It is easy to become disillusioned by the vector of technological progress that capitalism has placed us on. Yet somehow, there are countless out there still excited by the slop we are inevitably served year after year through keynotes, press releases, conventions, and the like - all designed to coat the shit in lustrousness, the novelty of the event, newness itself. There are few, if any, aspects of life unfettered by the poison of speculative capital and the growth economy, but it is the tech sector that is most eager to intoxicate itself on the promises of more. That is the unfortunate nature of technology: it is characterized by ‘growth’, ‘advancement’, ‘speculation’.

And so a natural response to the maladies of contemporary progress is a staunch opposition to the tech world, but as is quickly found out, it is entirely inescapable. Especially as a multi disciplinary individual, enthralled by the capacity for learning that technology ostensibly promises. All that I have been able to do is try as vigilantly as possible to reduce time spent on social media sites and reduce consumption - especially of short form media. Even still, I remain an ‘online’ individual, just trying to divert my attention to smaller forum sites, reading articles and essays, and using my computer to provide me more means of self expression. I believe that we must re assert our agency on the digital sphere.

And despite all this, I am an individual afflicted with hopefulness, and my malady is embodied by my love of science fiction. By proposing worlds that are outside of our own, i find it easier to become excited by the prospect of space travel, interplanetary networking, super computers. Something especially felt through the futurism of the 50s and 60s where Americans were optimistic about their future, when we used to produce tangible things not just services and a noxious dose of speculative trading. Not that I remember any of it.

I find that nowadays the best form of scifi optimism can be found through techno music & techno culture. Electronic music in general has always been at the forefront of ‘progress’ but in techno there is a wealth of musicians plastering their releases with space insignia that is not really seen in any other genre. From the beginning artists like Jeff Mills have been dreaming up interplanetary worlds escaping from and burrowing themselves underneath Motor City, creating spaces feverishly liberated, entranced by electronic signals. Axis Records, Mills’ contemporary label embraces the overt love of space featuring artists like Jonas Kopp, Jeroen Search, Terrence Dixon, Jeff Mills himself and countless others all releasing records very clearly space obsessed

It is artists/releases like these that remind me the most of what Mark Fisher discusses in his ‘Baroque Sunbursts’ essay where collective ecstasy and release at raves reveals flashes of a world outside of our own that is impossible to access outside of the darkened warehouse of sonic assault and hedonism. It feels like the trance state induced by techno is a uniquely primal way to enter a world of fantasy. A world doubly fantastical in its overt queerness where for so many hours faggots are the hegemonic class.

I guess I really meant to write this as a brief introduction before I shared some of my favorite Techno releases but it became a discussion that I will leave standalone. There is a lot more that could be said and many more eloquent ways to express it but the point of publishing work on this site is to write more casually and loosely so, apologies.