Classics

Juan Atkins: the story of Clear and No UFO's

Juan Atkins died on 31 October 2026 in Mexico City, aged 64. In the shorthand for the Belleville Three, Derrick May is the innovator and Kevin Saunderson the elevator. Atkins, who came first, is the originator. Two of his records explain why: "Clear", made with Cybotron in 1983, and "No UFO's", released as Model 500 in 1985. Neither was a big chart hit. Both changed what electronic dance music could sound like.

At a glance

A synth for Christmas

Atkins got his first synthesiser, a Korg MS-10, for Christmas at 16. He wanted it after hearing Parliament's "Flashlight", which to him sounded like UFOs landing on records. He later called the time he spent with that small synth the most productive period of his career, as Reverb retells.

In 1980 he founded Cybotron with Rik Davis, a Vietnam veteran about ten years older who brought his own ARP synthesisers. They released their first single on Atkins' own label, Deep Space Records: "Alleys of Your Mind" in 1981, which according to Sound On Sound sold around 10,000 copies.

The man who made that possible was the Electrifying Mojo. The Detroit radio DJ played Kraftwerk next to Prince, Parliament and the B-52s, and he put Cybotron on air.

Ahead of Prince

Then came the moment Atkins liked to tell. Cybotron's "Cosmic Cars" came out at the same time as Prince's "Little Red Corvette". Back then each city had one big radio station whose chart decided what got played, and on Detroit's chart the order was clear: "Cosmic Cars was number one on this chart. Little Red Corvette was number two," Atkins remembered in a 2011 interview with Little White Earbuds.

The industry was baffled. The record companies and promoters, he said, kept asking who this Cybotron was: they had millions of dollars of promotion behind Prince, and two unknowns from Belleville were beating them. For Atkins the story also explained why independent labels mattered. With cheap vinyl a small label could still reach the top of a city chart. When the CD took over, he felt, that door closed for years.

Clear: four notes and a drum machine

Cybotron recorded "Clear" in April 1982, and Fantasy Records released it in 1983 as a single from the album "Enter". It is a nearly instrumental track: a cold, cascading synth line, a few robotic words, and a bassline Atkins built from just four sequenced notes, with random patterns triggered from a drum machine. Sound On Sound traces the idea back to Afrika Bambaataa's "Planet Rock", which itself borrowed from Kraftwerk.

The Wire later counted at least 50,000 copies sold. Atkins himself never saw a hard line between electro and techno. In his interview with Reverb he simply calls all of it electronic music.

The track travelled furthest through hip-hop. In 2005 Missy Elliott built "Lose Control" on a sample of "Clear" and took it to number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, more than twenty years after the original.

No UFO's: techno in a grandmother's basement

After "Enter", Atkins and Davis went separate ways: Davis wanted to move towards rock, Atkins wanted to stay electronic. Atkins founded his own label, Metroplex, and in April 1985 released its first record under a new name, Model 500: "No UFO's".

He made it at home, in a studio in his grandmother's basement that he called Metroplex Soundworks. "No UFOs was a total home recording," he told Sound On Sound. The beats came from a Roland TR-909 and a Sequential Circuits DrumTraks running in sync, the bassline from a Sequential Six-Trak, the stabs from a Pro-One. Everything went onto a Tascam eight-track.

The record found its audience through Derrick May, who took it to Chicago. Frankie Knuckles played it at the Power Plant, and for a while it was said to be the only American dance record outside Chicago that the city's key DJs played. A few years later, when the British label 10 Records wanted to call its Detroit compilation "The House Sound of Detroit", Atkins objected. The album came out as "Techno! The New Dance Sound of Detroit", and the music had its name.

The big one of the three

In Detroit, his peers never had any doubt who came first. At the TV Lounge, Moodymann gave Atkins his crown in front of the crowd, a moment the DJ lolo__knows filmed and shared on Instagram on 1 November 2026, the day his death became known. In the clip Moodymann calls him the big one of the Belleville Three, because he was the first, and the one who showed the other two the way.

Atkins was a year or two older than Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson, and when his two friends from Belleville started out, he already had the synthesisers, the first records and the radio connection. They followed his lead before they went on to make "Strings of Life" and "Good Life".

One artist, many names

Atkins rarely released music under his own name. Each alias stood for a different side of his sound, and two labels carried most of it. His first, Deep Space Records, put out the early Cybotron singles. In 1985 he founded Metroplex for "No UFO's". It is still running today, managed by his daughter Milan Ariel, and turned 40 in 2025, as Carhartt WIP's label feature describes.

The last two names show how close Detroit and Berlin became after the fall of the Wall. Tresor in Berlin released both projects, and his work with Moritz von Oswald ran for more than twenty years.

Why it still matters

Atkins kept both names alive. In 2019 he relaunched Cybotron as an audiovisual live show, with a first concert at the Barbican in London and further dates at Primavera Sound and Dekmantel, as Attack magazine reported. Asked about the word he gave the music, his answer was short: techno, as in technology, is self-explanatory.

The records outlived every trend that followed. Billboard placed "Clear" at number 77 in its 100 best dance songs of all time in 2025, and DJs from electro, techno and house still play both tracks. His story also shows a pattern: the music was invented in Detroit, but it was named on a British compilation, released in Berlin and celebrated at the Barbican in London long before American cultural institutions caught up. Records like these turn up every month in the "Still in the bag" corner of our chart, and the Classics page collects their stories.

Questions

Who was Juan Atkins?

A producer and DJ from Detroit, born in 1962, often called the originator of techno. With Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson he formed the Belleville Three. He died on 31 October 2026 in Mexico City, aged 64.

What is "Clear" by Cybotron?

An electro track by Juan Atkins and Rik Davis, released in 1983 on Fantasy Records. Missy Elliott sampled it in 2005 for "Lose Control".

What is "No UFO's"?

The first release on Atkins' label Metroplex, recorded as Model 500 and released in April 1985. It is seen as one of the first techno records.

Did Cybotron outsell Prince?

On the chart of Detroit's leading radio station, Cybotron's "Cosmic Cars" was number one and Prince's "Little Red Corvette" number two, as Atkins told Little White Earbuds in 2011.

Which names did Juan Atkins record under?

Cybotron, Model 500, Channel One, Infiniti, 3MB (with Moritz von Oswald and Thomas Fehlmann) and Borderland (with Moritz von Oswald). His labels were Deep Space Records and Metroplex.

Who named techno?

Atkins insisted on the word when the 1988 compilation "Techno! The New Dance Sound of Detroit" was put together in the UK.