![]() "As soon as we pulled into the city, one station had an exclusive of this mystery record, and it just lit up the airwaves," Atkins explains. That is where technology and electronics helped." Incredibly, he was in New York promoting the second Cybotron single, "Cosmic Cars," at the moment "Planet Rock" landed. ![]() Over Skype, Atkins told me, "The reason I was doing electronic was because I lived in a place where I couldn't get other band members, so I had to put these songs together by myself. The music of Parliament-Funkadelic, Prince, and many new wave records had already primed the pump for funky electronic sounds, inspiring Juan Atkins and Richard Davis to form Cybotron in 1981 and record the scrappy but powerful single "Alleys Of Your Mind." Although not as widely cited as "Planet Rock," its syncopated rhythms and chilly synth work suggest it was perhaps the original electro tune. The arrival of Kraftwerk's "Numbers" and then "Planet Rock" sent aural shockwaves through music scenes around the US, which were perhaps felt deepest in Detroit. For everyone else, let's start at the beginning. If you're already an expert on the origins of electro, skip to the second section, on Electro's resurgence, below. We hope this serves as a jumping-off point for more deep dives into this fathomless collection of sounds like the one inspiring this feature. Given its complexity and the wealth of subject matter, this piece will only attempt to summarize the major developments in the genre over time and will unfortunately omit many amazing electro tunes-and much of the social context around them-out of sheer necessity. With its return in more recent years to the spotlight on dancefloors and in new release bins, it seems especially worthwhile to examine the history of this portentous genre. It's had a long and fruitful evolution since, seeing occasional resurgences in popularity among DJs and producers while some staunch supporters hold on throughout peaks and valleys. By my count, electro first appeared in 1981 and was nothing less than the harbinger of hip-hop and techno, created largely by African Americans artists and often inspired by European, synth-focused records. ![]() ![]() While it took many forms inside the US and eventually internationally, its most steadfast features are ground-shaking TR-808 percussion in swift, syncopated patterns and motifs that often invoke technology and ponder the future. The word "electro," sometimes called "electrofunk," describes a wide breadth of electronic music sounds with more or less the same origins. The genre of electro is as lovable as it is difficult to pin down. ![]()
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