Generation Ecstasy is the story of rave culture and techno music. Challenging traditional ideas about music and spawning a global network of underground scenes based on the frenzied euphoria of the all-night dance party, rave is the most innovative, influential, and controversial pop phenomenon since punk rock. A celebration of rave's quest for the perfect beat and the ultimate rush, Generation Ecstasy is the definitive chronicle of rave culture and electronic dance music.

In Generation Ecstasy, music and culture critic Simon Reynolds takes the reader on a guided tour of this end-of-the-millennium phenomenon. The first critical history of techno music - and the drug culture that accompanies itGeneration Ecstasy traces rave's origins in Detroit techno and Chicago house, then follows the myriad ways in which these black American genres were transformed by British and European youth.