Thanks for the advice. I've been endlessly searching the web for this kind of thing and have come across a few of those sites. they are helpful, and i've now got a basic understanding of scales, chords etc from them - but (obviously) none of them relate to techno, not even electronica really.

So maybe what i'm more after are the scales, chords and modes peeps use to compose techno. i know it must vary quite a bit, but there must be some more favoured ones than others.

As a seperate issue, i've been stuggling to get my primevil brain round the subject of tuning. on my 303, the tuning knob at it's centre position means (from reading the wonky manual) that the synth is tuned to A. Fair enough then. So it all harmonises and A = A and C = C, if you get me.

But the fact the knob exists must mean you can tune the synth into a different note / pitch. So would C = something else, then? So can this maybe be setup to get a darker flavour going on?