The Music Institute

For about 18 months, the heart of Detroit techno was a club at 1315 Broadway with no liquor license and no reason to last. The Music Institute opened in mid-1988, founded by George Baker and Alton Miller, with Derrick May and Darryl Wynn spinning Friday nights and Chez Damier on Saturdays. No alcohol, all ages, all night — just bodies, sweat, and the newest records on Earth, many of them made by the DJs themselves.

It became the room where the scene found itself, and its legend outlived its short run by decades. When it closed on November 24, 1989, May ended the final night with “Strings of Life” layered over a recording of clock-tower bells, then walked away. “It didn’t last because it wasn’t supposed to last,” he said. Few addresses in dance music carry this much mythology.