Regular readers will probably recall an article that we published on 17th November, where we covered some controversy over Detroit Beatdown’s name – in short, its use seemed a little inappropriate after recent events within the scene. Event organisers brushed off the comments, presenting a threadbare defence somewhere along the way.

The event finally took place on Friday night – with no less than three of our regular Detroit sources in attendance. One reported that the party was “pretty good, if a little quiet by the usual standards” whilst another said “Eddie Fowlkes in particular played a really good one, but the atmosphere was a bit off from the usual”.

Another person who also graced Detroit Beatdown with his presence at The Marble Bar was Juan Atkins himself – the so-called originator of techno. From what we gather, this isn’t an unusual occurrence – but as far as we can establish, it is the first time that Atkins decided to live stream part of the party on the night.

Taking to Facebook over two separate live streams – adding up to some 25 minutes of footage altogether – Atkins stood near the DJ booth showing Eddie Fowlkes at work on the night. The consensus at Ears To The House was that the music was rather good and that Fowlkes was just concentrating on doing a good job – it’s certainly a refreshing change to the rubbish we sift through for our DJs Playing Badly column.

But on the very rare occasions that Atkins rotated the camera to face the audience, we noticed two things. The positive first – we didn’t observe a single person branding a phone in the air trying to record some grainy footage for their Instagram page. Indeed, the only individual who seemed to have their mobile out was Atkins himself.

As for the negative? There wasn’t exactly a lot of dancing going on – or as our final source bruisingly put it, “I’ve seen more signs of life in a morgue than at the party”. Not Detroit Beatdown’s finest hour…