998-2003. After the former building was demolished, the organizers of an Ostgut-hosted, male-only fetish event brand called Snax were responsible for the opening of Berghain in 2004. The label was launched the following year; among its early signees were Panorama Bar signees André Galluzzi, Cassy, and Ben Klock.

Find the full list of Fünfzehn tour stops via Resident Advisor.

The four soundscapes comprising Alpha avoid techno clichés while still staying true to the genre’s time-tested aesthetic. Rather than exploring minimal, murky sonic depths, each concept artfully pairs rich instrumental samples with atmospheric elements. However, “Quantum” is the only remotely melodic track on the EP; the others exist in a blissful space in between.

Etapp Kyle is a resident of Berlin nightclub Berghain – the venue tied to Ostgut Ton. His initial contribution to the label was his 2015 single “Nolah,” which appeared on their Zehn compilation from the same year. He describes his new EP as “four tracks of pristine, sci-fi minimalism” that are “more utopian than dystopian.”

Etapp Kyle’s Alpha EP arrives by way of Ostgut Ton on September 8th. Find the tracklist and album art for the effort below.

Source: Resident Advisor

A1. “Alpha”
A2. “Quantum”
B1. “Source”
B2. “Ritual”