Early electronic disco

[Move2This]

My flatmate and I were discussing when electronic disco music first came into being, and the earliest track I could think of was Hot Butter by Popcorn (1972) - it was dismally short (just over 2.5 mins) - and, despite being a chart success in the UK, failed, as far as I know, to spawn a host of imitators at the time.



Does anyone have any suggetions?

[BrunoRepublic]

Calling "Popcorn" disco is a bit of a stretch if you ask me... but then again, Patti Brooks did a version of it...



Predominantly electronic music was pretty rare until the mid-70s, primarily because the technology just wasn't ready, and the equipment used to make it was so expensive. Aside from the Minimoog and ARP 2600, synthesizers were massive stacks of modules inter-connected with dozens of cables. In addition to the cost, they were unstable, would not stay in tune, took ages to set up, and could only play one note at a time. The few all-electronic works from this era (i.e. Wendy Carlos "Switched On Bach" and Isao Tomita's "Snowflakes Are Dancing") took *months* of effort to gain just a few minutes of music. The guy who did Popcorn said in an interview that it took hundreds of overdubs just to make that 2-minute ditty. If you've ever heard the rest of the album, it's all conventional instrumentation with a synth or two on top -- which obviously took a lot less time to record.



Having said that, I think Jean-Michel Jarre's "Zig Zag Dance", done almost entirely with the VCS3 synth, was done around '69 or '70, and was a sizeable hit in France... however, this song is so astonishingly cheesy that it's easy to see why he has not allowed it to be reissued.



Although step-sequencers (the foundation for Giorgio Moroder-style tracks) were around since the early 70s, I'm pretty sure it was Klaus Schulze who started composing works based around them starting with his "Timewind" LP from 1975... mind you, KS's music is a far cry from disco, although he is regarded as one of the grandfathers of what we now call Trance. Giorgio Moroder's "Einzelganger" LP is supposedly another example of early electronic music, but I've yet to hear it -- it's pretty rare.

[markydefad]

This may be slightly off track, but this post reminded me of an assertion I once heard that Giorgio Moroder's production of "I Feel Love" was inspired by the synth parts from The Who's "Baba O'Riley" (that "teenage wasteland" song) from their "Who's Next" (1971). Any comments?

[BrunoRepublic]

The synth parts on "Baba O'Riley" were done on a ARP 2500; a quasi-modular synth with a price tag well in the five figures (and that's in 1970 dollars too!). Not surprisingly, the only places you'd find them were at universities and in the homes of those with lots of cash to spare... like Pete Townshend, who went from near-bankruptcy to multi-millionaire after the success of "Tommy".



I don't know much about the 2500, as very few of them were made... but I think it had two or three step-sequencers which could by synced together for the effects on "Baba". However, this still required extensive multi-tracking and tape editing. The Who, to this day, always peformed the song to a backing tape and never attempted to do the synth effects live.



ARPs are weird synths, even for the time. The layout is rather unusual, and in the hands of a novice, there will usually be only one of two results: (1) they won't make any sound at all, or (2) they won't stop. They have a very distinct sound to them, and even their more basic models can do all sorts of crazy things that you don't see on other synths, even today. I own an ARP Odyssey, which was used for most of the wacky synth noises on Mike Theodore's "High On Mad Mountain" (either that or a 2600).



Other ARP sightings:



- the syncopated melodic synth pattern towards the end of the Sumeria LP

- the random burst of notes at the start of "Love Is The Ultimate/Touch Me Baby" by Ultimate

- that nasty electric screaming sound in Soft Cell's "Sex Dwarf"

- Used all over Herbie Hancock's "Headhunters" LP



Anyway... synths back then were waaaay expensive. And the relatively cheap synths sounded... well, cheap. Just listen to any pre-1977 Rinder & Lewis production to hear those.



Getting back to Marky's comment... sonically, I maintain that "I Feel Love" owes much more to Klaus Schulze's "Bayreuth Return" or Tangerine Dream's "Rubycon" than it does to The Who's "Baba"...



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Graham Start on 2001-12-05 13:47 ]</font>