The Electronic Sound
I’ve gotten into the habit of sharing music documentaries on my Twitter account on Sunday mornings — a youtube-version of the “long read”, or perhaps more like the magazine insert in the Sunday paper. In my never-ending quest to find suitable blog content, I thought I’d repurpose the material to post here — and no doubt, some of my readers might prefer the convenience of a single bookmark (for later listening) even if they’ve already seen the links in my twitter feed.
This week I was inspired by the TR-808. Roland is bringing the legendary box back, after a fashion, as part of their new ‘Aria’ line. If you haven’t heard of the TR-808, that’s fine, just give a listen below:
“Roland’s genre-defining trio of sound boxes”, BBC Radio 1 feature (1hr), the TR-808, TR-909, and TB-303. (If you only have an hour today, I’d queue up this one.)
Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer gear demo (6.6min)
Roland TB-303 Documentary – Bassline Baseline (19.8min)
The 808 and 303 were not initially successful upon their release. Roland made about 12,000 or so 808s from 1980 to 1983. The technology was quickly “superceded” by other, newer units from various manufacturers, and the 808 was priced about a third as much so in some ways meant the Rolands were seen as ‘cheap’. The initial unpopularity and quick obsolescence actually built the ground for later success: The 808, 909, and 303 were sold used, and (while still hundreds of dollars) were much more affordable for struggling musicians.
Listening to the output of the 808 actually send me down a research-rabbit-hole than ended up with sampling culture and vinyl collectors — which I’ll post next weekend. On another tangent, though, I was inspired to learn more about the analog synth technology of the 70s and 80s:
The Shape of Things That Hum first aired by Channel 4 in the UK during 2001. (1hr22min)
The Museum of Synthesizer Technology (51.7min)
Moby’s Drum Machine & Synth Collection (12min)
Adrian Utley (Portishead)’s Synth Collection Tour (12.1min)
The last couple of links are from Future Music Magazine. They have a fantastic YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/FutureMusicMagazine and if you’re still interested in the topic, I’d watch of few of their’s and start following links in youtube’s right sidebar
Memetune Studios in London, UK (13.8min)
“Watch as Benge creates modular magic using his amazing stash of vintage and rare, modular synthesizers” (22.6min)
