I have a long history in electronic music, dating back to when I was just a teenager. My father was director of the Electronic Music Studios at Brandeis University during my youth, so I was able to play state-of the art electronic music instruments and create music on my own.
I have written about my early electronic experiences in a series of three articles:
Part One: From Forbidden Planet to Brandeis University
Part Two: The Electronic Music Studios of Europe
Part Three: Minnies and Pollies: My Work at Moog Music, Inc.
These articles were published in WIND AND WIRE Magazine, Nos. 2, 3, and 4, 1997. For the last few years, I have written reviews for WIND AND WIRE, a magazine devoted to experimental, New Age, electronic, world, ambient, and other unclassifiable music. Please visit the magazine’s Web site at http://www2.bitstream.net/~billb/wandw_home.htm
Though I don’t play synthesizers or create music now, I’m still an avid listener and enjoy writing about this kind of music, as well as other experimental, esoteric, and "new age" music. In this section I would like to introduce you to some of my favorite artists and labels, with reviews I have written over the years, and links to them all so that you can "visit" them if you wish. If you click on the highlighted album titles, you can read my review.
Steve Roach is in my opinion one of the most powerful, versatile, and creative talents in the field today. He has been producing electronic music for more than twenty-five years. In his early days his work ranged from frenetic sequencer-driven rock-like material (STORMWARNING) to soft, serene "ambient" mood sounds (QUIET MUSIC). In the ‘80s he became influenced by Aboriginal and Native sound and cultures (DREAMTIME RETURN) and began creating work which consciously attempted to approach the primal musical voice of prehistoric humankind, without actually re-creating it (ORIGINS, ARTIFACTS). Yet at the same time Roach can also journey into futuristic-sounding outer space. Two albums which are more explicitly "space" oriented are WORLD’S EDGE and THE MAGNIFICENT VOID. Roach lives near Tucson, Arizona, and his work often evokes the vastness of the American Southwestern desert (DESERT SOLITAIRE, SLOW HEAT, DUST TO DUST). He has singlehandedly created a whole sub-genre, which might be called "Desert Spacemusic." His newer work explores cyber-psychedelia (BODY ELECTRIC, done in collaboration with Chicago-area electronic musician "VIR UNIS". Look for Roach’s next solo album, THE LIGHT FANTASTIC, coming this September.
Roach has also produced many albums in collaboration with the Belgian electronic musician " Vidna Obmana" such as WELL OF SOULS and CAVERN OF SIRENS.
Steve Roach has inspired many musical followers, some of which have produced good listening in their own right. The "School of Steve Roach" includes musicians like Biff Johnson (READING THE BONES, MIRAGE AT THE CROSSROADS, both produced by Steve Roach) and the Spanish synthesist Maximo Corbacho whose album VESTIGES is available by mail-order from the artist.
If Steve Roach is the composer of the open, sunstruck desert, Robert Rich is the voice of the wet, dark swamps. Starting with long, drifting pieces actually meant to induce dream states (TRANCES/DRONES), Rich has explored the deep subconscious mind with sound (NUMENA). His concern with the sounds of waters and plants produced one of his greatest albums (RAINFOREST) and continued in his PROPAGATION. Rich is also much influenced by Islamic and Sufi music, and has included these motifs in his albums GEOMETRY, GAUDI, and SEVEN VEILS.
Robert Rich and Steve Roach collaborated on two albums, STRATA and SOMA, both of which, in my opinion, are masterpieces of the genre.
PAUL AVGERINOS is a Greek-American bassist, trained in classical technique, who also works with electric bass and electronics. He has produced a limited amount of electronic music, but it is all choice, especially his two more recent albums, MUSE OF THE ROUND SKY and SKY OF GRACE. Avgerinos uses his Greek ancestry and other Mediterranean elements as inspiration for his soaring, dreamy music, more directly aimed at a "spiritual" quality than that of Roach or Rich.
Also in the "spiritual" category of electronic/acoustic music is CONSTANCE DEMBY whose work is explicitly "New Age" and intended to heal the emotional and physical ills of listeners. Demby is one of the few women working in the electronic spacemusic field. Her piano playing accompanies lush, grand synthesized sound-scenes in a highly romantic, emotionally moving style. Her album NOVUS MAGNIFICAT is an over-the-top plunge into a galactic well of sound. SET FREE features cheerful and tender electronic pieces at the beginning, but the second half has some of the most hair-raising mystical sound-passages I’ve ever heard. AETERNA, her most recent album, is more dependent on piano melodies, and often rises to cinematic intensity. Like most of her other work, it is aimed directly at the listener’s emotions.
The enigmatically pseudonymed A PRODUCE has created a series of rather somber but intriguing electronic albums, (LAND OF A THOUSAND TRANCES, WHITE SANDS, INSCAPE AND LANDSCAPE) where each track is a kind of "etude" exploring single sounds or combinations of sounds. In many places he is outright "minimalist" but in others, he edges towards electronic rock. There are also moments of New Age drift, surrealistic "ambience," and sonic sarcasm. In his detachment and austere sensibility he might be considered the opposite of Constance Demby.
C.W. VRTACEK is a guitarist and electronic composer who speaks in many musical languages. He plays in a rock band, "Forever Einstein," but I mention his non-rock music here. In his two experimental albums (SILENT HEAVEN, FIFTEEN MNEMONIC DEVICES) he mixes "noise sample" pieces with delicate, melodic guitar passages, wry humor, European salon tunes, cinematic soundscapes, witty musical puns, and unexpected ironic sweetness. All of his music is suffused with a kind of world-weary but kindly melancholy; there is an intimate but wintry quality to his work.
If Vrtacek’s music lives in winter, the music of Canadian DINO PACIFICI is the door into summer. It is always sunwarmed and breezy when Dino’s music is playing. Pacifici’s music is much more accessible and (I don’t think this is a bad word) "commercial" than the other artists I’ve cited here. He can get you dancing with his bouncy RANDOM FACTORS and ACQUIESCENT RESONANCE, and then calm you down with the balmy warmth of THE JOURNEY. Pacifici is a professional who is not afraid to make music that amuses, entertains, and comforts the listener.
The largest, slickest, and most commercial of New Age spacemusic labels. Their choice of music is flawless. Try especially the FATHOM sub-label for their "deep space music." Not a bad one in the list. HOS titles include work by Constance Demby, Steve Roach, Robert Rich, Paul Avgerinos.
A smaller label with a highly specialized collection of artists, all of them good. An elegant and sophisticated sound, with gorgeous computer-designed CD graphics.
Uncompromisingly experimental, abstract, advanced listening. Plenty of percussion and techno-shamanic drumming. Not for the faint-hearted. Some Projekt titles by Steve Roach, "Vidna Obmana," and "Vir Unis."
A label that specializes in "dark ambient," music and sound that evokes moods of black night, dreams, troubled sleep, mystical states, disturbing visions, a scary sense of wonder.
Hypnos artists include "A Produce."
Specializing in re-releases of unusual earlier material as well as new albums, Cuneiform’s repertoire is never boring. They’ve done everything from atonal "free jazz" to European jazz-rock to early Moog synthesizer music by the pioneering synth-band "Mother Mallard." For me, their most spectacular achievement to date is the brilliant electronic album by Forrest Fang, THE BLIND MESSENGER.
Cuneiform artists also include C.W. Vrtacek.