Jump to content

The Electronic Music Thread


Thor

Recommended Posts

Couldn't find a similar topic in the search engine.

So far, I have the impression that most people here are traditional, orchestral buffs with little to no interest in electronic music. So here's your chance to prove me wrong and mention some of your favourites! :)

Electronic music is the whole reason why I became interested in soundtracks in the first place, way back when. It started with all the pioneers - Jean Michel Jarre, Vangelis, Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream. Then the 80's MIDI masters, like Faltermeyer, Moroder, early Silvestri. Or those that brilliantly merged synth with orchestra in the style of prog rock and electropop, like Zimmer, JNH. In the 90's and beyond, I got interested in more hardcore stuff, esp. house or goa/psytrance like Paul Oakenfold, Juno Reactor, Man with No Name, Shpongle, Infected Mushroom, Astral Projection, The Crystal Method etc.

Finally, in more recent years - I've really been into more soothing ambient, texture-based stuff like Isham, Mansell, Martinez, Eno.

Your turn.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 87
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Couldn't find a similar topic in the search engine.

So far, I have the impression that most people here are traditional, orchestral buffs with little to no interest in electronic music.

This IS a John Williams forum, after all!

I like Levay's Airwolf theme though...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I like the way Williams uses electronic instruments.

Dead serious here. There's a lot more non-acoustic stuff in his music than most people realize, and it's just not a recent thing, either. But the way he uses it usually serves the music brilliantly, without calling too much attention to itself or allowing any room for becoming dated. Everything from the celeste in the Potter scores to some of the percussion in Jurassic Park to bizarre markings like the "great long ascending regurgitation ad lib." in TLC...the idea is typically to augment the orchestra without distracting from it, and the fact that most people don't think about or realize this is a testament to how well he does it, IMO.

On an entirely different note, I have a soft spot for Zimmer's Drop Zone. ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I heard several members here confessing they actually enjoy the new Tron score. I don't remember their names though.

I'm one. One of the very best scores last year.

I like the new remix album too (TRON LEGACY RECONFIGURED), which has the likes of Oakenfold, Crystal Method and Moby among the artists contributing.

But Alex, you're a big Alan Parsons Project fan, if memory serves? They have a couple of electronic instrumentals (with orchestral elements) that are very good. And their latest album, A VALID PATH, is a kinda pop/electronica hybrid. Love it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I used to be quite a big Alan Parsons fan when I was a teenager, Thor. I loved their first 3 LPs but ever since Eve (1979), I rapidly began to lose interest in the group. I stopped bying their albums after Turn Of A Friendly Card (1980). I did buy the first three 'classic' albums on CD though. The closest thing to modern electronic music that I have in my CD player these days is the later work of Radiohead. And, of course, my love for vintage Vangelis is legendary here. ;)

I've noticed that you are more loyal to a composer once you've embraced him. I sometimes get the feeling that you love everything from A to Z, at least with Alan Parsons, Vangelis, Jarre, ... It seems I always like certain (artistic) periods.

Alex

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's cool. I never really lose interest in my ol' favourites, though, even if it can go in phases.

Right now, for example, I'm really on another Vangelis binge, listening and relistening to his old albums.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Turn of a Friendly Card is my all time favorite rock album. Love how the tracks play out.

As for Vangelis, I often play Soil Festivities and Antarctica quite a bit. I find both hypnotic and very mesmerizing.

Has anyone here listened to Larry Fast aka Synergy? Some nice stuff.

Also love Tangram by The Dream. Thief is still a gave of mine as well. Scrap Yard is one kinetic piece. And I enjoy Sorcerer as well. And parts of Firestarter.

Don't have much Kitari nor Tomita. Suzanne Ciani I have a little of. I was into synths big time in the '80s and was knocked out when this young German synthesist came onto the scene with a score for a Barry Levinson film in 1988. Can't recall the name of either composer nor the film though...;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've been playing the beautiful ANTARCTICA too a bit recently, as well as my favourite Vangelis album next to BLADE RUNNER, namely L'APOCALYPSE DES ANIMAUX.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My taste for electronic music is a bit like my strange variations in period - I can like or dislike something, and not really know why.

JNH's Freedomland is largely synth (in the sense of not trying to imitate an orchestra) and I love it. I like Robocop which has synth additions, some of Vangelis' Alexander. Nothing else I can think of from the top of my head.

I used to listen to a lot of Vangelis' material in my magic performance years but that's very much faded now.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I heard several members here confessing they actually enjoy the new Tron score. I don't remember their names though.

Weren't they banned afterwards and all their posts stricken from the Board?

No. I'm still here and greatly enjoy the Tron: Legacy score.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I heard several members here confessing they actually enjoy the new Tron score. I don't remember their names though.

Weren't they banned afterwards and all their posts stricken from the Board?

No. I'm still here and greatly enjoy the Tron: Legacy score.

It's more of an orchestral score than a purely electronic one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love that theme.

I would immediately purchase expanded / complete releases of Top Gun and the First two Beverly Hills Cop scores.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love that theme.

I would immediately purchase expanded / complete releases of Top Gun and the First two Beverly Hills Cop scores.

Same here. There are only a couple of score tracks on the existing soundtrack albums and that's too little, even for me. I would also love proper albums of the two FLETCH films and THIEF OF HEARTS.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Star Wars is electrifying.

Well, with all the remix and reinterpretation albums out there, I'm sure there's one for electronica too! (no, Meco is disco...which is a beast onto itself!).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I heard several members here confessing they actually enjoy the new Tron score. I don't remember their names though.

Weren't they banned afterwards and all their posts stricken from the Board?

No. I'm still here and greatly enjoy the Tron: Legacy score.

I should give this a try. Is it like the Matrix scores where Davis's orchestra music was married to Juno Reactor?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I should give this a try. Is it like the Matrix scores where Davis's orchestra music was married to Juno Reactor?

Not really. I would say that some tracks are more purely electronic, while others merge in the fashion you mention (with orchestration input by Bruce Broughton, it seems). It's also very much in the general style of Zimmer's INCEPTION, with deep, rumbling chords and big key leaps.

But Daft Punk is very different from Juno Reactor. If you know their previous work, it often sounds quite "analogue", with lots of samples of 80's sounds. In this particular case, the reference to the Arcade sounds are obviously very fitting, given the subject matter. Genre-wise, Daft Punk is house while Juno Reactor is - as previously mentioned - more in goa/psytrance territory.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hmm, worth a visit to the iTunes store no doubt. I wish iTunes would carry more TD. I have like 20 actual records of theirs from my '80s diet of electronic music but haven't found them available on iTunes. My Thief CD is pretty banged up and I'd love to be able to get a clean copy of this awesome score. I know iTunes US carries Sorcerer. Cool score too.

I'm waiting for my Kurzweil PC3LE7 to arrive any day now and it has a ton of classic analog synth sounds like Arps, Solina, GDS, CS80, etc. It's a beast and I'm actually looking at doing an electronic project to accompany the Tai Chi Chuan I learn.

Does anyone here like Thelma and Louise by Hans Zimmer? I think it's a really cool marriage of synths and grass roots guitar. I loved that phatt sound Zimmer brought with his CS80. I should use my Arturia CS80v plug-in more come to think of it. That synth was a beast in its day. Vangelis used it for string pads so effectively.

Another Vangelis album I love is China.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am big fan of Vangelis myself, and apart from hil fim work (and let me just say straight up he makes terrific albums out of his film music), I'm particularly fond of Mythodea. I always though (and still do) that the first movement is cheesy as hell, but the rest more than makes up for it. Not the greatest example of electronics, I know (it's a largely choral work).

And, for example, I find this just great, in a way I can quite justify :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Does anyone here like Thelma and Louise by Hans Zimmer?

Brilliant score, one of his best. It has a superbly realised seedy and dusty feel to it. It's a soundtrack for sweaty hot summer days.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Does anyone here like Thelma and Louise by Hans Zimmer? I think it's a really cool marriage of synths and grass roots guitar.

I do, although I think of it less in terms of a synth score as a more purely based rock score. Lots of it reminds me of Pink Floyd (the David Gilmour kind), with those twangy, spacey el guitar chords in a blues idiom. Could have been an outtake from MOMENTARY LAPSE OF REASON or something.

As far as MYTHODEA is concerned, I've still to properly "get" this. I have it on CD, and have played it several times, bit it still doesn't nail me. It's a bit too intense and "dense", sound-wise, and not really very electronic. It's certainly an odd beast in Vangelis' discography.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'll never get tired of advertising the old C64 and Amiga game scores by the great Chris Hülsbeck.

On another note, this might be a good place to try my still unanswered question from the Quick Question Thread once more:

What Vangelis piece is this (at the beginning of the clip):

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Electronic Music Thread

Oooo yeah, pulsey synth music. Long followed Jarre's career and attended two of his live concerts after getting into his early analogue soundscape work while still at school (and also loved his later work up until the mid 1990s,after which his later experiments lost my interest) and truly love Synth Pop from the late 70s, 80s, 90s and even some forms of it which continue today. Erasure and the Pet Shop Boys in particular are duos who really flooded this genre with great meaningfull songs and clever use of the instrumentation. Both provided great stuff which was a bit of a soundtrack to my life in the early to mid 90s. O.M.D,Yazoo,Jan Hammer,New Order,The Prodigy,Depeche Mode,A-Ha,The Shamen,Gary Numan,Vangelis,Kraftwerk,the list goes on. Lots of great work.

Like you, my interest in the kind of stuff, spilled over into the Rave / Trance.

Anyway, a mere slice of a very large pie :D

~ Pet Shop Boys.

~ Erasure.

~ U96

~ KLF ( 2:01-2:36 .....woo hooo! )

~ Rhythm Device

Enjoy the Silence ~ Depeche Mode

~ Gary Numan

~ Vince Clarke in Yazoo, before teaming up with Andy for Erasure.

Ebeneezer Goode ~ The Shamen

Forever Tonight ~ Jan Hammer

Video Killed the Radio Star ~ The Buggles

Das Model ~ Kraftwerk

Blue Monday ~ New Order

~ A-Ha

Charlie (Original Mix) ~ The Prodigy

Interestingly,Kylie Minogue has tinkered with Synth to produce new songs with an earlier synth era feel to them.

,has an awesome throw back to an earlier synth era at 2.26. I explode into dance when that part comes :D

And when it comes to J.M.J, I wouldn't know where to start. But to pick one from his later stuff, how about Chronologie 1?

He opened his London 1993 Concert in Wembley with this Gem, and I tell ya it shook the very ground :eek: . That night was a dream come true, for me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Excellent list, Melange! We're in synth synch on many things. You mentioned all the big hits of those artists, though. Some of their lesser known material is more interesting, IMO.

I've seen JMJ live 5 times myself, and I am a completist of his, just as I am of John Williams. I saw him twice just last year - once in Budapest and once here in Oslo, with Röyksopp as the warmup. He never disappoints.

You mention rave. I was part of the rave scene in the 90's and early 2000's. For example, I went to a Paul Oakenfold gig here in Oslo in 1997. I was only 19 years old at the time, going on 20. Great stuff. With one exception, I stayed away from the drugs, though. I was only into it for the music. Did you ever tap into the clubbing, or was it only music listening?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Does anyone here like Thelma and Louise by Hans Zimmer? I think it's a really cool marriage of synths and grass roots guitar.

I do, although I think of it less in terms of a synth score as a more purely based rock score. Lots of it reminds me of Pink Floyd (the David Gilmour kind), with those twangy, spacey el guitar chords in a blues idiom. Could have been an outtake from MOMENTARY LAPSE OF REASON or something.

As far as MYTHODEA is concerned, I've still to properly "get" this. I have it on CD, and have played it several times, bit it still doesn't nail me. It's a bit too intense and "dense", sound-wise, and not really very electronic. It's certainly an odd beast in Vangelis' discography.

It is a similar situation to Alexander, where I found the main piece of the work to be totally underwhelmig, not to say plain cheesy (the track Titans in Alexaner and Movement 1 in Mythodea). In the case of Mythodea I found the first movement to be a very poor Holst pastiche (only after did I make the now obvious Mars connection, which is precisely part of the subject of the programa of Mythodea). When I heard movement 3, I was gripped. This works is surprisingly nuanced and layered, and depends very little on melodic repetition. It's great stuff and, IMHO, one of the most ambitious things Vangelis has ever written.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Copy/paste from a recent post about Vangelis' non score albums over at FSM.

Heaven And Hell: The music on this album feels more suited to a sword and sandal film than his score for Alexander. That's the great thing about Vangelis' music. It's so evocative that it doesn't need a film to support it. Best parts of Heaven And Hell: Bacchanale and Needles And Bones.

Albedo 0.39: The title track with spoken word is a classic. The text is just a bunch of dry information about our planet (numbers) but the music changes it into something dramatic.

Spiral: Spiral and the second track Ballad are my current favorites. At the time of release, my favorite was, of course, To The Unknown Man.

Beaubourg: Beaubourg, Part I is a modernistic piece filled with vivid cosmical sounds but also with beautiful, usually short moments of melody and harmony. I was never that fond of Part 2.

Odes: Again, this album summons forth imagery of the Ancient Greek. More Alexander than Alexander.

China: In my opinion, the best album of Vangelis, music and sound wise. A coherent and beautiful journey through the East seen with Western eyes. I can't select one track as a favorite because the whole is so damn perfect.

Short Stories: Easily the best album of Jon and Vangelis. If there is something as English Chanson, then this must be it. Curious Electric is a standout. Fantastic sound.

See You Later: Artists used to experiment and search for different forms of expression or methods to convey thought and emotion. The public either agreed or disagreed with that. It led to discussion and discussion can lead to a broader consciousness. What happened to that period?! Favorite tracks: I Can Take It Anymore, Multi-Track Suggestion and Suffocation.

Soil Festivities: Vangelis first steps into New Age? The first piece is nice and atmospheric. The key is to let yourself 'undergo' the music, rather than to actively listen to it.

This is it. I'm not a fan of the musical content of the later 'normal' Vangelis albums, which I think of as lazy. Also, real synths, Fender Rhodes and real percussion have been replaced with digital workstations based on small samples and this has led to a less appealing sound. I don't like how it's 'recorded' either.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Occassionally, I do enjoy a spin of CD by Vangelis, Jean Michel Jarre, Era, Enigma or even 2 Unlimited (the 1993 album No Limits!). But usually it's very hard to find the time to listen to this stuff 'cause there are too many soundtracks, classical, jazz and prog metal CDs in the queue. :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alex, my favourite Vangelis albums (including soundtracks) are BLADE RUNNER, L'APOCALYPSE DES ANIMAUX, THE CITY, OCEANIC, OPERA SAUVAGE, ANTARCTICA, THE BOUNTY, 1492 and CHARIOTS OF FIRE. I prefer him when he's really ambient, soft, soothing, melancholic. I think his more avantgarde material, like BEAUBORG, is fascinating too - but not really something I put on when I want to have a good time. More of a "rational" listening experience.

SPIRAL is nice too, as is ALBEDO. "Pulstar" always reminded me of Tangerine Dream's "Chimes & Chains".

Never been that hot on his collaborative efforts, for some reason. Nor his more orchestral/choral-based things.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm still on the verge of filing RÖYKSOPP albums under Pop or Electronic in my iTunes...

Well, it's electronica, of course, but more in the downbeat/trip hop genre which often uses pop elements too.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alex, my favourite Vangelis albums (including soundtracks) are BLADE RUNNER, L'APOCALYPSE DES ANIMAUX, THE CITY, OCEANIC, OPERA SAUVAGE, ANTARCTICA, THE BOUNTY, 1492 and CHARIOTS OF FIRE.

Well, I like Blade Runner too (duh!) but it's a score which I can't detach from the movie. It's like breaking up the perfect marriage.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alex, my favourite Vangelis albums (including soundtracks) are BLADE RUNNER, L'APOCALYPSE DES ANIMAUX, THE CITY, OCEANIC, OPERA SAUVAGE, ANTARCTICA, THE BOUNTY, 1492 and CHARIOTS OF FIRE.

Well, I like Blade Runner too (duh!) but it's a score which I can't detach from the movie. It's like breaking up the perfect marriage.

It is indeed the perfect marriage, but I think the (original Atlantic) album is a brilliant listening experience too. A voyage through a dystopian, urban, futuristic landscape through music. Not that different from THE CITY, except that THE CITY only really has a couple of tracks that capture this mood ("Dawn" or "Twilight", for example). I usually say that BLADE RUNNER captures the city at night, while THE CITY captures it at daylight untill twilight. :)

As for Fiedel's TERMINATOR scores, I can't take more than the theme before I want to tear my hair out. Horrible listening experience, but absolutely brilliant scores in the films themselves.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.