Kevin Saunderson on Pioneering Detroit Techno and Its Legacy | Living for the City FULL Interview

Kevin Saunderson is one of the Belleville Three, the teenagers from suburban Michigan who invented Detroit techno, the architect behind Inner City, and one of the most influential catalogs in electronic music history. This is his full conversation with host Hanif Abdurraqib.

In this interview, Kevin traces his path from New York to Inkster to Belleville, where he met Derrick May and eventually Juan Atkins, and where there was nothing to do but make music. He talks about the early days at the Music Institute, driving records to Chicago to get them played alongside house music, and the night at Heaven in London when he first heard Big Fun played for a crowd that rushed the dance floor. He breaks down the origin of the word techno, why his sound went toward melody and vocals when the others went abstract, and how the Reese Bass ended up shaping not just techno but hip hop without most people knowing it.

Kevin also reflects on the racism he encountered in Belleville, the segregation that made it harder to break in America than in Europe, and what it meant to watch the city of Detroit finally embrace what he helped build decades after he built it.

This one is about invention, patience, and what it means to go full circle.

CHAPTERS

00:19 - From New York to Belleville: How Kevin Found the Music

02:50 - Meeting Derrick May and Juan Atkins

04:16 - The Light Switch: Giving Up Football for Music

07:31 - The Belleville Three and the Mythology Growing Around Them

09:44 - Driving to Chicago and Finding the First Audiences

10:57 - Big Fun in London: The First Time He Heard His Music Move a Crowd

14:32 - The Music Institute in Its Prime