Progress by DJ T-1000

01. Intro
DJ Bone`s introduction to my live radio set. You can tell he`s had a few beers. I thought it`d be a cool opener for the album.

02. Supernatural (Banging’)
This Track took so many twists and turns. This is actually the alternate, hard techno version. The original has vocals by Blake Baxter. I guess I’m not used to producing vocal tracks because they’re never right to me. The shift I did with Cara Nova on “Enginefloatreactor” was a fluke. Until I can get it so it`s like the stuff I hear on the radio, I won’t be comfortable doing vocals.

03. Push
I was in full Regis mode here, can you tell?

04. Locomia
This one named after a club I played in Portugal. Unbelievable. It had a swimming pool on the roof and a patio where you could see the sunrise over the ocean. Oh, and the woman, don’t get me started. My hotel pool was topless. If I had been able to change my flight home, you would have never heard from me again.

05. Marina
On the way home from Unionfest in Mexico City (a massive outdoor event with Slam, Stacy Pullen, etc.) last fall, I stopped over in Chicago for a day to see my girlfriend (although she wasn’t my girlfriend yet). I made this track as soon as I got back to Detroit, inspired by her.

06. Metatransmission
My obsession with frequencies and signals on display.

07. Pure Code
Made during the Blizzard of January ’99. I was snowed in all that week so I just made tracks and did artwork. I only went out once to get groceries. This is why so many good records come from places like Detroit or Stockholm. Crap weather.

08. Progress
I already had the title of the album, the challenge now was to make a track that fit. I’d originally envisioned a spoken-word interlude by the Godfather of Techno, Mr. Juan Atkins, but he proved to be too hard to get a hold of at the time. Now I heard he’s moved to Los Angeles.

09. Berlin
This is a holdover from the Pure Sonik Evening sessions, but never before released. I was inspired by Timbaland’s beats on this one, but the MMT-8 sequencer is limited. I’ve got the DrumStation and R-8 both going at once on this track, with the BassStation and the R-8 on the same MIDI channel, hence the heavy bassline.

10. Untitled
Another interlude

11. Semi-Destroyed
This is how you feel after you come home from a long flight; semi-destroyed. Partly inspired by M-500 “Think Quick (Maurizio Remake)”. Designed so you can set your CD player to continuous loop, put on your headphones and just float.

12. They Will All Betray You
I was going through a heavy breakup at the time I made this track, as you can tell from the title. That shit goes for your so-called friends too; watch them closely or you’ll end up like me, with a whole butcher shop (knives, saws, etc.) sticking out of your back.

13. Tonight
I don’t know what made me write this track. I guess I was really into Massive Attack’s Mezzanine (the best album of 1998) when I made this one. Just trying to bust out of the techno ghetto, man. Do something a little different, seductive, more real. There’s a full set of lyrics that I wrote to this track, too. Maybe you’ll hear them someday.

Would like to thank everyone who lent their support during the recording of this album: Meine Liebe Schatzi Carola Stroiber und alles von Tresor Berlin. Miss Marina Tang. Diana Potts. Howard Forbes. Jennifer Jeffrey. Dan Sicko. Darren Ressler and Hobey Echlin/Mixer. Dirk Walthmann/Raveline. Thaddi Hermann/De: Bug. Tim Barr. Ben Turner and Dave Mothersole/Muzik. Tom/Magic Feet. My hard-working booking agents Stacy, Laura, John and Thierry. Mike Dearborn. Bryan Zentz. Christian Smith. Mistress Barbara. Joel Mull. All the Sonic Groove NYC and 611 Records Philly. Club Locomia, Albrufeira, Portugal. Malta. Jonas, Colette and Addy at Phuture Trax London. Saskia Slegers (as always). Renee Bulanda. Liz Copeland. Sloane Burwell. Monika Janek. Dana Lorenzetti. Jean-Michel Basquiat. Colson Whitehead for his brilliant book “The Intuitionist”. The Roots. Depeche Mode. Massive Attack. Curve. Mad Mike. Submerge. The Legendary Mr. Blake Baxter, and my personal style hero Stacey Pullen.

When Tresor opened on March 13th 1991 in a shack on Potsdamer Platz, beneath which the vault of the Wertheim department store lay, no one would have thought that from there would arise an institution that one day would celebrate 34 years of existence.

tresorberlin.com