Actually to be pedantic raves go way further back. The first mention of rave in modern writing goes back to 60s counter culture, think oil projections and proto-pysch rock… it self a continuation of the happenings from the beat era. The term was repurposed in the mid eigties when dance music got pushed underground after disco demolition night. Disco never died in the uk or europe even though the roots arguably of modern dance music starts there with the breakout kraut rock scene centered around Düsseldorf… and of course a lot of cross pollination.
But to be even more pedantic the concept goes further than that as in the late 30s and forties there would be dance contests to see who could last the longest…
To go even further than that jazz, before that polka… it being a folk version of the waltzes of the time. Newspapers of time read like madlibs only replace leather jackets and mohawks with polka dots. Quite a trip.
Going back further pre industrialization its said you couldn't hear the orchestra over the sounds of fucking in the box seats on the balcony… the idea of stuffy classical concerts only emerging when the concert halls were opened to the burgeoning middle class and said class would dress up to rub shoulders with the aristocracy.
But in antiquity the mystery religions of Dionysus would arguably be the first true raves in spirit.
But every culture has its all night dances, from pow wows of the plains to suffi’s in the muslim world.
Music is largely universal and a uniquely human endeavor, the oldest flutes found are made by Neanderthal.
We're not talking about Techno per se though, but the so-called "rave parties" of the late 80s/early 90s associated with the namesake culture. A lot more than techno was involved, including acid house and later UK developments like jungle.
(And to be pedantic in the same way, we can find it way before Detroit, e.g. in Dusseldorf and Moroder's Italy and NYC)
They existed, but where they "raves" or just clubs and venues playing rave music?
Proper raves where the DIY open or underground fare, secretly organized, communicated with flyers or whisper-net, etc. And when the 1994 act banned them there was a lot of (justified) anger from the rave "community"! In any case, still a British thing.
You know you're old when you find yourself grumbling while using a decibel meter on your phone at 2pm in the morning, but I respect that they got away with it.
It's trying to maintain definitions of things we love that are resistant to being lumped in with commercial parties, and hold the things we love about them as an important distinction.
When I think "rave" I don't think about paying stupid money for drinks, being groped by security, mainstream artists and EDM ("musical gentrification") in general, curfews, expensive tickets, arbitrary rules, profiteering, or drugs/sexual expression being frowned on or barred.
Raves should be counter-culture, anti-authoritarian, DIY, and anarchic. Bona-fide liberated situations that aren't behest of the rules and requirements of commercial events. This is a definition that shouldn't be diluted nor conflated.
This is rewriting history. Raves was a british thing, and it was in the open, not in clubs.
Chicago warehouse parties preceded raves and are important for electronic dance music history, but are not raves.