Claude Young

As the nineties drew to a close, Claude Young ranked among Detroit’s foremost DJs and producers. He merged the richer textures favored by Motor City melodicists with the stricter, stripped-down current represented by Robert Hood and Jeff Mills, yielding tracks that balanced emotional depth with forceful trance drive. Early in the decade, after lending assistance to Jeff Mills on his radio program, Young issued his debut recording, the One Complete Revolution EP, on his own Utensil label. He also released material as Project 625 on DOW, a second imprint he operated, and collaborated with Anthony "Shake" Shakir on Frictional, his third label. Further tracks appeared on Acacia under the name Rhythm Formation and on 7th City, where he worked with Dan Bell as Brother From Another Planet. Young began reaching an international techno audience through a single on Andrew Weatherall’s Emissions Audio Output Recordings, credited as Being, along with releases on DJAX-Up-Beats issued under his own name. In 1995 he supplied several prominent remixes, among them productions by Inner City, Astral Pilot, Innerzone Orchestra, Joey Beltram, and Slam, the last of these realized with Ian O’Brien. His first full-length project, the 1996 DJ Kicks compilation, displayed his command and placed him among the strongest DJs to emerge from Detroit since Jeff Mills. The following year his debut album, Soft Thru, appeared on Dutch Elypsia Records and received considerable praise for its skill in joining minimalist and melodic impulses.