Do you aknowledge the importance of dance music

[Computer Controlled]

I remember the first article I ever read on dance music production, it was in the British music shop rag Making Music, maybe 91/92 (anyone remember that???). Some things it said put me right off. It said point blank that dance music required samplers, and serious dance music required 2 fully loaded S1000s. It made scant mention of analogue synths, maybe producers back then regarded analogues as garnish around the meat and potatoes of sampling, and not the other way round.

One thing to remember, is that most of the dance music in the UK back in the early 90s was largely sample oriented. One listen to Pump Up The Volume confirms this =o]

[Syn303]

If you go back to 1987, The KLF or The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu as they were called at that time, put together a heavily laden sample album called "1987 What The f**k Is Going On?", just using a Greengate DS3 sampler, a TR-808 and a large pile of records, and Bill Drummond's brogue scottish rap, the album also included samples from TV shows and adverts.

That shows that sampling was indeed happening in the mid-late 80's, like CC mentioned MARRS Pump Up The Volume (1987) and also artists like Coldcut and their single "Doctorin' The House" (1988) a cue also for The KLF's Timelords Single "Doctorin' The Tardis" (1988)

[JSRockit]

if you've never danced all night before... never been in the state of total abandon of the usual daily routine, never gone completely nuts for a tune emerging in the midst of a slamming mix by a DJ or live P.A. performance that is stimulating everything in sight.....then I feel somewhat sorry for you.
You just haven't lived yet, son!
OR rather, I envy you a little, because there's only one unique "1st time" for anyone...

I've never done this and don't care too. This doesn't mean I haven't been to a club all night, but I don't dance and still enjoy myself.

[Computer Controlled]

but I don't dance and still enjoy myself.

Me too. I have 3 left feet =o]

[Automatic Gainsay]

Some of this has swerved rather OT. This isn't about did dance music start with techno. It obviously didn't. You guys are looking too far back.

KBD_TRACKER seems to state that synths were just a flavor in dance music until the artists he lists, including the first techno artists. Mine was a response to that. If that portrayal of his statement isn't accurate, I rescind my statements in regard to it!

In addition to that, I would like to add that there was a lot of electronic dance music made entirely of synths (including Moroder, whom he mentions... weirdly)... which was actually disco. One could make a very strong point to suggest that electronic dance music arose from disco. And, it bears striking similarities in structure.

You guys are looking too far back.

I might suggest that KBD isn't looking quite far enough back.
Dance beats and wholly electronic recordings occurred throughout the earlier history of synths. These beats, etc. weren't used quite in the same context, but the music is there.

This is about did "modern" EDM kick start the analogue revival of sorts and help with bringing them back into the public eye. I'd say yes, without a doubt. Would there be all these new analogue and VAs w/o the interest from EDM? Probably not. I don't see the audience for these being large enough outside of EDM.

I'd be inclined to agree that various forms of electronic dance music from the eighties and nineties has had a big market impact, and that much current technology is a reflection of that. If that's all this thread was saying, it would be certainly hard to contradict!
I would slightly extract the analog thing, though... and here's why:
The analog revival, as I know it, didn't happen in dance music at all. It happened in quirky "alternative" bands. The first recordings I heard of analog synths for the sake of analog synths was Moog Cookbook, followed by The Rentals.
At the time I heard these recordings, I was making electronic dance music. I was amazed by the sound of these synths, but I had no inclination to try to cram them into dance music... we were all too into samples at that point.
Some artists were still using Minimoogs, etc. throughout the 80s, too.
As such, I don't think the analog market specifically owes its existence to dance music, although artists, genres and hype have definitely helped sell analog to the dance market.

Without Acid House, there would have been no interest in the 303 or 808 or 909. Or any of the Roland x0x boxes. Same with techno. It just happen to end up that these boxes were cheap at the time being dumped for all the latest digital whiz bangs. They didn't care that they were analogue (for the most part, though some did actually). They cared that they were cheap and affordable. If you look at the rise in popularity of analogues, the manufacturing of new analogues and VAs... you'll see a parallel with the rise in popularity of EDM.

Amusingly, I bought an EPS-16+ in 1991. As I was going through its presets, I found one that was samples of the TR-808. Was my response "HEY, COOL... now I can do Detroit Techno!" Ha ha, sadly, no... it was "HEY, now I have that drum machine with the cool sounds that so many rap artists use!" I can tell you right now that in 1991, the popularity of the TR-808 was squarely in the Rap market. (and because there was no internet to speak of... if you weren't attending raves in the non-major cities of the US, you probably had no exposure AT ALL to techno)
Also, there is nothing about any of the x0x products which actually screams "ANALOG." The 909 has samples in it. Does anyone really use those devices because they think they have some analog appeal? I'd be surprised if that was the case.

So what would we have all these great new toys to play with if the EDM/Rave scene hadn't kicked off the way it did? Uhhh... probably not. I'm sure we'd have some, but probably the amount that there is now.

There is a lot of music technology which plainly owes its existence to these genres... that can't be denied!
But saying that modern synths in general wouldn't exist, or wouldn't have survived if not for these genres is taking it a bit far.

[Jack Spider]

The analog revival, as I know it, didn't happen in dance music at all. It happened in quirky "alternative" bands. The first recordings I heard of analog synths for the sake of analog synths was Moog Cookbook, followed by The Rentals.

I completely agree with this - I stumbled across The Rentals via Weezer and it was right up my street, having been an avid Stranglers fan since the late 70s - the incorporation of synths in new-wave-style rock. Although I held no interest in the gear used by Dave Greenfield until this point, this all changed when I first heard the Moog Cookbook's first album in 1995 and that sparked my interest as much in the instruments as the music itself.

This led me to pay more attention to any synth usage in the albums I already had and singled-out the Minimoog as a firm favourite of mine. I spent the late mid-late 90s trawling magazines and latterly, the internet (when I finally had regular access) for as much info on these old synths as possible, using the sleeve notes from the Moog Cookbook albums as a 'hit list'.

If it sparked my interest around this time, it's likely to have done the same for many others - perhaps even heralding the way for the popularity of analogue-modelling synths and a return to hands-on interfaces. And driving up the prices of older analogue synths!

[Computer Controlled]

One could make a very strong point to suggest that electronic dance music arose from disco. And, it bears striking similarities in structure.

Actually, it half way did. House was a direct decedent from Disco. The term "House" was simply a short hand for Warehouse, which was the club where all this underground dance music was being played. The majority of it being Disco. The earliest of the Chicago House records were stripped down disco beats really. House basically stripped disco down to it's fundamental and rebuilt it their way.

Techno on the other hand was influenced by P-Funk and German electronic. Juan Atkins is quoted as saying "Techno is like Kraftwerk and George Clinton stuck in an elevator with a sequencer".

[redroomrecordings]

people use synths for non dance music? :-k .... you mean like in guitar music?

[nvbrkr]

I think it's clear that a lot of the people who have bought modern analogs and kept the companies going on have been making dance music themselves. But that's a bit like thanking all those teenagers who are in bad heavy metal and hard rock bands for the fact that Fender and Gibson still manufacture guitars.

I listen to some more offbeat genres of dance music, mainly IDM (which, incidentally, you can't usually even dance to). Been trying to get into progressive house, but I've usually failed to understand what would be so progressive about it. The problem with many current electronic dance acts using analogs is that often I don't even hear what would be the actual benefit of them using expensive analog synths anyway - sometimes it's just some short notes edited heavily on the computer or something like that. If a certain unit does the trick for them, then I guess it's fine. But when a person has 16 vintage synthesizers - including a Memorymoog and an original Mini - and the music still sounds like it could have been very well done in Reason, I just have to wonder about the whole thing.

I'm sure there are a lot of people who'd think I too "waste my analogs" on a completely redundant genre of music too.

[shaft9000]

And to shaft, if you haven't been kicked in the face or kicked someone in the face at a hardcore show in your youth, you haven't lived. I couldn't imagine dancing like a prick to techno music. I don't mean that to be offensive but we each have our own places we come from and we probably all have some magical youth experience that can't be replaced, repeated or completely understood by others.

does getting bottles broken over my head @ a Pantera show and strangling the j**ka** that did it count?
it's totally cool that our imaginations work differently. :thumbup:

[schmidtc]

I definitely have the rave scene to thank for my love of synths and I spun techno music for ten years before I bought a my first synth. However I don't think electronic dance music (call it what you will) is churning out a new generation of youth that will love synths, seems bands like radiohead and the like are getting the kids into it these days.

[ross308]

do you aknoledge the importance of synthesizers in dance music? if it weren't for synthesizers most "dance" music would be completely boring (for me at least).

[otto]

it's totally cool that our imaginations work differently. :thumbup:

I'm not sure what this sentance means, please elaborate.

Nah, Pantera wouldn't really be the same thing. Kinda like the difference between you dancing in a smallish club vs seeing daft punk from 100 yards at coachella.

[Stab Frenzy]

The analog revival, as I know it, didn't happen in dance music at all. It happened in quirky "alternative" bands. The first recordings I heard of analog synths for the sake of analog synths was Moog Cookbook, followed by The Rentals.

I completely agree with this - I stumbled across The Rentals via Weezer and it was right up my street, having been an avid Stranglers fan since the late 70s - the incorporation of synths in new-wave-style rock. Although I held no interest in the gear used by Dave Greenfield until this point, this all changed when I first heard the Moog Cookbook's first album in 1995 and that sparked my interest as much in the instruments as the music itself.

I also first got interested in synths from those bands, and Stereolab, Portishead, Minimum Chips and Dr Octagon, and later Cibo Matto and Add N to X. When I heard dance music in the 90's I just heard 'dance music', not the individual parts. When I heard bands like those mentioned I heard music with synths in it. The synth sounds stuck out more and sounded better to me in the context of being in a mix with other instruments, and I still think that's the case. All synth is pretty boring.

[Yoozer]

Some things it said put me right off. It said point blank that dance music required samplers, and serious dance music required 2 fully loaded S1000s. It made scant mention of analogue synths, maybe producers back then regarded analogues as garnish around the meat and potatoes of sampling, and not the other way round.

Well, yes.

Consider the following: an analog acts as an analog. A sampler acts as a subtractive synth, for synthetic or realistic sounds. It does vocals. It does percussion - it's far more versatile because the Atari 1040ST you had running Cubase or Notator just didn't have audio recording possibilities.

A sampler would've been a far more worthwhile purchase because it could take so many duties, while that analog would do only one thing, even if it did it well.

But it was all in there back then, and people were less judgemental of the lable "digital". They just wanted something that made a sound in the hope they could achieve a full mix.

It is my experience that those who actually get work done are far less judgemental of "digital" than people on forums are. They use whatever works. After all, they have to make money with it .

When someone lands a fat-paying contract (if those even still exist) and you see 'm buying a huge stack of vintage gear - that's partially preference, but also indulgence - as much as buying a Ferrari is for rappers.