Hard techno and schranz: from Frankfurt to TikTok

Where the name comes from

In 1994 Frankfurt DJ Chris Liebing was hunting for the darkest, most distorted records in a record shop and called them "schranz". The word doesn't really mean anything, but it sounds like grinding metal. When he came back, the records were waiting in a section labelled with that word. Soon it appeared on flyers for Frankfurt clubs Omen and U60311.

What schranz sounds like

Schranz is usually 140–160 BPM, with short, looped percussion fragments, a distorted kick and almost no melody. Tracks are built as tools for DJs: minutes of loops that are easy to layer. Around the turn of the century Liebing and André Walter released the Stigmata series, which became a template for the sound. Others played hard techno at the time too, such as Chicago's DJ Rush.

The fall

After 2005 schranz went out of fashion. The scene moved towards minimal, and Liebing himself slowed down and turned to deeper techno. For more than a decade hard techno was a niche for loyal fans.

The big comeback

In the late 2010s and the 2020s hard techno returned with huge force. Frenchman I Hate Models combined distortion with emotional rave melodies. After the pandemic a young generation wanted speed and energy, and short party clips on TikTok and Instagram spread the music around the world. American Sara Landry, who plays around 150 BPM, became one of the faces of the new wave and founded her own label, HEKATE. New hard techno often blends with trance, hardstyle and even hip-hop edits.

The hard techno debate

Fans of the older scene accuse the new wave of being too simple and made for phone clips. Younger fans reply that it is just another generation with the right to its own sound. This debate returns in techno every decade, so it is worth knowing both sides and listening for yourself.