Octave One are an integral part of Detroit techno history. Their early forays into production on Transmat, their work with Underground Resistance headquarters Submerge and the founding of crucial labels 430 West and Direct Beat attest to that. Not only have they fostered an environment that platforms and nurtures the artists around them, but they've stayed creatively motivated for more than 30 years.

Lenny and Lawrence Burden are the original and core members of Octave One, with their younger brothers Lorne, Lance and Lynell contributing at different points. They came from the source of techno and watched its rise, so they never had to follow trends. Instead, they helped create them. While many of the original Detroit artists were DJs, the Burdens were among the first to focus on live performance. Their general aesthetic can be seen in the many shades of techno derivatives that have come since.

As true techno futurists, Octave One embrace technology without being beholden to the idea of progress for progress's (or consumption's) sake. Though they're not necessarily vintage gear purists, they have critiques of new gear where quality has diminished. For them, it's about getting the optimal performance with trusted tools—nothing more, nothing less. Their high standards and impressive consistency means they're recognised as one of the most electrifying live acts in electronic music. Last year, I spoke with the duo from their Atlanta studio about their setup, their thoughts on touring life and staying true to their sound.

Lenny and Lawrence Burden are the original and core members of Octave One, with their three younger brothers—Lorne, Lance and Lynell—contributing at different points.

What equipment are you currently using in your live show?

Lenny: According to the customs list, we carry about 60 pieces. We don't use a laptop for any type of audio or sequencing. Any time we use a laptop it's for syncing video. The main sequencer is an MPC Live. We have two MPC Live Ones, a Moog Voyager RME Rack Mount, a Dave Smith Instruments Tetra and a modified MeeBlip. The Roland TR-8S is the performance drum machine. A BeatStep Pro as a secondary sequencer. For acid emulation we're using the MAM MB 33.

In the FX case I got a dbx goRack, a Strymon Big Sky Reverb, a Roland RM 202 and a Roland AIRA Modular Scooper. Various pedals—at least three Behringer V-Tone Bass Drivers. Most of the pedals are modified.

On Lawrence's setup we have two Eventide H9s, an Alesis NanoVerb 2, a Dave Smith Instruments Tetra and a Little Labs LL2A Compressor on the master bus. Two Korg Kaoss Pads, the mini and regular. We also have an Overstayer Instrument Driver ID4 for saturation and a BASTL Instruments Dude 5-Channel Monophonic Mixer.

How often do you change out your gear and why?

Lenny: It's usually because it's broken and they don't make it anymore. In the case of the MPC Live, we were using two MPC1000s for years. And we were also using the Roland VP9000 for certain sample playback. Because there are things that we can't reproduce, like in the case of "BlackWater," there's an 18-piece string orchestra on the recording. We don't bring the orchestra with us. When the MPC Live came out, we bought the units thinking that we could seamlessly move the data from one machine to the new ones, which they advertise that you can. I was using a JJOS operating system. When I tried to move it over, it was a disaster. None of the programmes were lined up. So we put them back in a box, put them in the closet and got back on the road. They sat for about a year, maybe two. Finally when the MPC1000 broke and I couldn't find parts for it, I had to start moving the MPC Live into the show. Because of the pandemic I actually had time to do it.

We run a lot of samples. We don't run stems, so it's little drum hits and keyboard stabs. It took a long time aligning everything correctly, getting volumes correct. The settings on the filters don't work the same. I had to go through a lot of things. It took about a year to move everything over. In the case of the Roland TR-8S, they stopped making the TR-8. So we had to buy the S. Lawrence's stuff has stayed pretty stable. Except for the master bus. We've been goofing around with the master bus for the longest.

You mentioned some of the pedals were modified. Do you modify them or do you have someone who does it for you?

Lenny: I modify them. That's the best thing about buying inexpensive gear like Behringer and stuff—you're not scared to modify it. You can't find someone who's already done it on the internet, so you think about it yourself, maybe even open a piece up. Add a switch here, add some resistance there, whatever.

You mentioned that a big reason you replace gear is because it breaks and then you can't find parts. Do you have a piece of gear that you wish you could have again?

Lenny: For me, I used to abuse the Korg Electribe EMX-1. In fact, I still got four units. But when I got down to one working unit, I was like let me just stop. I was buying them every time I saw them, overpaying for them. It's a digital unit, but it was a lot of fun to perform with it. You can do drum rolls and different degrees of drum rolls with this touch strip. One of them is actually sitting on a shelf, but three are broken sitting in boxes. They're heavy, they're built very well. But when it broke, it broke.

Lawrence: I don't. I will use anything. Piece of string and a rubber band, whatever. Going to make it work.

As true techno futurists, Octave One embrace technology without being beholden to the idea of progress for progress's sake.

There must be a fair amount of anxiety when travelling with so much gear. Have there been any horror stories? And how do you deal with those situations?

Lenny: We figured out a way where we can always play with the gear that we bring on board with us. We bring two carry-on Pelican cases, a couple of small bags and that's enough to make sound and ink out a show. Once when we played EXIT Festival, the gear didn't arrive, and it wasn't gonna arrive. It was panic time.

Lawrence: They would find a piece of gear here, find a piece of gear somebody wasn't using there. And that's how the whole show came together. We were grabbing manuals, trying to learn pieces of gear.

Lenny: We have a couple horror stories like that. But before we started touring as a band, we were roadies. We used to pack and carry other people's gear. So we know how to pack things pretty well. That's the reason why we can bring so much with us. But even when stuff is packed very well things get broken.

We had a situation when we went to Dubai, we were standing and waiting for the gear to come. And then we see the customs guy bring a big ol' cart around with all our gear on it, asking, like "What's this?" "It's musical equipment." They were ready to tear it all apart. He started pulling the cables, it was about to be a complete disaster. But my man, who happened to work at customs, was a DJ. He was like, "Wait, they're DJs!"

Lawrence: When he got started working with a screwdriver... Yeah, that was rough.

Lenny: That was probably one of the worst. You know we've been to a lot of places, we've been over a lot of borders. And that was probably the worst. We make sure we have all the proper paperwork. Especially because some gear looks like a bomb to people. We've had a couple close calls and a few disasters where we've learned to have the bare minimum of things to bring on board. It's something where we can at least play our music. We won't be having the kind of fun that we normally would be having. It turns into work. That's when it becomes a job.

Now we have backups of anything essential. There's something that can serve as a backup for it. That's another reason we carry so much gear. A lot of the preparation comes with just anticipating things breaking. So if this breaks, what would we do? If this doesn't arrive, what will we do? We do a lot of that.

We've played and the power tripped. On our technical riders it says don't put the lights, DJ gear, any of that stuff on the same circuit. For bigger venues, we ask for two circuits to have a backup. One venue thought it wasn't important. 20 minutes into the set, the whole place goes dark. Whole arena goes dark. They didn't have the proper technician but they figured out how to get the lights and stuff back on. We played for another ten to 15 minutes and it goes dark again. So you get some things like that. But part of this is just making it work as best as you possibly can.

Do you have favourite places to play? Are there favourite cities or festivals that you connect with?

Lawrence: Every couple of years, audiences change. A lot of the guys who have been in techno for a while, their audiences are older. Ours get younger. It's the energy they give us. Right now I think France is probably one of our strongest markets.

Lenny: The best thing about the kind of music we play—which isn't rooted in trends—is that we can weave in and out. When things get fast or slow or whatever, we're able to survive the wave and continue playing. At the moment everybody likes it hard and fast. That's the beauty of being part of the roots of Detroit techno: you understand where most of the stuff is based. I can do the song I always do, but when I play the song this time I'm emphasising the kick drum harder. Maybe crank the tempo up a little bit. Certain places get a bit more funky than other places. But we're just happy to be able to keep playing these places and still having an audience, which is great.

Lenny: "According to the customs list, we carry about 60 pieces of hardware. We don't use a laptop for any type of audio or sequencing."

Who inspired you to first put together a live show as opposed to DJing, like a lot of your peers?

Lenny: I think the first time we saw somebody putting it together was Derrick [May] and Carl [Craig] practising Rhythim Is Rhythim. We never saw them actually play, but we saw them putting the show together. The first person that really got me going was A Guy Called Gerald, when he came out to Detroit. He played at The Shelter, if I'm not mistaken, when Richie [Hawtin] had his night. That was my first time ever seeing the MPC3000. Actually Aril Brikha was on Transmat and we saw him play, too. Then we were like OK, we could do this. Seeing Gerald at The Shelter was definitely one of those times and he was such a big influence on Detroit with "Voodoo Ray." I can vividly remember that show. It was before we started going to Europe. Maybe '90 or '91.

Who was the first to find out about the progressive-into-techno scene? I'm guessing the oldest brothers introduced it to everyone else.

Lenny: We're the elder brothers. Lawrence is the oldest and I'm the second. There's five of us in total. We all still make music together, though I don't think we've all performed at the same time.

Lawrence: I was a DJ and we were doing college events, but we were also with the original Music Institute. Before the doors were even open. We did Friday nights. We were doing lights, FX and working the smoke machine. All kinds of stuff.

So where was the first performance? And do you remember some of the gear that you used?

Lenny: It was at Motor. We were starting to tour, we were doing four cities in the States. I can't remember what year this was. Maybe '98 or '99. We were performing first as our other alias, Random Noise Generation. That was all sample based, and initially it was just me by myself. So it was the Akai MPC2000, a Roland SP—I want to say the 303. We had a Roland JP-8000, that was my main keyboard. I think there were maybe four or five other pieces. I can't remember what else. At that time, I was trying to do way too much. I thought I had it down. Lawrence DJ'd right before my set. I played for maybe five or ten minutes by myself, running back and forth between gear. Eventually Lawrence came behind the mixer and that's where he's been ever since.

Lawrence: He had all this stuff, pretty much like he does now. But he had a lot of stuff and he's trying to work it out. I was hyped from the DJ set. He was trying to do this and move over there and do that. I just jumped on there. That's how it started as far as us performing together. It hasn't changed. I still don't practise. Never. Even when I was in school. I'm just that kind of guy.

Playing Detroit must be different to anywhere else. What do you feel between the crowd and your performance? What's special about performing there?

Lawrence: For me it's about coming up in the city and understanding the pulse. I understand who I'm playing to and what I can get away with because I know the background of what we were exposed to. DJs like Jeff [Mills] or [The Electrifying] Mojo, The New Dance Show—there are certain rhythms and grooves that we're all familiar with. I know I can go there and play with that. I understand what kind of reaction I might get out of it. That's what I like about coming back to my hometown to play.

Lenny: There are definitely songs that we'll play differently. The crowd has a certain background. A lot of times when we play places, it depends on where we are in the lineup that dictates what we can play. If the guy before us is playing 145 BPM, it's going to dictate what we can play after that. In Detroit, we definitely have a lot more variety that we're able to get away with. We debut stuff at the [Movement] festival. We might play once and we might not play it again ever. Our peers are there. We know that they understand what we're playing. You get to see familiar faces. It's different playing in Detroit, for sure.

For the Burden brothers, playing live is about getting the optimal performance with trusted tools—nothing more, nothing less.

How was your last Movement experience? Did you have a favourite moment from the weekend?

Lenny: It was good. Things are kind of settling into the new normal [after the Covid-19 lockdowns]. It had a very good vibe. Very good energy. We finally got a chance to see our guy Kevin Reynolds play.

Lawrence: Kev got down, it was really good.

So everything went smoothly during your performance, no hiccups or anything?

Lenny: There's always problems. We've been working with these Akai MPC Lives and I had to buy a new one. A whole new MPC. I had to run out to Guitar Center. That's why it's important to have gear that you can replace. That was the reason why we moved away from the MPC1000. Because they no longer manufacture them and they were getting very difficult to find. The MPC1000s, 2000s, they were tanks. The MPC Lives are computers that have a controller attached to it. The differences are night and day. They do a lot more things, but it's not fully baked. Especially for live and roadwork.

You mentioned the new normal and how people are trying to return to their patterns and routines. But especially with air travel, there's been a lot of challenges. Do you think people might have to rethink their touring schedules? And has it affected you at all?

Lenny: The cost of it has doubled and our fees haven't. [Laughs.] There are a lot fewer flights. Certain places used to have three flights a day, now it might only be one, and that flight costs a lot more. So the costs have affected us tremendously. We've had to turn down a lot of shows because they're not cost effective.

Lawrence: Sometimes we can't even get there. It might be fully booked already, you know, or not allow us to come in a day before because we might be in another city or another country.

Lenny: Sometimes financially it makes no sense. It might cost more to actually get to a place than what the fee will be. Normally Europe books us so fast that we don't have many open dates. Now we're focusing a lot more on North America, which is great. Next weekend we're going to Phoenix, we just played Chicago. Before that we'd never played Chicago in the 30 years of our career.

And sometimes your gear gets left behind, because there's too much luggage. That's happened quite a few times, a lot more than it used to. So when we go to Europe, we go in at least a day early. We don't go on the same day. That way there's at least an extra day or two for them to get our luggage over.

Lawrence: "A lot of the guys who have been in techno for a while, their audiences are older. Ours get younger. It's the energy they give us."

What do you think the US scene needs to get to a substantial level so people can live from it, like they do overseas?

Lenny: We're putting shows together and there's a lot of festivals here. Here's the difference. We're not exotic in the US. There are many people from other countries who come here and play quite often. I mean we've been in Detroit for a large part of our careers. And we never got that invitation to play Chicago. Plenty of European artists, artists from South America come and play Chicago, come and play clubs in the US. I think it's going to take us emphasising more on playing at home so that the promoters understand that we're available—that we want to do this.

Lawrence: I feel the same way. We just need more attendance, and the word just needs to get out a little bit more. I think we have to present ourselves in such a manner with our performances and the way we do things. We have to bring it. It can't be half-assed. You got to do just like you do in Europe. You got to play like there ain't no more tomorrow, you got to deliver. I think that's part of the key—don't go easy because you're at home. Hit 'em hard, you know?

Adding to what you were saying, a lot of people didn't play in Detroit or Chicago for a long time. How do we move past these rivalries, fights about credits on tracks, things of that sort?

Lawrence: People have to realise we're old men and need to quit all of that stuff. We were some of the same. We got robbed, but we kind of look at it as being initiated into the club. I just appreciate the music. I go back to the music even more as I get older. Because that's what it was about. It's not about politics.

20 or 30 years ago selling music was still a way to make a living. Now I assume that most of your income comes from touring. When did that happen?

Lenny: More or less it was when streaming became commonplace. When Apple Music and Spotify became common and people started devaluing music, when it wasn't something you purchased. When it came to a point where we no longer had to mail out vinyl, we could just email it. You have collectors still, but it's nothing like before when you put a lot of care into a complete package. You knew someone would be reading the credits, holding the record. It wasn't just listening to the music. It was everything around the music.

Lawrence: It was around 2000 when we recorded "BlackWater" in the studio in London. And I remember taking the record—I was DJing somewhere in Germany—and giving it to another DJ. I had the white labels, I was passing them out all happy. He said, "Hey, I already got it." And, "I'm like, wait a minute, you already got it?" He said, "Yeah, somebody sent me a link." I'm like, "dude, this is a white label. We just left the studio two weeks ago." But he already had it. I was dumbfounded. He obtained the track somewhere and once I saw that, I was just like, "OK, it's just up for grabs." It turns into the Wild West for music. You just get it. However you obtain it.

The Roland MC-707, a portable all-in-one groovebox that allows producers to make and perform full tracks without a computer.

How do we fix that? How do we get the younger generations into it? There's no Jeff Mills or The Electrifying Mojo on the radio. How do we tackle that problem?

Lenny: I think music is more universal now. Kids don't listen to the radio anymore. Their discovery lanes are completely different than when we came up. There weren't many TV channels, there was no internet, there was a limited number of radio stations. Now we're in the limitless era, where you can be on the internet forever and never see everything. Because there are so many different lanes, it's going to be primarily up to those special young people who are looking for something different. That's what we were—we were looking for something different. We had pop music, but we were also looking for something else. It's going to be up to the listener, the person, the individual—we just have to make sure it's available.

We know Spotify pays us nothing and they make millions and billions off of us. But we also have to be available so people can discover us. It's the reason we're on these platforms—not because we're making money. It's just so someone can discover it. There's not a lot else that we can do. And it's about not always just playing the most exclusive, underground thing. You can complain about things like Mysteryland or Tomorrowland, but if you don't play these festivals, how can people discover you? It's important for us to present ourselves so that if you're looking and want to find this information there are ways for you to do it.

Playing music for audiences is great, but touring isn't as glamorous as people think. Most of your time is in airports, hotels or in transit. How do you decompress or deal with the physical and mental toll of being on the road?

Lenny: We're constantly doing something. We don't have downtime. It's not like a DJ where they get off the plane, sleep all day and then play that night. We're doing a soundcheck, grabbing some food, maybe getting a couple hours sleep. Sometimes we don't even get a chance to go back to the hotel. We'll leave the club straight to the airport.

Lawrence: A 90-minute soundcheck turns into four hours because they don't have the equipment we need. We're ready and prepared, but they're waiting on an engineer to come through and the stage is halfway built. Stuff happens all the time.

Lenny: We realise that we bring in quite a complex setup. We've had shows that were extremely enjoyable. But getting to that show could have [involved] so much nonsense. It's stressful for most people just to travel. Think about travelling with this gear. As far as decompression, that only happens when we come home. It doesn't happen on the road. We just don't have that. We don't have time to decompress. Sometimes we get maybe two or three hours, but you can't get to sleep. It's not really decompression if you can't get some sleep. Sometimes you're in the best hotel in the world, and only there for two or three hours.

Lenny: "We could easily do a simpler setup… Just because something is easy doesn't mean that it's the path you need to take."

What's next in the pipeline for you?

Lenny: We've almost finished putting together our first compilation remaster. We did a compilation years ago called The Collective. What we find is now because of these platforms, we need to go ahead and get it remastered. And we're going to put together another compilation of live mixes.

What haven't you done with your art that you'd still like to do?

Lawrence: We've done a lot of stuff, man. It's a good question. Tracks in movies, commercials and video games—all been done already. We've had music in film, but never scored a film.

Lenny: Film scoring would be fun. I watch anime and I'll see music by Ken Ishii. The appreciation for what he does in Japan is much greater than the appreciation for what we do in the US. We don't get that kind of reverence here.

What would you say to young artists who want to have longevity? What advice can you give to them?

Lawrence: I would just tell them to stay true to what you feel. Because a lot of times what you might be feeling might not be "the trend" at the moment. We've been in this so long because it wasn't a trend for us. You'd be surprised what people might be looking at in you that inspires them. Don't hop all over the place. We could have easily started working with laptops. But that wasn't our vibe, even though that was the trend at the time. You just do you.

Lenny: You've got to be true to who you are. We could easily do a simpler setup. They sent us Ableton before it was released. We had the early version. We just weren't comfortable. Just because something is easy doesn't mean it's the path you need to take. We're not making trendy music. If you jump on a trend when it's hot, when it's not, you've got to try to figure out what's hot next. You can't sustain yourself that way. We know a lot of artists learned the hard way. Once you figure out who you want to be and what you want to do, just stick to it.

Lawrence: We see other artists do these phases. But we're still here just being true.

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