Electronic Music Introductions..discuss (1 Viewer)

[Kevin M]

Vangelis' albums...
Spiral
Heaven & Hell
Albedo 0.39, are very good but I personally recommend..
Ignacio A great soundtrack to a French(?) documentary, and..
See You Later Very interesting album.
I also recommend
Digital Moonscapes - Wendy Carlos
Rubycon
Phaedra
Stratosphere
Force Majeure
Sorcerer - Tangerine Dream
Also you might want to check out Tomita, he is fairly bizarre and sometimes overly garish but he is also quite good.

 

[Sem]

I am suprised nobody mentioned real pioneers of Euro disco which actually gave the world "house", "rave", etc: original Space (the French one with Romanelli, Marouani, etc), Marc Cerrone, and Giorgio Moroder...

 

[Zen Butler]

Quote:

is a must, and a standard in most electronica fan's collections, great mention! Similiar importantance Boards of Canada, Orbital (In-Sides) ,
A little off-topic and a little late: I've always like the Bristol Trip-Hop sound , Tricky, Portishead . I'm just now getting into early Massive Attack, this is great stuff. I've only experienced Mezzanine , and loved it.
On the topics of books there is a new one, I just ordered, called Electronic Music Pioneers by Ben Kettlewell. Looking forward to that.

 

[Kevin M]

Ignacio...
Organic, melodic, dreamlike yet forceful at times, cultural sounds from all over the world, very nice mix of electronic and traditional instruments (an early Vangelis trademark). I would love to see the film it is scored to.
Reminds me, for the most part, of the Sea. Take that for what it's worth.

 

[Raine Linton]

Speaking of books, Archie Patterson, the owner of Eurock, will be releasing a book on the history of electronic music. Read about it and view the online music cataloge at
www.eurock.com
Raine

 

[JasonK]

Thanks for the book mentions, gang. Since electronic music never really caught on in the US, I'm always on the lookout for books to help keep me 'in the know'.


Zen, on the topic of Richard D. James:

What did you think of his 'Polygon Window' outing? I like that disc quite a bit. I haven't heard 'Caustic Window' yet.

Another few discs:

1. Muziq - Lunatic Harness
2. Mike and Rich - Expert Knob Twiddlers (a Richard D. James and Mike Paridinas -aka Muziq- collaboration) This disc is a real gem.
3. Mouse on Mars - Idiology

Good stuff.

 

[Zen Butler]

What did you think of his 'Polygon Window' outing? I like that disc quite a bit. I haven't heard 'Caustic Window' yet.

I have yet to get the Polygon or Caustic stuff yet,
Surfing on Sine Waves sounds a bit interesting. I do have much of the AFX stuff, Analogue Bubblebath and several plain label releases for which I don't care for as much. It's much more house beat, straight dance. IMO, RDJ as the Aphex Twin material is much more interesting and far beyond the IDM, Ambient tag that he is slapped with. Once again, try and get your hands on some Takako Minekawa specifically the Fun9 lp. Amazon should have some samples.

 

[David R. Hendrickson]

i was going thru my cd's today i'm surprised no one has mentioned one that i was into LONG before Vangelis or Oldfield:
Thomas Dolby - The Golden Age Of Wireless
of course it has She Blinded Me With Science, but other good tunes as well, Europa and the Pirate Twins, Windpower, One Of Our Submarines...

 

[Mike-W]

I'm suprised no one has mentioned Synergy. My intro to electronic music was via WNEW-FM in NYC in the 70's. They use to play both Synergy and Walter Carlos.
You can find out more about Larry Fast and Synergy at Larry's web site http://synergy-emusic.com/ .

 

[Andrew Chong]

Ah yes, Isao Tomita. At his introduction to electronic music, in the 70's (after being inspired by Wendy Carlos's 'Switched-On Bach no less), he was regarded by many other synthesists as incredible in terms of his ability to evoke expression from what many considered to be a mechanical/non-feeling instrument.

He's got a great synthesized whistle-blow that sounds very realistic.

My favourites include his interpretation of Gustav Holst's "The Planets" and Modeste Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" (all that clucking during 'Ballet of the Chicks in their Shells' is at first hilarious, then quite ingenious).

 

[Lewis Besze]

Ignacio is one of the few albums I don't have from Vangelis.
However you don't wanna own Invisible connections from him same goes to TD's "Zeit" both horrible,worst then Subotnyick's "Touch"
I disagree about Jarre not being able to move[me] emotionally.
I still remember the first time I've heard "Equinox",it was quiet surreal.
Vangelis also wrote :1492:Conquest Of Paradise,another great film score.
I also like from him:
Soil Festivites
El Greco
China
Mask
And there is Mike Oldfield who makes quiet a different type of music then the "traditional" electronic music,maybe that's why someone came up with the "new age" term to accomodate all the different styles that can't be categorized otherwise.
His Tubular Bells still one of the best selling album of this genre,other greats from him are:
Omadawn
Hergest Ridge
QE2
Five Miles Out
Incantations
Amarok [this a 60 minute composition 1 "song" only!]

 

[John McDevitt]

Don't forget Giorgio Moroder!! He brought electronic music to the masses.:alien: :alien:

 

[Andrew Santos]

JasonK,
I love all of those discs you mentioned. good choices.
one of my favorite electronic acts is squarepusher. i have yet to hear an artist that has gone in so many different directions and been able to push the boundary every time in his efforts. as bob in office space said, "i celebrate the man's entire catalogue "
other acts i like:
boards of canada
autechre
clifford gilberto
herbert
amon tobin
nautilis
luke vibert
nobukazu takemura
plaid
there'd be way too many to list. most of the acts i listen to are fairly new, mainly because i'm a young'n at the age of 20 and haven't yet gotten into early works, such as kraftwerk and orbital. but what i've heard i like very much.

 

[JasonK]

Andrew,

I enjoy Squarepusher as well. Hard Normal Daddy is a terrific album, and Go Plastic has some inspired tracks as well (like My Red Hot Car.)

I've yet to hear any Clifford Gilberto though. Is there a particular disc you could suggest?

 

[Zen Butler]

Andrew:
also Boards of Canada created one the best albums of any genre. Music has the right to children , good choice on any list

 

[James_P_Clark]

At the board I frequent most often we trade compilations of tunes we enjoy. While it's predominately an indie rock crowd, all forms of music get at least some discussion. My last comp offered up was a synth pop comp that may fit into the discussion here. Most of the ambient, new agey electronica doesn't really appeal to me but that's why there are upteen million bands.

The Power Of Electricity
1. That Smiling Face-Camouflage
2. It’s Over Now-Cause And Effect
3. Annie Would I Lie To You? Iris
4. The Power Cosmic-The Echoing Green
5. Breathe-Telepopmusik
6. DeVision-All I Ever Do
7. I Die, You Die-Alt. Version-Gary Numan (remastered)
8. Mansion World-Deadsy
9. Cold War-Trans Am
10. Redemption-Faith Assembly
11. Dreamland-The Nine
12. Heroin, She Said-Wolfsheim
13. Shine-Depeche Mode
14. Our Dreams-Anything Box
15. Face Of God-The Echoing Green
16. In The Name Of Angels-Men Without Hats
17. Forever Young-Alphaville

Nothing really to out of the ordinary on this disc and of course there are a couple hundred faves not included but the discs only hold 80 minutes of music.

Later,
jc

 

[Ed E Lee]

There's a huge discussion of electronic music recommendations here at Slashdot
I listen every so often but the names that usually come up are things like Autechre, Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, among others.

 

[Andrew Santos]

I've yet to hear any Clifford Gilberto though. Is there a particular disc you could suggest?

Jason,

he only has an EP and one full length out right now, but i would recommend either, but mainly the full length. he is sort of a mix of freeform jazz, jungle, and a bunch of other things. it's really quite hard to describe. you'd have to check it out to see what i mean. by the way, the title of the cd is "I Was Young And I Needed The Money."

 

[JasonK]

Thanks Andrew! I'll have to pick the disc up. (Love the title...)

 

[Miles_W]

I cannot remember the composers name but his sound track of the film the Mission is very nice. It is nice to see so many Oldfield aficionados in one place. In my opinion you never can have enough Mike.

One more I Love that I do not think has been mentioned is the Art of noise. Some good stuff there...

Miles