This is a slightly updated (in 2003) version on an essay I wrote in 1999 for my undergraduate music degree.  Although the writing isn’t brilliant, I’m still really proud of this, particularly as Bob Moog and Jean-Jacques Perrey, two of the main subjects of the writing, I later went on to become good friends with.  Feel free to share and use this essay but please credit me (Susi O’Neill) if you do.

Space Age Music and the Moog

An exploration of the amazing new electronic pop sound and technology developed by Robert Moog, Jean-Jacques Perrey and others.

“Don’t you understand? This is the future!” – Robert Moog to Gershon Kingsley, 1965. (1)

“After the success of Switched on Bach (and the subsequent crazed season of novelty follow-ups from Gershon Kingsley, Jean-Jacques Perrey and others) there came Keith Emerson’s much copied Moog solo on Emerson Lake and Palmer’s Lucky Man, and the Moog organisation – working with or against the business regime of whoever then owned it – was able to found its own research and development of the Mini-Moog, the first single unit integrated synthesizer.” (2)

Part One: In the beginning…(1900, early electronics)

The latter half of the twentieth century has seen the greatest period of change and development in music, mainly due to the birth of electronic music, synthesis and wider access to sound recording. The most important and far reaching technological changes have been born, not out of academic or institutional research, but from the demands of the largest consumer group in the music marketplace – commercial and popular musicians.

The Italian avant-garde Futurists called for an exploration into the possibilities of new sound worlds in their 1920s manifestos, for example Microtonal Harmony (Busoni, 1911) and the breaking of classical timbres (in Russolo’s Art of Noises), and also in their experiments with ‘sound boxes’ to produce original and novel sounds. Edgar Varese, composer of percussive-sonic exploration Ionisation (1936) saw the scope for ‘sound producing machines’ that would ultimately lead to the ‘liberation of sound’.

Since 1900, experiments with early electronic instruments were the first step to realising these possibilities, beginning with the 200 tonne sand, water and cement constructed Dynamophone (c.1900), the Trautonium and Mixtur-Trautonium (1930s), used to create horrific bird sounds in Alfred Hitchcock’s film The Birds, the Ondes Martenot (1920s), sustained through its use in Messiaen’s Turangalila Symphony – even common and household wood saws became popular in Southern America as a cheap alternative to these new ‘eerie’ electronic sounds.

However, aspects of performance were often problematic for musicians used to the easily comprehended physics of acoustic instruments; players of electronic instruments were often prone to technical failure as many were unwilling or unable to learn the complex and unusual new skills – the most notable example being the infamous theremin, a ‘leap into the future’ (Boulez) (3). The theremin was capable of glissandi, microtones and subtle vibrato and pitch modulation, controlled using complex hand gestures in an electro-magnetic field, literally played ‘in the ether’ without touching the instrument. A pitch antenna and variable oscillator controlled the pitch and volume. Its idiosyncratic and quirky sounds and unusual, hypnotic visual performance led to its immediate popularity, the ethereal and spooky sounds were heavily exploited in sci-fi films soundtracks like The Day The Earth Stood Still and Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound to suggest space aliens, dementia, paranoia or other worldly qualities, especially key cinematic musician Samuel J. Hoffman’s trademark ‘wobble and woo’ space-like sound. Ultimately, after its long novelty phase (popularised from 1930s – 50s), the theremin had an untimely failing.

Theremin virtuoso Clara Rockmore improved the public profile of the instrument with her highly disciplined and beautiful performances. She intended the theremin to substitute a classical instrument (particularly her professional instrument, the violin) and she performed works from the classical canon like Rachmaninov’s Vocalise and the technically complex Cesar Franck’s Violin Sonata, in high profile concerts at Carnegie Hall. “..without her, the theremin would have ended up as a wacky effect box,’ – Lucia Pamela (4). However, in the pre-mass media and television age, her very limited number of performances could have little success in the international opinion of the theremin as a novelty instrument.

The Hammond organ was the first instrument to succeed commercially, due to its conservatism of sound and design. Intended to imitate a church organ, the design was uncluttered using a conventional keyboard that was easy to master to good effect. Recession, lack of funding and distribution, the Great Depression of the 1930s and World War II caused the premature death of many of these innovative devices. This was no era for sonic experimentation, and neither funders nor the general public were yet ready for these sound producing futurist machines.

However, it was not musicians who were to change the future of music, but engineers. In the late 1940s/50s, engineers Harry Olson and Herbert Belar produced a machine based on random probability, which would be capable of creating melodies based on the folk songs of Stephen Foster. It used Sixteen Function Binary Selection and pitch sequencing, but the device failed miserably in its intention, as the machine was incapable of determining characteristics that only a human ear can – idiosyncrasies of form, structure and melody. Olson and Belar intended this prototype synthesizer not to explore new sonic worlds yearned for by the avant-garde, but to reproduce the conventional. The result – a series of seemingly random notes and bleeps. Their prototype synthesizer was eagerly seized by the intellectual music academia of Princeton University and premiered in 1956 as the RCA MK 1 in Columbia, USA, and later co-owned by the Princetown/Columbia University foundation and given a massive $175,000 grant by the university to develop.

Programmability gave new computer technology unprecedented advantages over Musique Concrete in speed of operations, flexibility and parametric control. The capabilities of the RCA Mk I and its follow up, the MK II, is epitomised in Serialist composer Subotnik and engineer Buchla’s seminal work, Silver Apples On The Moon (1967), the first work to be commissioned for record rather than live performance. A ‘studio art’ work, they believed it could be played (via a phonogram) by anybody. Subotnik believed that using both programmed and random parameters allowed him complete artistic control, “…the flexibility to score some sections of the piece in the traditional sense; and to mould other like a piece of sculpture.” (5). The Voltage Controlled Synthesizer allowed for evolving timbres during a single note duration, making possible “sustained yet transforming streams of sound” (6).

These often uncontrollable machines allowed for the ‘freak out’ factor desired by East Coast 1960s avant-gardists, bored by the limitations of classical musicians who “…will produce a predictable sound given a specific instruction, ” – Brain Eno (7). Dogmatic composers like Stockhausen, who demanded complete control over every musical parameter, found the ability to control and sculpt sounds as an individual sonic artist the perfect completion of his aesthetics. The new technology created a tension between the will to master it and the threat of the machine slipping from human control (‘Man Machine’ theory, first seen in Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, which permeated much 60s and 60s film and literature, e.g. Arthur C. Clarke’s The Nine Billion Names Of God story).

However, the avant-garde Classicists ‘experiments’ were purposefully veiled in secrecy; the general public excluded, concerts invite only. When Milton Babbitt was asked to justify his work to High Fidelity magazine in 1958, he insisted their work was purely ‘research’. The article was mockingly titled ‘Who cares if you listen?’. The division between ‘ivory tower’ research and public acceptance of academia-based music is still as predominant today. Perhaps this is an indication of the academia’s lack of will, need or desire to market their work to the public, which they fear may damage notions of ‘integrity’ and stunt creative development; mass acceptance being a low second priority to securing funding.

Part Two: The saviour is born…(Robert Moog)

From this backdrop of elitism came New York engineer Robert Moog (b. 1934) who in 1949, fascinated by the then archaic and deceased theremin, decided to construct his own. In 1954 he designed a D.I.Y. theremin kit and took to the road as a theremin salesman, partly in order to subsidise his studies in Engineering Physics at Cornell University from 1958-9. In 1961, his transistorised redesign of the theremin was the cover features of Electronics World.

The transistor transformed and accelerated the birth of the computer revolution, computers the size of office blocks became small enough for business, and later, domestic use. Moog, working with Herb Deutsch, first realised the possibilities for transistor technology in music to create portable, modular components, allowing customers to ‘pick n’ mix’ components to cater for their specific needs.

The philosophy of Robert Moog was to make electronic music performable and available to mainstream (non-academic) musicians, in response to the academic musical elitism, “if it is Art it is not for all, and if it is for all, it is not Art.” (Shoenberg) (8). Moog was never ‘pro-academia’ or ‘pro-pop’ but simply ‘pro-music’. His first customers were the Columbia-Princetown students, fascinated by the superior technology of his keyboard based Modular Moog. Initially, neither a composer nor a musician, Moog thought of music in ‘inclusive’ terms to appeal to all, accommodating conventional elements for traditional musicians (e.g. keyboards, set pitches) and also experimental elements (e.g. real time parameter control, patching, portamento) – a wealth of sound possibilities for the avant-garde composers. “…the composer’s freedom to extemporise was well catered for with the analogue equipment of the 1970s.” (9). Other engineers were designing prototype synthesizers e.g. ARP who used Pin Matrix non-flexible systems, but these were not as critically revelled as the Moog Modular ‘flexible’ systems, and thus the Moog Modular became the industry standard in sound synthesis.

Initailly, Moog received little subsidy or support, working in a disused, ramshackle gelatine factory producing ‘cottage industry’ handmade Moog Modulars. The basic components of the Moog Voltage Controlled Synthesizer are filter, oscillator, amplifier, ring modulator, mixer (for voltage), envelope generator and white noise generator. Typically, they would have three waveforms – square, triangle and sine – in addition to pink and white noise generators, filters including ‘glide’ function (to control glissandi), L.F.O. and various high/mid/low pass filters. The Moog treated pure sounds as an element, reproducing actual sound without storage or manipulation.

Moog himself was a natural entrepreneur – a good businessman and a free spirited intellectual. His theories on ‘democratisation’ through technology (i.e. microprocessor technology allowing faster and cheaper synthesizer manufacture, thus involving more musicians in sound synthesis and gradually lowering the price ‘pyramid’ for synthesizers, musicians becoming ‘consumers’ of music) pioneered the success of electronic music in both the pop and avant-garde marketplace. Moog’s non-musical business background gave him this ‘sensitivity to the marketplace that he might have lacked had he remained only in the service of the university based music community.” (10).

Chuck Leavell, Moog’s main salesman, pioneered synthesizer sales with Moog’s principles of
‘democratisation’ by touring music stores with the Moog Modular, taking it directly to musicians, coaxing them to listen to these new electronic sounds. This ‘word of mouth’ principle led to the East Coast Moog craze around 1967. Like Leon Theremin with Clara Rockmore, Moog realised the importance of using good musicians and personalities to publicise his instrument, artists who record sales would exceed any specialist ‘electronic’ publication. His well-placed posturing with Keith Emerson, George Harrison, Stevie Wonder and other early Moog disciples helped to dispel the image of synthesizer owners as lab scientists (e.g. Milton Babbit’s ‘research’) and established synthesis as cool, fashionable, and the future sound in popular music.

In 1968, Moog he embarked on a recording project which would increase the popularity of the Moog synthesizer a thousand-fold. Switched on Bach by Walter Carlos, a collection of J.S. Bach ‘hits’ played on the Modular Moog, was a surprise smash selling a million copies worldwide. It succeeded due to the inspired musicality of Carlos (a former Princetown-Columbia student), inventing sublime nuances and tone colours from the synthesizer while genuinely reinventing Bach’s music in ways the composer could never have foreseen. It appealed to a mass audience by staying true to the original music and tonality, never moving too far into ‘freaky’ electro-sounds or avoiding the common persuasion to add other ‘pop’ instruments.

In 1969, the year of the moon landing and the ‘summer of love’, the world went Moog crazy with thousands of Carlos-style take offs. Musicians, good, bad and indifferent made use of this “shiny new toy” (Boulez) (11). Titles like Moog Espagna, Moog-a-go-go and The Plastic Cow Goes Mooooog! Monopolised record shops, cashing in on the liberating ‘democratisation’ its inventor had worked so hard to establish.

The next move – the unveiling of the Mini-Moog in 1971, the first truly portable synthesizer. With a three and a half octave keyboard, pitch wheels and headphone adapter, it contained most of the effects of the Modular Moog without the need for complex patching. Buttons, dials and knobs for ‘real time’ control allured boffins and intellectuals. Ideal for practice, portable enough to carry and cheaper than a full Modular, it was the obvious choice for live musicians, a completion of Moog’s ‘democratisation’ principle. In 1968, R.A. Moog changed its name to Moog Music to emphasise performance, and was later bought up and re-named Big Briar Inc., leading to the worldwide production, distribution and marketing of the Moog synthesizer brand.

Part Three: And then there was lounge…

The Moog in the period 1969 -1973 played an important role in the advent of Easy Listening music, also know later as High Fidelity, Airport, Elevator, Space Age Bachelor Pad, Cocktail, Lounge or Mood Music.

As early as 1888, Edward Bellamy published the paper Look Backward 2000 -1887, predicting the future society which would contain, “an arrangement for providing everybody with music in their homes, perfect in quality, unlimited in quantity, suited to every mood, beginning and ceasing at will. ” (12). By the 1940s, ’78s’ fanatics were enraged with the popularity of the 33 1/3 long player, which they believed encouraged laziness as one had to change records, and thus concentrate, far less. These crackly short ’78s’ provided a music that could never be background. A decade later, Arthur Haddy developed High Fidelity, which used three way high/mid/low frequency speakers to replace heavy iron needles with coils, and ‘double’ grooves (the 45/45 system) allowed for extending crackle-free listening. Engineers and marketers used technology as a means to market ‘lifestyle’ (Lounge) records, which used this new technology, originally developed for cinema sound. Record sleeves described the technological marvel of the disc parcelled within, with complex diagrams and descriptions of the recording process and microphone placement intended to impress listeners, the all-knowing tone suggesting, “we know a lot of things you don’t. Trust us – buy this record, it’s a technical marvel.” (13). The advent of stereo promised consumers “spectacular sonic illusion of motion, directionality and depth” (14), selling impressive looking Stereo Demonstration LPs with the new designers stereo systems. The marketers’ message was punctuated loud and clear: BUY STEREO, IT WILL CHANGED YOUR LIFE.

The public’s fascination with aural space coincides with academics fascination with opening up 2 and 3D sound possibilities. In his 1985 book, On Sonic Art, Trevor Wishart defines landscape as ‘virtual acoustic space’. He argues that stereo is capable of emotional changes, behind as mysterious or sinister, left/right motion suggesting dialogue, swift stereo transition suggests energy. “Characteristics of spatial behaviour play a crucial part in an interpretation of sound morphologies.” (15)

The 1950s was a period of great change in society, particularly in America; sailors returned from the war in Hawai’I as international travel became affordable, the media focused on the domestic and ‘ideal home’, the baby boom was blossoming, consumer spending was at an all time high and the space race was beginning. With this idealistic and aesthetic outlook, Big Band arrangers, who had fallen from fashion, turned to recording often poppy or jazzy versions of Tin Pan Alley standards, Big Band numbers and popular contemporary songs from the Hit Parade. Mainly instrumental, hard rhythms were often replaced by soft strings, tempos rarely exceeded 72 b.p.m, with an undertone that whispered ‘relax’. The roots of Lounge also derive from the background music played by pianists or small ensembles in expensive diners (or lounges). Lounge recordings initially intended to replicate this music in a quasi-sophisticated domestic environment.

Lounge is now often used as a blanket term for all of these ‘low’ or non-classifiable recordings from 1955 – 75, but, like its many names, it is a rich and varied form including sub-genres like sci-fi and film soundtracks, tax evasion LPs by celebrities (.g. Senator Adam Clayton’s ‘Keep the Faith’), dance genres like mambo and cha-cha-chas, ‘exotic’ world-influenced music and original songwriters like Bacharach and David.

Most music in this period was inferior, the aural equivalent of a B-Movie, concerned with musical commodity and quantity over quality; like Andy Warhol’s endless bored repetitions (e.g. White Car Crash, 1968), the ‘authentic’ products is undermined in its value, confirming critic Adorno’s worst fears that recorded music, “…encourages alienated, narcotised listening” (16). Composers were motivated by making a fast buck, part of the ‘culture industry’ (Adorno).

Music as a background feature is by no means a new concept, in fact, it could be argued that ‘secular’ background music (for feasts, theatre and merry making) has been prevalent since the very start of music as we know it. Twentieth century examples of background music include the Palm Court Orchestra, jazz clubs and Eric Satie’s ‘furniture music’, “…a music designed to satisfy ‘useful’ needs, furniture music creates a vibration; it has other goal, it fills the same role as light or heat.” (Satie) (17).

Lounge music was indeed ‘unlimited in quantity’ and ‘suited to every mood’ (‘music to eat dinner by’ ‘music to drink cocktails by, ‘music to fill in the uncomfortable pauses in conversations by’…); the clarity of High Fidelity allowed music to become truly background, part of Satie’s musical furniture, though maybe not quite the all-inclusive utopia that Bellamy had prophesised in 1888.

In its defence, Lounge was not a purely functional music. The genre gave rise to what is arguably some of the most beautiful and superbly recorded music of the twentieth century. Songwriters like Serge Gainsbourg and Burt Bacharach (the personification of the ideal bachelor) are now recognised as premier songwriters of their generation, who shed the rock drums, backbeat, and ‘Mod’ look of contemporary pop stars and favoured smart suits, slick haircuts, fast cars and high living (‘cocktail’ culture). Much of this music defies its own formula, being far from ‘easy’, it is instead complex, densely orchestrated and often, “contains contagious rhythms that stop conversation and compel listeners to get up and dance!” (18).

John Barry, composer of the James Bond soundtracks, was seen as a rebel against Big Band music with his bold and sinister orchestration, a rock quartet added to usual orchestral instruments. Mantovani went to great expense to record arrangements of classic songs, choosing the popular and familiar to highlight his changes in recordings and arrangement. Esquivel, composer of the Peal and Dean ‘theme’ used in cinema multiplexes, was regarded as a ‘pop avant-gardist’ (19) for reinventing the human voice as an instrument. Vocal sounds like ‘zu-zu-zu’ and ‘Pow! Pow!’ replacing the expected trumpet or glockenspiel solo. Martin Denny, composer of the Exotica album, combined Hawaiian and Latin rhythms and percussion with an all-American sentiment, ‘apple pie with a hint of mango’ (20).

Lounge emphasised the regeneration of post-war society, creating images of global culture, family ideals, the bachelor or ‘playboy’, and the exotic, representing the ‘suspended space of the traveller” (21), voyaging between continents with the simple turn of a record. It is also, as the popular record label name suggests, ‘music for pleasure’, suggesting exciting possibilities for freedom and escapism, “…a world of possibilities, life in the fast lane set to xylophone and flute.” (22). A diluted form, Lounge took traditional, modern and exotic elements and mixed them up, like a cocktail, to be easily digested by the masses. At the time shunned by hipsters as ‘too perfect’ (e.g. Mantovani), it was a pure form appealing to the middle-aged, too old to rock n’ roll, but in possession of an expensive new stereo system.

Part Four: A note on Musak…

Since the invention of the Dynamophone which intended to bring music into businesses via telegraph lines, Musak has played a vital part in the social and physiological fabric of western society. Piped music, to the annoyance of many, is everywhere. Developed by General George Squire in 1922, Musak was monopolised during World War II, used in factories to affect physiological systems by using ‘scientifically calibrated bio-rhythmic cycles’, e.g. upbeat until coffee break, relaxation before lunch (differing according to industry), always aimed at increasing worker productivity.

Musak has now infiltrated every aspect of westernised culture, Musak was pumped into the Apollo space flight, when a B-25 bomber crashed into the Empire State Building trapping victims inside the elevator, the Musak still played on. Lanles describes some of the more positive physiological effects of Musak:

“When I saw Star Wars, at a key moment, the reel broke and the theatre lights went on. People were furious and a crescendo of hooting filled the hall. Suddenly, the lights went off, the Musak started and everyone, me included, turned around and waited for the movie to resume.” (23).

Although much mocked and parodied (including a wonderful scene in Steve Martin’s spoof comedy film The Jerk where the hero, white, middle class but growing up in a hip black family, hears supermarket music and thinks, “It speak to me! This is the kind of music that tells me to go out there and be somebody!”), background Musak, be it popular, classical or ‘supermarket’, gives westerners cues for living – to buy, to go, to stay, to talk. The worker productivity of the factory Musak now takes the form of improving our consumer productivity, i.e. encouraging us to spend more by either browsing longer to make that purchase, or turning around the tables more rapidly in a fast food restaurant. Lounge, particularly ‘Mood’ music, made great use of Musak’s psychology in creating Musak for the home, which could be simultaneously ambient, meditative, sensual, or vivacious – simply select, from the thousands of titles available, music for your desired mood.

Part Five: The amazing New Electronic Pop Sound…

Jean-Jacques Perrrey (b. 1929, France), a ‘combined musician and scientist’ (24) met George Jenny, inventor of the Ondioline in 1952 whilst at medical school. Soon struck by his ‘little demon of music’ he quit medical school to become a composer, ‘a creator’ (25) while selling Ondiolines and doing cabaret with the Ondioline in his show Around The World In 80 Ways. His music combines experiments with electronics, Musique Concrete, Musak, commercial and popular music in ways never conceived of before and never successfully imitated afterwards.

Perrey briefly studied tape loop technique with Pierre Schaeffer at the Studio for Contemporary Music Research in Paris. His work functions both in conjunction with and in reaction to academic theory, making use of the art-relais technique of bricolage, primitive use of near to hand sources, in Perrey’s creation of psychotic, witty and irreverent tape loops, whilst delivering slating attacks on the ‘esoteric’ and ‘serious’ musical avant-garde, thus establishing him as an outsider and deviant. “The possibilities of electronic sonorities were still being explored in a most limited way in ‘serious music,’ listened to largely by an elite of initiates, music devotees and concert-goers.” – Perrey (26)

Like Moog’s ‘democratisation’, Perrey realised the power of the popular and commercial in reaching a wider, mass audience to develop technology, working as an ‘inventor’ alongside the studio engineers. Two key aspects affected Perrey’s compositions; Perrey the ‘scientist’ and Perrey the ‘composer’: his medical background lead to his experiments with music for sleep, in 1957 recording the medically acclaimed Prelude to Sleep, helping thousands of insomniacs into deeper sleep through hypnotic and relaxing sounds, a positive extension of Musak theory. He has also worked, throughout his career, studying dolphins as part of the process of understanding how sound effects sleep. Perhaps the most important aspect of Perrey’s music is his ‘message of humour’ (27). Perrey saw music and humour as two healing forces in the corrupt modern world, “humour will save the world, and I say this in all seriousness. Humour must be approached very seriously. ” (28). Unlike Schaeffer and the French avant-garde, for Perrey, music was not fiercely intellectual, drenched in meaning, emotionally challenging and elitist, but offered the world an aesthetic of fun. “This is the age of electronics. Why should it not add to the pleasures of life?” (29).

Perrey was shrewder than many of his contemporaries, like Robert Moog, he realised that to have his music financed, realised and produced, it was necessary to be part of ‘the system’. Endorsed and encouraged by celebrity friends like Walt Disney, Edith Piaf and Jean Cocteau (who described him as ‘a pioneer with a mission’ (30)), Perrey travelled to America to have his research and composition generously subsidised by Edith Piaf’s friend, Carol Bratmann.

“I told him (Schaeffer) I was going to America to develop the process (tape loops) in a humorous way, to get closer to the Anglo-Saxon public. I had his benediction.” – Perrey (31).

In his ‘alchemical laboratory of sounds’ (32), Perrey worked extensively, collecting over 3000 sound sources, and manipulating them on tape using studio techniques such as filtering, pitch-speed shifts, reversal and multi-tracking to create both ‘real’ sounds and those which were ‘practically unidentifiable’ (33) (Schaeffer’s ‘l’objet sonore’ theory). His library, like those of ‘serious’ composers, was catalogued according to parameter (attack, envelope etc.) then painstakingly spliced to produce “calculating patterns using repetitive loops and sequences for a new style of rhythmic sequences.” (34).

By utilising typical Musique Concrete sources like machine and animal noises and combining with lighter pops, clicks and whirrs, Perrey was able to produce complex and humorous loops which, by adding Moog, Ondioline and percussion, formed the basis of his ‘humoristic and unusual’ (35) compositions. Working commercially composing for TV adverts, jingles and cartoon, the advertisers and general public’s lust for new, space age electronic sounds gave Perrey, Moog and others license to experiment with electronics for commercial revenue. His lively personality and stage presence made him a great TV personality with the American audiences, who loved his ‘European’ humour and accent.

Often working collaboratively with composers and arrangers like Harry Breur and Angelo Badalamenti, Perrey’s real breakthrough came after 1964 with two collaborative albums with Gershon Kingsley – The In Sounds from Way Out and Kaleidoscopic Vibrations. Kingsley was also a pioneer of electronic composition with his First Moog Quartet (1969, Carnegie Hall) and Concerto For Moog (1970, commissioned by the Boston Pops Orchestra). In 1972, shortly after the issue of the Mini-Moog, Kingsley release the advert single Popcorn, a classically orientated pop tune which went on to become the biggest instrumental hit of the 70s and an inspiration for over 500 cover versions. Popcorn succeeded musically on many levels: its crisp ‘pop’ sound suited the Moog perfectly whilst sympathetically imitating the real sound of popcorn, coupled with a catchy melody, much loved and often imitated. Kingsley and his Moog were also occasionally involved with the avant-garde, doing ‘happenings’ with composer John Cage and choreographer Merce Cunningham. Like Perrey, Kingsley also detested ‘classicist’ values: ‘I was always aware that the word ‘avant-garde’ has ‘derriere-garde’ built into it.’ – Kingsley (36). He became fascinated by Perrey’s experimental use of tape loops, “I head – boom-chuck-a-oom-chuck-squea- oo-chuck – it made me laugh.” (37).

Perrey’s real creative breakthrough came directly after his work with Kingsley when he began to find his true voice as an original composer in his two solo albums The Amazing New Electronic Sound of Jean-Jacques Perrey (1968, Vanguard records) and Moog Indigo (1970, Vanguard records). Working more autonomously, Perrey and his arrangers and producers were able to create more controlled sounds using the Moog and produce radiant multi track arrangements of Perrey’s finest compositions.

So what is it that sets Perrey’s work aside from thousand of other inferior Lounge artists? Although much of the material on his LPs are cover version or parodies of popular melodies, Perrey, like Mantovani, makes the listener appreciated the melodies in a new often subversive light, e.g. Frere Jean-Jacques uses the traditional nursery rhyme, adding electronic, loops and humorous sounds allowing ‘tradition’ to be seen in a new, modern light. Other sources, like those of Lounge, come from the exotic (Brazilian Flower), space age (The Little Girl From Mars), dance forms (Country Rock Polka), popular (Mister James Bond), ‘standards’ (Hello Dolly!) and popular classical (Flight of the Bumblebee), whilst retaining originality and an ear for experimentation.

Flight of the Bumblebee, historically his most important work, uses many kilometres of recording from inside a Swiss beehive, painstakingly splicing and editing the tape and adding pitch shifts to produce melodic singing bees, in a work that pre-dates the first sampler by fifteen years. His success was also due to the optimism of the times and acceptance and funding of experimentation in the arts, a ‘golden age’ for electronic music. ‘Humour sparked in the music of the 60s like champagne.’ (38).

Perrey continues to influence generations of new musicians. His theories of ‘electronic for all’ are now in practice, with technology becoming ever cheaper and popular enough for ‘bedroom electonisists’ to experiment with a vast palate of sound possibilities. Perrey claims to have had a dream in 1969, whilst recording Moog Indigo, where his deceased ‘guardian angel’ Jean Cocteau visited him and told him he must record a track that will be recognised in the year 2000. 27 years later in 1996, E.V.A. from the Moog Indigo L.P was remixed by DJ Premier, six years after the publication of an interview with Perrey in the influential Incredibly Strange Music journal, marking the start of Perrey’s renaissance. E.V.A. continues to be covered and sampled by artists like Fat Boy Slim and rapper Ice-T: “For me it’s an honour, it’s very gratifying, sampling is becoming part of the music’s life.” – Perrey (39). He continues to tour university and theatres. At a 1997 performance at the Midland Arts Centre in Birmingham, he carried out an onstage tape looping and splicing demonstration within a comic routine, bringing Schaeffer’s theories to the ‘masses’ using humour. He is still heavily involved with the Ondioline and Moog (‘robots with souls’ (40)) and he is able to see the idiosyncrasies within his own work. ‘There are three kinds of music – good, bad, and mine.’ (41).

Part Six: Death of a Salesman…

During the period 1975 – 1991, there was a lull in popularity and production, and finally extinction of the Moog Synthesizer and Lounge music. The reasons for this were four-fold:
firstly the ‘overkill’ of Moog and other Lounge LPs in the 70s, many poorly recorded and packaged, “the repetition of sounds everyone was so crazy about were actually quite boring when the novelty wore off,” – Walter Carlos (42). ‘Music to drive by’, ‘music to read James Bond by’…it seemed that no aspect of every day living could not be repackaged into a ‘music to…’ style record. The composers had little say over the way records were marketed; many were often sold with attractive, semi-naked women adorning the covers. ‘I don’t care if they call my records ‘music to have a shit by’ as long as they put my music out’ – Esquivel (43).

Secondly, many of the original synthesizer manufacturers like ARP, Moog Music and Kurzweil went bankrupt in the early 70s due to financial mismanagement and tough competition from new markets. Robert Moog himself was put under undue pressure to release the first polyphonic Moog (PolyMoog) ahead of competitors. Designs were plagued with faults and returned by angry customers to the stories in the hundreds.

Thirdly, the social and political optimism of the 60s and 70s gave way to economic downturn and the uncompromising Reagan and Thatcher regimes in America and Britain. Humorous music and records for ‘lifestyle’ became redundant as the Punks in 1976 were waiting to kick in the expensive and elitist Moog synthesizers as owned by ‘rock dinosaurs’ like E.L.P, Rick Wakeman and Pink Floyd. (The Sex Pistol’s Johnny Rotten infamously strode down the King’s Road in Chelsea wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words ‘I hate Pink Floyd’). Once again, guitars became the musical weapons of this new generation of rockers.

Significantly, by the early 80s Japan was becoming the centre for technological development. Corporate manufacturers like Casio, Yamaha and Roland, tired with making motorbikes and calculators, had moved on to exploring and developing digital, polyphonic synthesis. With huge teams, immense financial backing and superior technology, the Japanese were able to swiftly capture the market in mass producing cheap synthesizers, which would truly ‘democratise’ electronic music on a global scale. The ‘cottage industry’ instruments built by individual like Moog gave way to corporate Japan. In 1970, it took Moog alone six months and 300 transistors to produce the 12,000 selling Mini-Moog. In the 1980s in took twenty men three years and 300 million transistors to construct the first Korg Wavestation, selling 200,000 units in just three years (44).

The ‘analogue’ pure synthesis of the early synthesizers was scoffed at by the new technologists; Moogs were discarded, demolished and made their way, with Lounge LPs, to the giant music bargain bin in the sky (or more typically, a car boot sale). As CDs, the new ‘high fidelity’ became the standard audio format towards the late 80s, the music industry encouraged consumers to throw out their archaic vinyl. Many of the original Lounge LPs became obsolete or destroyed. Musicians struggled to get to grips with what, as they were led to believe, was the superior ‘pre-programmed’ technology of buttons activating samples of instruments to replace patching. Initially difficult to achieve any variety within the limited range of sounds, the 1980s became renowned musically for repetitive sounds – a transitory period in music and music technology. Aesthetic experimentation was exchanged for convenience, low cost and ultimately corporate profit. “…there is no philosophy in the major synthesizer industry today, it’s all about making money. ” – Edgar Froese (45). However, the dominant Japanese market has allowed for ‘flexible accumulation’ – the displacement of Fordian production values, allowing for companies to explore less profitable specialist markets to develop future technology.

Part seven: The miracle of re-birth…

From 1991 to present, both Space Age Music and the Moog have undergone a curious period of revival, popularity and change, asserting the Re:Search publications ‘rubbish’ theory that everything, no matter how seemingly lowly, will return once more in its counterculture glory (46), e.g. 70s disco, Thunderbirds, James Bond movies. The ‘analogue freaks’ and ‘vinyl junkies’ mocked during the 80s who held true to their archaic formats, maintain that these swift changes in technology were making music more impure. Ironically, re-mastered CDs were trying to clean up recordings which, like Rock n Roll itself, were essentially impure to start with. In recent years, experts have conceded that the ‘indestructible’ CD is, in fact, easily prone to damage, and digital processing via its method of bit (selective quantity) sampling and sound compression is impeding the ‘pure sound’ reproduction as used by older analogue technology. Dolby, in its removal of hiss, filters off frequencies that can destroy the natural reverberation and timbral qualities of the sound, leaving in its place a slightly ‘cold’ synthetic or disembodied ‘virtual’ sound. “Digital is too exact, analogue spikes add a factor of minute randomness to the waves that give the impression of being ‘alive’. ” (47). Many musicians now seek alternative to the corporate and regimented pre-programmed keyboards typified by pre-programmed synthesizers, which in the process of liberating the composer from the barriers of technology, have limited his access to timbral variety.

Moog and his machines are once again in fashion, a good condition Mini-Moog can fetch up to $8000, and groups like Moog Coobook are reinventing their own curious variant on Lounge music. “The name Moog will remain synonymous with the synthesizer because it was the first.” (48). Analogue synthesists are now considered to be musicians proper, as like an acoustic instrument, the musician determines the production of sound, a sound which some believe has a human characteristic of its own, what Ralf Hutter (Kraftwerk) calls an ‘acoustic mirror’. ‘As soon as you put a different person in front of the synthesizer it’s very responsive to the different vibration.” (49). Some even believe synthesizer sounds connect closely with nature e.g. wind and sea sounds that can have stimulating, healing and calming properties. “The organic, orgasmic energy can be quite a moving experience.” (50).

The combination of digital and analogue technology (e.g. analogue sounds sampled into MIDI samplers, like the new MIDI compatible Ethervox theremin designed by Bob Moog) is now seen as the way towards combing sonic exploration with modern convenience and fidelity of processing and control. Synthesizer corporations like Roland are now intentionally adding ‘analogue’ warmth as a marketing feature of their digital synthesizers, a return to the benefits of warmth and ‘real time’ parameter controls. “…we were on the threshold of new sounds in the 60s, we may be on the threshold now of new ways of controlling sound.” – Robert Moog (51). Pop groups like The Shamen, The Prodigy and Fat Boy Slim (in his 1997 club hit, ‘Everybody Needs A 303′, advocating the use of early drum machines), combine vintage analogue with modern technology for wholly contemporary sounding records.

Moog’s ‘democratisation’ has taken on a tri-partie process of initiation, after cheaper microprocessor technology, synthesizers began to use internal and external memories for sound production and sound reproduction, leading to a decrease in need for programming ability for synthesists, thereby synthesizer owners have become ‘consumers’ of pre-purchased sounds. MIDI too has offered consumers a standardisation between instruments, allowing sound to become an internationally recognised standard.

Most significantly, since the late 1980s, the public, from the youth upwards, have become more susceptible to electronic music and even very complex, avant-garde electronic sounds. The rave and hardcore culture stemming from clubs in Chicago, Amsterdam, Manchester and New York in this period created hypnotic effects to make the participants dance to the sound of electronic bleeps, beats and pulses – not a world away from the sounds of Moog’s synthesizers and Perrey’s tape loops.

The obsolete electronic oddity the theremin has also undergone its third period of revival, some believe due to the publication of a D.I.Y. theremin guide by Maplin’s Electronics and also a TV documentary about the extraordinary life of its inventor, Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey by filmmaker Steven M. Martin. According to Moog, these earlier electronic devices have never been seriously credible, always treasured for their quirky novelty. ‘It is in such un-seriousness that the peculiar forces of these devices resides…they remain exotic even deep in electronic music territory.’ (52).

As all things come full circle, Lounge too has undergone its own inexplicable revival. In a movement in part initiated in America by the Re/Search foundation, ‘Lounge’ night clubs are appearing all over Britain, America and Western Europe, politically placing the ‘background’ music into the main arena in venues such as Club Velvet (Minneapolis), Madame JoJos (London), the Leopard Lounge (San Francisco) and Klub Catusi (Birmingham, UK), which was the subject of a 1998 Channel 4 documentary, ‘…an oasis in the dance orientated or mainstream indie clubs…’ (53). This ‘incredibly strange music’ appeals with its naïve, exotic and kooky attributes by defying the slogans of pop, politics and image imposed by the 80s music like rap, Live Aid and Billy Bragg, and instead offers relaxation and escapism, with a nod, wink and laugh at the luridly inappropriate tackiness of the form, a ‘fresh source of sonic balm for the 90s’ (54).

Lounge is, however, not a revival movement appropriated by its survivors but by their grandchildren, the 18 – 30 youth who, not purely as an ‘ironic’ statement are, in all sincerity, discovering the endless charm, variety and beauty of this ‘lost’ music:

“The ‘retro’ phenomenon in the past decade has taken a number of different guises, ranging form simple revivation to highly sophisticated forms of revaluation that frustrate traditional notions of irony and parody.” (55).

Unlike other popular music fans, there are two distinctly separate sub-cultural groups who appear to be perpetuating the phenomenon, firstly the typically beatnik 25 – 40 generation, typically working class, fans of rock and alternative music, and another 18 – 30 new ‘lad’ and ‘ladette’ culture group lead by media figure like Chris Evans (who used ‘theme from man in a suitcase’ and ‘the pretenders’ in his beery show for lads TFI Friday), a more debonair side to the rough ‘laddism’ of the Gallagher brothers (Oasis) etc. appropriating the style with pseudo-glamorous irony. Also in this set, half parody half serious publications like The Chap magazine, with its covers of 1950s men in knitted sweaters and pipes, attempt to add new glamour and cool to the values of cocktail culture.

Popular and underground groups like Stereolab use Moog and Farfisa organs in albums like Space Age Bachelor Pad Music which act as a re-evaluative ‘homage’; they have even sampled Jean-Jacques Perrey in their songs. Bristol’s Portishead sample Lounge music and theremin and add a melancholic Trip Hop beat, epitomised in their hit record Glory Box. French duo Air combine ambient moods, 80s/90s camp disco, Moogs and vocoders in their creation of ‘timeless’ melodies, and they have collaborated with Jean-Jacques Perrey in working on film soundtracks.

Even Birmingham, England, has developed its own unique and prospering lounge revival, with a number of lounge-infused bands growing from and working in the hip suburb of Moseley, a 60s mecca for ‘alternative’ and hippy culture which has never rid itself of its self-imposed ‘retro’ culture. The dingy bed-sits deep in oppressive urban territory these bands inhabit is an unusual paradox to the escapist glamour of original ‘jet set’ lounge culture, and is perhaps part of the complex politicised revisiting of Lounge, contrasting the exotic and sophisticated with the lowly and cheap commodity it has become; ‘High Fidelity’ transformed into ‘Lo Fi (delity)’.

Most notable examples are the band Plone who ‘mix cranky old anlogue gear with fancy new computers for some exemplary Space Age Exotica.’ (56), the enigmatic and elegant Broadcast, fusing elements such as Serge Gainsbourg, John Barry and Ennio Morricone with modern breaks and sounds, to create a seductive pallet of 1990s ‘mood’ music, “…a big box of dark bitter chocolates, a couple of packs of French cigarettes, smudged with lipstick and faded dark wallpaper,” (57). Perhaps most exemplary of all things easy are Pram, who combine child-like Fisher Price instruments with rare analogue gear like the Mini-Moog, theremin and Omnichord, throwing in conventional pop and orchestral instruments to create intentionally retrogressive music which is simultaneously kitsch, relaxing and ominous – ‘sauntering rhythms that suggest cocktail lounge music with clanging and bubbling replacing smooth string arrangements,’ (58). The results are not unlike Perrey’s subversion of Lounge music replacing strings with tape loops. ‘If you don’t find Pram a little scary then you’re obviously not listening hard enough.’ (59).

By combining analogue equipment and Lounge with modern influences, these groups negate their own idiosyncratic styles, neither popular nor mainstream, unlike the original Lounge music, and divorced from and commenting upon the original form in a modern hybrid. Unlike the more ‘knowing’ revival of Lounge from San Francisco and Paris with groups like Dmitri from Paris and Combustible Edison, the Birmingham groups, as is the way in the waters in this industrial city, maintain an authentic air of genuineness in their treatment of Lounge, born from love and homage, not parody. Whether this revival of Lounge music and the Moog is an isolated and inexplicable phenomenon or part of a recognition of the historical and aesthetic significance of pioneering electronic music development, only time will tell. But ten years on, Lounge and the analogue revival show no signs of losing steam.

Musicians and technology have always shared something of a love/hate relationship. Through the work of Moog the engineer, barriers of technology have been reduced, and the work of Perrey the commercialist, has allowed for the popularisation of the synthesis genre in a way no academic established could ever have initiated. Now, in our period of curious revivals, we are able to see in clarity the level of enriching experimentation and change these men put into place. We are now coming to accept that the ‘low’ forms of previous generations, can, by their fundamentally inherent ‘non-low’ characteristic and qualities, come to become relished and admired by new generations in ways they were never originally conceived.

“The utopian impulse, the negation of everyday life, the aesthetic impulse that Adorno recognised in ‘high’ art must be part of low art too.” (60).

FOOTNOTES

(1) The Wire No. 175 August 1998 (pg3) ‘Tomorrow’ by Tony Herrington

(2) The Wire, ‘A huge, ever pulsating brain’ by Mark Sinker

(3) The Wire, ‘A huge, ever pulsating brain’ by Mark Sinker

(4) Clara Rockmore website

(5) Sleeve notes to Silver Apples on the Moon by Morton Subotnik

(6) On Sonic Art (Pg 6) by Trevor Wishart (self published) 1985

(7) Any Sound You Can Imagine (Pg. 52) by Paul Theberge, University Press of New England, 1997

(8) Schoenberg, as quoted by Dr. Vic Hoyland, lecture notes to Music in the Twentieth Century

(9) Illustrated Compendium of Musical Technology (Pg 16) by Tristan Cary, Faber & Faber 1992

(10) Any Sound You Can Imagine (Pg. 52) by Paul Theberge, University Press of New England, 1997

(11) The Wire, ‘A huge, ever pulsating brain’ by Mark Sinker

(12) America On Record (Pg. 139) by Andre Millard, Cambrdige University Press, 1995

(13) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 111) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(14) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 111) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(15) On Sonic Art (Pg 90) by Trevor Wishart (self published) 1985

(16) Performing Rites (Pg. 226) by Simon Frith, Oxford University Press, 1996

(17) Performing Rites (Pg. 65) by Simon Frith, Oxford University Press, 1996

(18) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 59) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(19) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 56) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(20) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 3) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(21) Performing Rites (Pg. 227) by Simon Frith, Oxford University Press, 1996

(22) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(23) Cocktail Culture Website – Richard Lanles

(24) Sleeve notes to Moog Indigo by ‘Mr Bongo’

(25) Incredibly Strange Music (Pg. 92) by Caroline Herbert, Re/Search Publications, 1993

(26) Sleeve notes to The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound of Jean-Jacques Perrey by Jean-Jacques Perrey

(27) Ibid.

(28) Computer Music Journal Vol. 18 No. 4 Winter 1994 (pg. 25) by Lanurent Fourier, Masachuettes Institute of Technology

(29) Sleeve notes to The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound of Jean-Jacques Perrey by Jean-Jacques Perrey

(30) Incredibly Strange Music (Pg. 97) by Caroline Herbert, Re/Search Publications, 1993

(31) Cool & Strange Music Magazine by Dana Countryman

(32) Incredibly Strange Music (Pg. 95) by Caroline Herbert, Re/Search Publications, 1993

(33) Ibid.

(34) Ibid.

(35) Ibid.

(36) Incredibly Strange Music (Pg. 86) by Caroline Herbert, Re/Search Publications, 1993

(37) Ibid.

(38) Incredibly Strange Music (Pg. 98) by Caroline Herbert, Re/Search Publications, 1993

(39) Cool & Strange Music Magazine by Dana Countryman

(40) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 87) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(41) Cool & Strange Music Magazine by Dana Countryman

(42) Walter Carlos as quoted on a Moog Music Web Site

(43) Esquivel as quoted on Space Age Bachelor Pad Music website

(44) Any Sound You Can Imagine by Paul Theberge, University Press of New England, 1997

(45) www.anlogue.org website

(46) Roots of Lounge website

(47) Chas Gould on online debate at www.sonicstate.com

(48) Julian Coldbeck, quoted on a Moog Music website

(49) Lester Bangs (music journalist)

(50) ‘Josh M’ on online debate at www.sonicstate.com

(51) Computer Music Journal Vol. 12 No. 1 Spring 1988 – Curtis Road (Pg 9), Masachuettes Institute of Technology

(52) The Wire, ‘A huge, ever pulsating brain’ by Mark Sinker

(53) We Brought Our Friends Fanzine (pg. 50), by Alan Farmer, privately published

(54) Easy! The Lexicon of Lounge (Pg 107) by Dylan Jones, Pavillion Books, 1997

(55) Modernity and Mass Culture (pg. 205), Jim Collins, Indian University Press, 1991

(56) John Peel’s Meltdown website

(57) WARP records website

(58) Satellite and Cable New, New York October ’94

(59) Ibid.

(60) Performing Rites (Pg. 20) by Simon Frith, Oxford University Press, 1996

(61)

With thanks to:

Dugal McKinnon, Jean-Jacques Perrey, Robert Moog, Re/Search publications, Alan Farmer, all the Moseley crew.

All texts © Susi O’Neill, 1999.

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