Last night a DJ saved my life is an extremely well researched (and more importantly, objective!) look at the chronology, the influences, the people, the places, the labels, everything to do with the birth of both house and techno, as well as what came before (Disco is NOT a dirty word!) and I recommend everyone into electronic music or DJing reads it.


I have to say though, that something that is entirely missed is the whole industrial/electronic/new romantic/new beat scene in europe in the mid to late 80s - Some of the tracks made then are just pure techno/house/trance but totally uninfluenced by house or techno from america, more directly derived from Kraftwerk, Jean Michel Jarre, etc. and I think a lot of people ignore that entirely, which is not so good because it did have a lot to do with the whole euro techno scene that came after (as much as American house and techno did influence that scene as well) Although it could be said there was a lot of "cross-pollenization" during that time in the 80s and that it was a lot more organic than just coming from one place or another.