Print Page | Close Window

ANALOG progressive electronic

Printed From: Progarchives.com
Category: Progressive Music Lounges
Forum Name: Prog Bands, Artists and Genres Appreciation
Forum Description: Discuss specific prog bands and their members or a specific sub-genre
URL: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=133762
Printed Date: November 21 2024 at 22:26
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 11.01 - http://www.webwizforums.com


Topic: ANALOG progressive electronic
Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Subject: ANALOG progressive electronic
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 16:46
Hello all,

I've been very interested recently in analog synthesizers and sequencers and particularly their use in electronic music.  As far as I can tell, there are a few different broad movements that would fit the bill:

1. The most obvious - albums from before digital synths were commercially available.  I'd put it at roughly 1978 for the bigger artists, some hangers-on didn't really switch until maybe '80, or '81 (gear was expensive back then!).  Kraftwerk, Schulze, TD, Eno, Cluster, Heldon, many associated acts of all the above...

2. Artists deliberately staying analog into the 80s - e.g. Bernd Kistenmacher and Steve Roach, as far as I know.

3. 90s and onward "analog revival" type music, for example hoax krautrock albums of Psi-Fi studio.  Note Minimoog being reissued in 2002, Korg/ARP in the 2010s...  Many youtube/soundcloud type musicians are fully analog, but it's harder to have info about what progressive electronic artists were using.

I am primarily looking for album suggestions in category 2 and 3 above, but would welcome discussion on any of it.

Why analog?
-Technical limitations force a certain compositional deliberateness.  This is relevant in art movements of all sorts of mediums, not just music.  Relating to this, the concept of physically altering your gear for custom outcomes - another form of artist expression - appears most prominent in analog electronic music.
-Purposeful selection of equipment, often for philosophical reasons, is crucial for many artists.  Especially in atmosphere/texture-heavy music. 
-Analog electrical musical equipment had a very short mainstream relevance due to quick technological advancement, which made it almost skip straight from introduction/experimentation to replacement by digital.  This heavily limits the available music in this form - at least until retro revival popularity.



Replies:
Posted By: Gordy
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 16:56
I wonder what you'd make of Alessandro Cortini. He has yet to be added here, but is a modern prog electronic artist through and through, operating with analog and modular synthesizers.

A markedly different yet related sound to what you're looking for in category 3:

https://cortini.bandcamp.com/" rel="nofollow - https://cortini.bandcamp.com/


Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 17:59
Originally posted by Gordy Gordy wrote:

I wonder what you'd make of Alessandro Cortini. He has yet to be added here, but is a modern prog electronic artist through and through, operating with analog and modular synthesizers.

A markedly different yet related sound to what you're looking for in category 3:

https://cortini.bandcamp.com/" rel="nofollow - https://cortini.bandcamp.com/

I sampled some tracks (where should I start for a deeper dive?) and read a bit about the artist.  It's interesting that he discuss the ease of self-expression he gets from his preferred synths, when much of the stereotypical 70s music I would almost see as the opposite - say, the distinctive style of Berlin School is largely due to the technical limitations of analog sequencers and effects.  Thanks for the suggestion.


Posted By: Starshiper
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 19:29
Originally posted by Triceratopsoil Triceratopsoil wrote:

Hello all,

I've been very interested recently in analog synthesizers and sequencers and particularly their use in electronic music.  As far as I can tell, there are a few different broad movements that would fit the bill:

1. The most obvious - albums from before digital synths were commercially available.  I'd put it at roughly 1978 for the bigger artists, some hangers-on didn't really switch until maybe '80, or '81 (gear was expensive back then!).  Kraftwerk, Schulze, TD, Eno, Cluster, Heldon, many associated acts of all the above...

2. Artists deliberately staying analog into the 80s - e.g. Bernd Kistenmacher and Steve Roach, as far as I know.

3. 90s and onward "analog revival" type music, for example hoax krautrock albums of Psi-Fi studio.  Note Minimoog being reissued in 2002, Korg/ARP in the 2010s...  Many youtube/soundcloud type musicians are fully analog, but it's harder to have info about what progressive electronic artists were using.

I am primarily looking for album suggestions in category 2 and 3 above, but would welcome discussion on any of it.
Hi! At this very moment, I would recommend these three masterpieces of progressive electronic music from the three decades you requested:

1. Jean Michel Jarre — Oxygene, 1976





2. Laza Ristovski — Merge, 1982





3. Radio Massacre International —  Frozen North, 1995




Posted By: cstack3
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 19:50
Oh my, a favorite topic of mine!!  One really needs to go into the history of electronic music and development of its instruments, all the way from the Theramin to present!  

Here, this is fun!!  

https://www.historyofsynths.com/" rel="nofollow - https://www.historyofsynths.com/

We cannot forget the contribution of early instruments including the VC3 synth, Hammond organ (a type of electronic instrument) and simple oscillators, used to create sound effects in the studio.  I was an early fan of the Mini-Moog, and later on became interested in the ARP Odyssey, a very robust competitor to the Moog!!  

Eventually, synth circuits became so inexpensive that they found their way into children's toys and inexpensive keyboards such as the Casio SK-1!  I own one of these amazing little toys, it can be played through a mixing board or large guitar amp, where it can blow the walls down!!  Here, check this out! 




-------------
I am not a Robot, I'm a FREE MAN!!


Posted By: Easy Money
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 20:08
I have a nice collection of analog synths plus a few digital, they are often very different from each other. The newer digitals that can imitate analogs sound similar but not really the same. I like a lot of the early electronic music that was coming from university studios using big modular systems, Milton Babbit and Lygeti are favorites. I have a large collection of albums like that.
Long ago, East Texas State, where I was attending school, had a Buchla modular with a quad sound system.


Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 20:32
Hi,

I was thinking about Edgar Froese's first solo albums ... they are neat. Aqua is in my head!


-------------
Music is not just for listening ... it is for LIVING ... you got to feel it to know what's it about! Not being told!
www.pedrosena.com


Posted By: Starshiper
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 21:16
Regarding rather contemporary artists who employ Moogs and Arps in a spacey dance of enchanting sounds and compositions, I'd like to recommend the New York artist Steve Moore and his masterwork titled "Primitive Neural Pathways" from 2010. The synthesiser sound on this album is beautiful and authentically analogue.




Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: October 23 2024 at 21:28
I'm enjoying the latest album from US duo Zombi called Direct Inject. As far as I know they use analog synths. I also love Tubeway Army's Replicas, a proper masterpiece of an album if ever there that used analog synths. Never got that much into Berlin school. No doubt you'll get a bunch of Klaus Schulze and early Tangerine Dream releases on this thread!


Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 07:45
Originally posted by richardh richardh wrote:

I'm enjoying the latest album from US duo Zombi called Direct Inject. As far as I know they use analog synths. I also love Tubeway Army's Replicas, a proper masterpiece of an album if ever there that used analog synths. Never got that much into Berlin school. No doubt you'll get a bunch of Klaus Schulze and early Tangerine Dream releases on this thread!

Hi,

As much as I love all the music ... there is one thing about these kinds of threads that scares me silly ... I don't think that it is the "instrument" that makes the music ... it's the person behind it! Put a monkey behind a guitar, or keyboard, and you will probably get noise ... and at that point, I think we lose sight of the music itself that woke our noodles up ... 

And you know that's true since there were way more players on those instruments than the instruments themselves.

I have a lot of electronic stuff going back to the soundtracks for a few sci-fi films some60/70 years ago, and a lot of it is more progressive, within the context of trying to learn the instrument, than it is anything else ... but we kinda loved hearing what they did with the sounds ... which was really far out! 

It should help TD and KS, but (sadly) it will miss the point of the music itself. The instrument is the medium, not the message.


-------------
Music is not just for listening ... it is for LIVING ... you got to feel it to know what's it about! Not being told!
www.pedrosena.com


Posted By: verslibre
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 11:32
I had a nice post all typed up last night, but the site glitched. So: Round Two!


Originally posted by Triceratopsoil Triceratopsoil wrote:

Artists deliberately staying analog into the 80s - e.g. Bernd Kistenmacher and Steve Roach, as far as I know.


Steve Roach had added digital equipment by no later than 1986, in time for the supremely impressive Empetus.


Originally posted by Triceratopsoil Triceratopsoil wrote:

I am primarily looking for album suggestions in category 2 and 3 above but would welcome discussion on any of it.


I see some great suggestions in this thread, like Zombi's brand new album. Direct Inject (they're one of my favorite bands). Zombi are Steve Moore and A.E. Paterra, who both have many solo releases to their credit. Paterra records as Majeure.




We'll get the usual mentions (Tangerine Dream, Schulze, Jarre), but what about the States' very own Larry Fast aka Synergy? From 1975-1987, he recorded a number of tremendous albums that unfairly get nowhere near as much bandwidth. (For some reason, Synergy is classified Prog Related rather than Progressive Electronic on PA.)

(from Audion, 1981)



Larry Fast later named his boutique electronic music label after that album, and released UK synth duo Wavestar's grand third effort, Moonwind. That turned out to be the best EM album of 1987, since Mark Shreeve wasn't exactly a household name on this side of the pond. Moonwind spent much time in the player, and I enjoy it to this day.




I'll always mention the late, great Mark Shreeve in these kinds of threads. Pre-Redshift/Arc (both are amazing, no guesswork req'd), Mark recorded a string of classic albums that halfway through veered sharply from the familiar tresses of spatial Berlin School-inspired bliss to a style that's much more cinematic, much more "rock." That started with Legion, an album that blew my mind when I first heard it in late 1988.

This is a live version of "Storm Column" from Legion (1985).



-------------
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ipg=50&_sop=1&_rdc=1&_ssn=musicosm" rel="nofollow - eBay


Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 12:05
Originally posted by Starshiper Starshiper wrote:

3. Radio Massacre International —  Frozen North, 1995



love this one, thx

Originally posted by verslibre verslibre wrote:

snip

awesome post Thumbs Up


Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 15:36
a nice relatively unknown one:



Posted By: verslibre
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 16:08
Originally posted by Triceratopsoil Triceratopsoil wrote:

awesome post Thumbs Up




-------------
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ipg=50&_sop=1&_rdc=1&_ssn=musicosm" rel="nofollow - eBay


Posted By: verslibre
Date Posted: October 24 2024 at 16:14
While this was evidently sourced from needle drops, it's still very much worth it to have the albums on disc!



-------------
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ipg=50&_sop=1&_rdc=1&_ssn=musicosm" rel="nofollow - eBay


Posted By: simianmobiledisco
Date Posted: October 25 2024 at 20:28
Iv'e always liked the old skool sound of the analog synths 

-------------
https://simianmobiledisco.com


Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 26 2024 at 01:20
Originally posted by simianmobiledisco simianmobiledisco wrote:

Iv'e always liked the old skool sound of the analog synths 

Hi,

I'm not sure how I think about this ... it was a "new sound" and it came off as a "new expression" ... and we all enjoyed it ... so in many ways, it helps specify that what ended up as digital was not considered "new" since the sound was still there ... and no longer considered "new".

I tend to think that it was the experimentation of the instrument that helped define it, for the most part, but to have the idea that it was more interesting than what is out there digitally, is strange in my book ... it's all an expression of the human spirit, and we can now state that a new sound is more important than the experimentation that gave us the life of that instrument? 

I have a feeling we're walking into landmine areas. Or the Model T car of old is better than the Mustang!



-------------
Music is not just for listening ... it is for LIVING ... you got to feel it to know what's it about! Not being told!
www.pedrosena.com


Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: October 26 2024 at 13:38
If you aren't interested in the thread don't post.



Print Page | Close Window

Forum Software by Web Wiz Forums® version 11.01 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Copyright ©2001-2014 Web Wiz Ltd. - http://www.webwiz.co.uk