walking upstream…
808 State
photo: music tech fest · cc by 2.0 ↗808 State
Formed in Manchester in 1988 by Graham Massey (of post-punk outfit Biting Tongues), record-shop owner Martin Price, and synth prodigy Gerald Simpson (soon to leave as A Guy Called Gerald), 808 State fused the bleep-and-bass sound of early Detroit techno and Chicago acid with a very British, almost pastoral melodicism, taking their name from the Roland TR-808 drum machine. Their run from the DIY acid of 1988's Newbuild through the crossover hits "Pacific State" and "Cubik" made them figureheads of the Madchester-adjacent rave explosion — and, by Richard D. James's own account, his first and most formative influence.
the sound in question
1989
Pacific State808 State
walk the tributaries ↓
Kraftwerk1970s · Electronic / Krautrock / Synth-pop
Graham Massey has described Kraftwerk's pull on the group directly: "melodic, gleaming projections into the future" — the same futurist optimism he says ran through the Detroit techno the band devoured alongside it while forming their sound.
listen: upstream & heresource: 5 Magazine - 808 State interview (Graham Massey on Kraftwerk/Detroit techno "optimistic futurism," electro/Mantronix, acid house) ↗
1977
Trans-Europe ExpressKraftwerk
1989
Pacific State808 State
listen forListen for a clean, major-key synth-melody hook riding over the rhythm track — 808 State's chillout and pop-adjacent moments borrow Kraftwerk's trick of making a machine melody sound genuinely pretty rather than merely functional.
Derrick May1980s–90s · Detroit techno / Techno / House
Massey lumps Kraftwerk and "all the Detroit techno, too" together as the same "optimistic futurism" that shaped 808 State's sound around Newbuild — a scene whose most celebrated architect, Derrick May, gave acid/techno its emotive, string-swept high-water mark with 1987's "Strings of Life."
listen: upstream & here
1987
Strings of LifeDerrick May
1990
Cubik808 State
listen forListen for the driving, string-pad-topped four-on-the-floor pulse and the sense of yearning melody riding over hard-quantized drum programming — the "hi-tech soul" feel 808 State imported wholesale into tracks like "Cubik."
Kurtis Mantronik1980s · Electro / Hip hop
808 State's members have cited electro's hip-hop lineage — "electro, which for us was a bit of a hip-hop derivative — stuff like Mantronix" — as part of the wonky, atonal palette they merged with acid house; Kurtis Mantronik's sample-science drum-machine productions (as Mantronix) gave the group a template for treating breakbeats as abstract sound design rather than straight rap backing.
listen: upstream & here
1985
Needle to the GrooveKurtis Mantronik
1988
Sync/Swim808 State
listen forListen for the sharp, dry drum-machine snare/clap combination and the sudden jump-cut arrangement style — 808 State's choppiest early cuts on Newbuild carry Mantronix's breakbeat-collage energy more than any straight four-on-the-floor techno track.