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The Amazing Electronic Music Thread


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The above video explained: You don't need to have the talent and skill to play a real piano either. They are MIDI-fied these days. 

 

 

Cheers!

 

 

Alex

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Ah so you got the email from NI too, eh?  ;)

 

Yeah, I enjoy a lot of Richter's and think he's done much to demonstrate how to integrate these two worlds, but I'd love to hear him stretch his legs a bit more.  

 

I admit that I was completely taken in by his endorsement of the Kontakt controller keyboards and may have already ordered one.

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Agreed. He's been in a bit of a rut lately. I think needs someone or something to really push him out of his comfort zone.

 

Did you get to check out his latest album (Woolf Works)? Familiar territory, but enjoyable nonetheless.

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On 2/17/2017 at 10:52 PM, KK said:

Agreed. He's been in a bit of a rut lately. I think needs someone or something to really push him out of his comfort zone.

 

Did you get to check out his latest album (Woolf Works)? Familiar territory, but enjoyable nonetheless.

 

I've just listened to this today, actually.  It is indeed very Richter, but is a particularly eloquent take on his usual stylings.  I am a fan.

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  • 4 weeks later...

OK, I've been raving about this for WEEKS now. A few weeks ago, or maybe months, my colleague Alan recommended this videogame score to me: PINOUT (Douglas Holmquist) from 2016. It's apparently some pinball app, I don't know. I've been playing it almost non-stop since (at least 20-30 times). So I wanted to share it with you guys. Knowing this place, I expect a lot of disparaging remarks, but if you're a sucker for retro synthpop elements with some contemporary elements, PLEASE check it out:

 

https://play.spotify.com/album/38isr7eM1n8gUgU8VNmwL6?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open

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Wow! The founder of Roland Corp!

 

They did much more than creating the TR-808!

 

RIP!

 

 

Roland CR-78

 

 

Damn, my kind of '80s!

 

 

 

 

 

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Jarre to hold concert at Masada (Israel)

 

(Guardian deems it an 'Anti Trump' concert)

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/03/jean-michel-jarre-anti-donald-trump-dead-sea-concert

 

Even back in my 'very' Jarre Fan days, when I was far more left, to be honest I always found the various virtue signalling causes this guy latches onto, somewhat pretentious and skin deep.

 

Back in the day I remember the controversy around the Sun City concert, essentially a closed event for the country's wealthy elite and a lot of the imagery at concerts in the vague - " Save the World / End Oppression / Environmentalist" themes came across as finger pointy from a man burning up vast carbon resources shipping himself and untold amounts of gear all over the world for the energy guzzling concerts.

 

He hobnobs with elites and corporations to get sponsorship, while unable to let go of the 'Communist Rebel' thing it seems was his youth.

 

"Save the world, don't waste energy but those monster carbon guzzling space missions are great, and so is the Pope who is literally the epitome of hot air".

 

Yes, I had to comment because the Guardian started it first. I gave up any pretentions of being an environmentalist in my early 20s, because so often the most vocal are the ones doing little (if anything) different in our lives than anyone else. It is easy to be the finger pointer while enjoying all the fruits of that energy guzzling world, and Jarre seems little different.

 

Anyway, yes he'll have an event at Masada. It won't be the first time though as Son et Lumiete are common there. I was camping in the desert below Masada a few years ago when the practice for a Son et Lumiere opera (forgot which one) was going on there, with the cliffs lit in various colours.

 

So, he's 'raising awareness ' about the Dead Sea level. Got any actual 'solutions' to that or the energy demand, Jean Michel? Being the - "We gotta do better" or - "We gotta stop doing this" is simply what the Pope does without offering practical fixes.

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No offense, but I find those criticims rather farfetched, Melange!

 

Jarre is not a politician. He's raising awareness the way he can -- i.e. to put up a show that integrates naturally with the environment. He's one of the most unique audiovisual artists in the world that way; i.e. using the surroundings to create an organic space that is able to 'conceptualize' the whole experience. Whether it is the worker's movement in Poland or cultural exchange in China in the early 80s.

 

Sure, inbetween these, there might be a "less aware" gig, and thank God for that! Otherwise, he'd end up all Bono in the end.

 

Wish I could attend those Dead Sea concerts (I've seen some of photos Jarre has put up on Facebook in preparation of this), or in fact any of his big outdoors concerts. I've only seen him in indoors stadium concerts (4 times) and one outdoor that was a smaller fortress here in Oslo.

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I agree with Melange here, though.  Jarre is a bit insufferable at times - one doesn't need to place it into a political context, he does it himself.  It was only this morning that he made a Facebook post bizarre enough to cause my wife to "unfollow" his page, though to be fair I've loaded up her page with too many of my own interests anyway.

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And what would that post be? The "vagina" one? I think that was created by whoever runs the JMJ facebook page, not the man himself. And even if it was, I found it a 'cute' analogy. Very "French".

 

Sure, Jarre is a 'megalomaniac' at times, but a lot of great artists are. In fact, they wouldn't be great without it. Roger Waters is too, and he's about a thousand times more 'political' than Jarre ever was. Still love his music (and shows) to death.

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That's the one.  Regardless of who wrote it, and whether or not it was "cute," it seemed like the kind of dishwatery tripe that one doesn't really need to see.  Few musicians seem to use their social media presence to really post anything substantial.  

 

Waters is obviously a gargantuan prick, but I've been able to stomach it more out of my supreme love for Pink Floyd.  Jarre's music is appealing to me, but not nearly as much.  I prefer Schulze or TD for the sort of ground that he was, frankly, retreading a few years later.  He has his moments, I'll say that.

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Well, we're miles apart when it comes to Jarre, as I think he's the greatest thing that ever happened to electronic music.

 

Also, I really don't have an issue with musicians having political views, or expressing them. Not even Bono, who everybody likes to hate for those reasons. What matters to me is their music. I am also particularly fond of musicians who are able to vary between concepts for art's sake and concepts that are organically ingrained with something meaningful. Jarre, to me, epitomizes all of that. I don't really see any 'pretension' in it, only 'ambitions' and visionary qualities.

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We are surely more than miles apart if you feel that contemporary fast food activism fused with music is anything approaching ambitious or visionary, or indeed anything but utterly banal. 

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7 hours ago, Thor said:

Well, we're miles apart when it comes to Jarre, as I think he's the greatest thing that ever happened to electronic music.

 

 

 

Is there a singular track of Jarre that embodies this feeling of yours? A track that makes you say Jarre is the best thing that ever happened to Electronic Music?

 

 

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It's more his scope. He can do the weirdest, atonal or ambient art projects one moment (no doubt influenced by his mentor Pierre Schaeffer), and then 'easy-listening' synthpop the next. Always with his unique trademarks and instrumentation. So no single track, really. For me, none of the other electronics pioneers of the 60s and 70s come close, even though I like them a lot too (Vangelis, Kraftwerk, TD, Stockhausen, Moroder, Eno etc.).

 

And then there's the 'gesamtkunstwerk' ideas of his shows, which is also unprecedented.

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1 hour ago, Alexcremers said:

But surely there must be a favorite track which you find better than anything else? 

 

Nope. I've never really been a 'track' person. I'm more about the whole albums. But sure, I could probably dish out a few great tracks over the years.

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12 minutes ago, Richard said:

Albums? You want whole albums, Thor? ZOOLOOK.

 

Yeah, great album. And curiously the one appreciated by the most non-Jarre fans (after OXYGENE and EQUINOXE). Not my personal fav, though. In fact, the much-criticized CHRONOLOGIE might be my favourite.

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12 hours ago, Richard said:

Not by me, Thor! I like CHRONOLOGIE very much. 

 

Great! "There is another". :)

 

I know that Jarre is very fond of it too, and has often expressed a desire to remaster it.

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Er...it was remastered, in 2014, I think. Now, if he wants to remix it to 5.1...:)

 

Out of interest, Thor...your top 5 JMJ?

Mine are ZOOLOOK, MAGNETIC FIELDS, CHRONOLOGIE, METAMORPHOSES, and the "new" material from THE CONCERTS IN CHINA.

 

 

Ps, mention TÉO AND TÉA, and you're dead! :lol:

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You're right, but there was a recent interview, I think in connection with the ELECTRONICA albums, where he talked about revisiting that particular album; I think for a remastering (perhaps it was 5.1, as you say), but maybe it was something else. He clearly likes it.

 

I actually like TEO AND TEA more than most people (cheesy, but lovely "surface" lolli-synth-pop!), but even Jarre himself doesn't like it very much.

 

My top 5  "regular" JMJ albums (not counting bootlegs, film music, "rare tracks", conceptualizations etc.)?

 

Perhaps something like this:

 

1. CHRONOLOGIE

2. EN CONCERT - HOUSTON/LYON

3. EQUINOXE

4. REVOLUTIONS

5. METAMORPHOSES

 

That's right. No OXYGENE, although that's a fine work too (I think I prefer OXYGENE 7-13 more, and haven't been able to properly get into the recent OXYGENE 3 yet).

 

There's really no JMJ work that I outright dislike, but I admit having a hard time enjoying some of the early weirdo tracks, like "Exasperated Frog" on DESERTED PALACE, or abstract musique concrete/concept music like PRINTEMPS DE BOURGES, INTERIOR MUSIC etc. But I find them very fascinating. My favourite "abstract" track to get lost in -- in a positive sense -- is the extended "Waiting for Costeau" (inspired me to write a short story when I was a teenager).

 

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Does anyone more hip than me know which if any of the countless subgenres of electronic music this might roughly fit into, focusing mostly on the slow psychedelic groove aspect?  I'm sure there must be a style that encompasses that sort of thing, but I wouldn't know where to start looking.

 

 

 

Somewhat similar:

 

 

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On 13.4.2017 at 10:56 PM, TheGreyPilgrim said:

Does anyone more hip than me know which if any of the countless subgenres of electronic music this might roughly fit into, focusing mostly on the slow psychedelic groove aspect?  I'm sure there must be a style that encompasses that sort of thing, but I wouldn't know where to start looking.

 

 

Some of it reminds me of a certain type of 'ambient' (like Future Sound of London or Shamen), only more melodic. I also hear echoes of the world music New Age that we associate with gigs like Era, Enigma, Deep Forest etc.

 

1 hour ago, Alexcremers said:

No reaction on that GROOVE System piece? Not even from Prometheus Sharky? This forum is really going down the drain.

 

Sounds like basic tribal beats, used in several of those 'exotica' albums in the 60s, but also the kind they would later employ (in a far more hardhitting way) with psytrance and goa two decades later.

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