Juan On Juan: Your Questions Answered

When you're given a rare opportunity to speak with someone like Juan Atkins, you want to use it wisely. And you want to make sure that you don't bombard him with the self-indulgent questions you've been mentally hoarding since you were a teenage obsessive. So we figured, given the chance to spend an evening on the phone with Juan, it'd be best to open up a forum of sorts. Give our family members (from Twitter, Facebook, and even a few of our favourite artists) that have been influenced by him a chance to dive into the brilliant mind of a true pioneer and one of the most interesting reps for Detroit. Here's the eye-opening conversation that followed, as he waxes lyrical about everything from wax itself to production techniques to Claude VonStroke's job applications...

A note for your diaries: Juan Atkins will be playing our Room Two on Saturday, 26 September alongside a live set from Octave One.

From COMMIX (METALHEADZ):  "What are your feelings on the new wave of Detroit techno?"
What is the new wave of Detroit techno?

Well, they'd mentioned artists like "Omar-S, Kyle Hall, Seth Troxler, Jimmy Edgar"...
You know, I don’t really have my finger to the pulse on that. So the only way that I can answer that is that anything coming out of Detroit, to me, is worth some interest.

What makes you say that, if you don’t mind me asking?
Because I think that you know...from the beginning, even when I started, Detroit's a fertile ground for creativity. Especially for dance music. So if you living in Detroit and you making any kind of electronic music or any dance music, I think its worth checking out. Just based on the surroundings.

What do you think it is about Detroit? I’m sure you’ve been asked this question endlessly, but do you think it has something to do with the industrial landscape of it? Or the Motown background? Or maybe a combination of everything that sociologically makes it what it is...
There’s a little combination of everything there, you know. I think we've got a rich history...something about the factories, the smoke from the factories probably gets in our lungs and does something to us.

The next few questions are from Claude VonStroke, who runs Dirty Bird - do you know him?
I’ve heard the name. I may have met him before.

FROM CLAUDE VONSTROKE: "I tried to get a job at Metroplex because you guys had the biggest ad in the Yellow Pages under 'recording studios' and you were only a bike ride away from my house when I was 15. It's not likely that you remember when I came in (you were really nice to me and my friend),  but when I visited I remember being impressed by racks of gear everywhere and that you had done that Technicolor track that got played on [The Electrifying] Mojo's show on heavy rotation..probably 1984 or '85...


"...I am a label owner now so I'm curious to know how you were able to distribute your records and get them to Europe? It's not like there was a manual at that time about releasing dance music vinyl so how did you figure it all out?"
I didn’t really figure it out. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing...it's just things, you know, had a natural flow to it.  There were a lot of import/export stores, especially in Chicago and on the East Coast. These are independent record stores that would buy records and somehow export them overseas. I didn’t know exactly what the method was, or how they did it. All I know is that you had to have a special import/export license, or something similar, to be able to import and export a material. So these certain stores had that license and were able to garn our sales from overseas.

It's interesting for us to find out these things, being part of the internet generation.  How did you even hear of these stores pre-internet - was it just hear-say that you would find these places in Chicago?
No, it was the same place where we would buy records. You know, anywhere that you bought imports. If you had a label, you’d wanna sell your music in the same store, because at the time for a lot of DJs during the early days, the best records were import records. Records imported from Italy, London, Germany...those were the best tracks so of course we wanted our music to sell in the same store. So there was sort of like an exchange program. You go in and you have the store take in a few records. They were exported just like they were imported from Italy. Italian imports were the best records back in the day.

I feel like back then it was a real close-knit community; everyone was kind of in it together. Whereas these days it's more disconnected - everyone is doing their own separate thing...
Yeah, well now it’s like everybody is able to; the progression of the technology has allowed, of course, everybody to be a one man band. Or one woman band. So therefore you’re not really dependent on other people to make a full blown track. Whereas when I first started I had to have a drummer, bass guitar player, guitar, keyboard player...and it was harder to sack them and just do the whole tracks by yourself. But now technology has come to play - that’s the way to do things now, you make your own tracks. So that has detached people from corresponding with other people in terms of making music. The next step is to get your music out there, and it's just an extension of making your own track - well hey, why don’t you get it out there yourself as well. So everybody has their own label, every artist and producer has its own label and that’s just how it is now.

Another question FROM CLAUDE VONSTROKE: "I've basically stolen the reverse clap idea from your productions on a few of my records. I would have never thought of it...it is the thing that sticks out for me in some of your tracks. Did it happen by accident, or do you remember what led to this production trick?  It's one of the best transition ideas. So simple but I never heard it before you did it..."
Even when I was doing Cybotron, we used to record at a studio called Pearl Sound. The engineer's name was Ben Gross, and he taught me that trick. He was a great engineer and I can’t remember that we recorded in the studio when we did that. He would literally turn the tape. This is at a time when we recorded on 2 inch 24 track tape. And he would actually turn the tape over, turn it around and record the effect onto other tracks as it was playing backwards. So that's how I learned. Ultimately they came up with programs and drum machines with preset sounds, where you could just hit a button and it would do it automatically. But back then they didn’t have that. So how we did that, was we actually turned the tape around and recorded the effect onto another track.

Last question FROM CLAUDE VONSTROKE: "You were always pushing the technology sound so I'm curious to hear what you think about current music technology?  DJs on laptops and 'live performances,' etc?"
Well...you know, I’ve always been...I mean, I’m designated the founder of techno music or what have you. So therefore I have to keep up my reputation, or so to speak. But there have been times where some of the technology...well, with certain things - like you pay to go and see a band, you wanna see them play something. So I’ve always been one to focus on performance - even in our live shows, though it's all electronic music, I’m playing with three other guys and we  show the audience that we are live musicians and we are playing instruments. Just to go up there with one guy and a laptop and a t-shirt doesn’t really make for a good show to me. Whatever you used to fashion your tracks and make your tracks is okay, but when people pay a lot of money to go see you, give them a show.

That actually leads onto the next question which is from someone FROM TWITTER (PHAM): "Why do you like mixing tracks from vinyl more than digital?"
It’s funny because I was playing with a couple of other DJs just last weekend and we had the same kind of discussion about laptops vs. vinyl and CDs, or what have you. And one of the guys who plays exclusively vinyl was like - my fans still like to see me drop the needle to the record. And it’s true in a way. There’s a certain performance element. There’s something to the art of actually spinning a record. The whole act of slamming that vinyl down on the platter and queue it up. You know, there's a look to it. And to me, the vinyl sound is the best sounding format to me. I haven’t really got into the MP3 playing yet but I’ve been burning a lot of CDs lately and playing a combination - maybe 50:50 CDs and vinyl. And the vinyl always seems to come out sounding better than the CD to me. It's that real heavy sound, the bottom is there. Everything, the dynamic range is there. Whereas when I put a CD up against a vinyl I always have to EQ the CD a lot hotter than the vinyl, to make it compare.

Do you think the vinyl industry is in danger?
I don’t think so. When I go out and play, I play with a variety of DJs and the most respected, especially the older DJs, still use vinyl. I play with Derek, play with Jeff Mills, I was just playing with Mad Max from Tresor and couple of other people and they all swear by vinyl. Jeff Mills was playing a few CDs, Derek was playing a few CDs, I play a few CDs. But I think the foundation is still vinyl. They're a bit expensive now, they need to drop the prices on some of these vinyl...you can download something for under a dollar, you know what I’m saying? I remember back in the day, when you be buying those import records from Italy, they were 12, 15, 20 dollars sometimes. Man, I just spent 100 Euros at Hardwax a couple of days ago!

The next question is FROM TWITTER (Cyprien Rose): Well, I’m not entirely sure what his question means, but I think he wants to know if you have any words to say about Michael Jackson. I’m gonna change this question up. (sorry Cyprien!) How did you feel about the news, coming from Detroit, Motown's home? Did people go crazy in Detroit?
Oh, yeah. We have the Motown Museum which is so historical, it's where a lot of that stuff was recorded.  The museum and the studio is on one of the major streets in the city, so when it first happened there were crowds of people standing around - you couldn’t even be able to drive through the street. It’s like a double lane street with a medium in the middle, so it’s a pretty huge street and you couldn’t even get through there for a couple of days. That right there puts Detroit and Motown back on the map again in a global way. A lot of people when they researched Michael Jackson probably didn’t realise that he was on Motown. Or started out on Motown.

For you personally, was he a big influence?
Oh definitely, we grew up on the Jacksons. Some of the first records I owned - my grandmother always bought Michael Jackson stuff for us. So ever since I was a kid in elementary school, we grew up on Jackson 5, their Christmas album and what not. The things that he’d gone through - from the young kid in the Jackson 5 to where he was right before he died was definitely a big metamorphosis. It wasn't a severe shock, but it was a shock when someone told me he died - I said, 'You lying!' I mean, hey I don’t know, I think maybe my eyes got a little watery.

He was potentially the last true pop icon of our generation...
And nobody else is probably gonna match that status. That was like one of those once-in-a-lifetime, once-in-history type deals.

Another question FROM TWITTER (Cyprien Rose): "I remember Derrick May told me in an 2001 interview that you, Kevin and Derrick stay united in life - any desire to work together again, and introduce a new audience to your live performances?"
Well, we are working on a project...I’m gonna leave it at that. I’m not gonna say what type of thing. But you will see something in the near future that incorporate me, Derek and Kevin and some other people that were there that started it.



Another question FROM TWITTER (Kristan J Caryl): "You've said before you want techno to take off on massive level - now it has, isn't it the case quantity rules quality?"
Yeah, it is more quantity over quality for sure now. I don’t ever recall saying that I wanted techno to blow up or whatever. I just did what I thought was the right thing for me to do musically ever since I started. It was never a blue print or manifesto, so to speak, to say, 'This is where I want this to be at a certain time or where I’m trying to go.' Of course I wanted as many people as possible to hear my productions, but there was never a blueprint to say that this was going be a global phenomenon or a global fad, or whatever you want to call it.

We had ideas, and it’s just like any experiment. You know, it was like a scientific experiment: you put a little bit of this ingredient in something, you put a little bit of that in something, and you got an idea of you looking for. When it turns out better and bigger than you could’ve imagined...that’s what happened with techno.

Being from Chicago myself, I have to ask - what was it like artistically between Chicago and Detroit at that time?
When I first started...I’ll give you a prime example: when Virgin Records wanted to do a compilation on us, the original concept was gonna be called the 'House Sound of Detroit.' Because, like I was telling you earlier, a lot of the export stores were based in Chicago so that was the closest export for us (there were some in New York, but the closest for us was in Chicago). We didn’t have export stores in Detroit, really, so a lot of the early Detroit stuff got discovered near Chicago. Believe it or not, Detroit music was being played on the mix shows more heavily than even Chicago records. And so when the record companies came to explore house music, they discovered Detroit. I guess, when it came time for Virgin to say, 'What is this Detroit stuff,' the general feeling was to call it "the house sound of Detroit." But I said, 'No, this is Detroit - we’ve got our own sound, it's called techno music. We’re not the house sound. We’re not an off-shoot of Chicago, if anything Chicago was an off-shoot of us.' And so, that’s what prompted that track on the album called 'Techno Music' - I put on that album because that was making a statement. And when my track was submitted, which was one of the last tracks to be submitted, they changed the whole name of the album to the techno sound. That was one of the instances where I’m saying it wasn’t an actual plan, but at least I knew better to not be thrown underneath somebody else’s...well, I knew better than to compromise myself. That was probably really how that whole thing kicked off.

I mean, hey - I used to love the guys from Chicago. If it wasn’t for Farley Jackmaster Funk playing No UFOs heavy on the radio, this whole thing probably never would’ve happened. So there was a definite love for our competitors, we had a friendly competition. Because Acid House, for me, was nothing but techno. But they couldn’t call it techno because of the rivalry, the friendly rivalry. But when Marshall Jefferson started using the 303 and they called it Acid House, it was really techno music.

After us delving into the past so far, I'm a bit curious to see how you keep yourself creatively inspired, how you keep moving...
You gotta keep your mind open to ideas and the ultimate situation for me is to take my knowledge and my experience as a foundation for the newer ideas and the newer technology. Thank God I’ve been doing things as long as I’ve been doing them. Ultimately all of the technology and all of the advancements came from something, so if you know a little bit about where it came from, then you are able to master where it's going.

Someone asked on FACEBOOK - what would surprise people to find out about you?
That I’m a very friendly person.

People think otherwise?
I think so, I think people have a tendency to think that I'm rude, because I’m not really one of those idle chatter kind of people; some people can just strike up a conversation, I'm not good at that. So I’ve been told that I come off as not being friendly, or not wanting to be bothered. So therefore a lot of people might not say nothing to me and might not speak, and it’s actually contrary. But I don’t like to talk just to be talking. I’m like that with friends and family as well. I just like to make sense or you know, make it relevant…

Also from FACEBOOK - similarily, what would surprise people about Detroit?
A lot of people look at Detroit, as like a crime-riddled, post-industrial, bleak. But Detroit is a beautiful city and especially in the spring time, because we have these winters where it's really cold. So when the spring comes around, people get out and show their own way of enjoying the first few days of sunshine and warmth and you know you go to the park. We even have a beach actually…

The last question is FROM DJ/PRODUCER PIERRE LX: "What happened when Thomas Fehlmann and Moritz Van Oswald invited you out to their studio in Berlin?"
That’s funny because I was just in Berlin. As a matter of fact I’m about to do another project there, that’s kind of a secret. I don’t know, there's something about Berlin...that was the first place that I went in Europe. The first place on the continent I went to, of course, was the UK - but in Europe, Berlin was the first. We were doing a deal at ZTT and I was there negotiating with them, and at the same time Thomas Fehlmann was trying to do a deal so a couple of times I ran into him in their lobby. We just eventually switched numbers. And he was like, 'Hey man, I’ll bring you over to Berlin. The only thing that's required is that maybe to pay for the trip we'll do a track - we can license the track to pay for everything (like flights and hotels), to Tresor or somebody.' And I’m like, 'Okay cool, done deal.' This was...I can’t remember what year, but it was back in the early day, probably around '92-'93. There weren’t a lot of guest DJ things going on at that time. So we decided to just do a track and license the track to Tresor, who were interested to do stuff anyway. That's how the 3MB came about, which is 3 Men in Berlin.



So you guys are working on a little something again?
Yeah actually, I’m gonna be doing some recording with one of the major players in Berlin…again…pretty soon. But I don’t wanna say too much about it right now.

What we can tell you about is his forthcoming Model 500 EP - well, kinda. We'll reveal more details soon...watch this space.