Recording
Strings of Life
Rhythim Is Rhythim
Independently chosen for5 of our lists. Here is what each of them said.
- Released
- 1987
- Label
- Transmat
- On
- Detroit Techno, The Eighties, The Waxonia Desk — A Way In, The Waxonia Desk — Detroit, Heard in Europe, and The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
- Updated
- 2026-08-29
Ranked No. 1 in Detroit Techno
Derrick May's piano stabs have no bassline and barely a kick for half their length, and the record still functions as the most reliable emotional detonator in dance music.
Picked by The Eighties
Derrick May's own label again, and the record the rest of the decade gets measured against. No chorus, no bassline for most of it, and no committee anywhere that would have let it out at that length.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — A Way In
Start here if you think electronic music is cold. There is no bassline and barely a kick for half its length, and it still empties a room into a dancefloor faster than anything made since.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — Detroit, Heard in Europe
Obvious, and obvious for a reason. It was a Belgian and British floor record before Detroit had a market of its own, which is why a city's most famous export sounds nothing like the city that made it.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
No bassline, barely a kick, and it still empties a bar into a dancefloor faster than anything made since. The one record on this site nobody in thirty-eight years has argued with.