A thread for the most beautiful synth riffs in music

Post Youtubes/etc of what you think are the most beautiful, aurally most pleasing synth riffs you know. And when you post a track, please indicate which riff you mean!

I'll start with this, my all-time favourite:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pi-6c6jwVw

Yello - Domingo. The riff first starts at 0:47, and you can hear it properly in its full glory at 1:05.

That one was uplifting, but here's something more melancholy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJVitdlwPWU

Caunos - Herzsprung 1. Starts at 1:25, I guess this is technically an arpeggio, it's really gorgeous anyway.

And this one everyone knows, obviously:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW972em87MU

Fever Ray - Seven. The riff is a variation of the chorus melody, it starts 2:54. It's what makes this tune IMO, as it's even more beautiful than the sung chorus.

I've always really loved the epic riff in Solid Space, esp the way it pushes the pulse of the timing around a bit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKy0LQUZi-s

That is pretty cool, very majestic!

Jon Anderson brings to mind Vangelis, who obviously has had his fair share of cool synth riffs, but I think this one is the best:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_tLx6yQMa4

Vangelis - Theme from Antarctica. The riff is first heard at 0:18.

Going for more clubby tunes, I've always liked the synth riff that starts this one, such a classic rave sound:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AA_B8XZ5yX0

Marusha - Cardinal Points of Life. I also love the point later in the tune when the riff turns into a synth harpsichord!

Was this the last good Omni Trio track?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pqt2GeG4TY

Omni Trio - Byte Size Life. The idea of using a trancey, wobbly synth line in a drum'n'bass tune was pretty cool!

dr dre - keep their heads ringing
luniz - i got 5 on it

Yeah, the "I Got 5 on It" riff is definitely all-time!

If we're talking about funky, other-wordly riffs, the one that opens this tune is pretty memorable:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8gi4lh75G4

Ramsey Lewis - Tambura

awesome thread alert

1.57:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSPYlFU2QUI

Gotta be this one. (Also fits for the "songs where the chorus is instrumental" thread!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzbDUbu1lMM

Was not familiar with that, it's quite something! Has kind of a nervous/alienating quality, no?

(xpost, that was about Orbital)

Wow, I thought I would not know that Italian tune, but the chorus is super-familiar... Has the tune been covered by someone else, or has the riff been sampled somewhere?

Here's another drum & bass hybrid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dr34IpfYw-g

CJ Bolland - Con Spirito. The riff begins at 0:29. CJ Bolland takes a lovely piece of melody from Vangelis' Heaven and Hell and turns it into a majestic trance riff.

This tune of course has one of most famous and memorable synth riffs of all time, but for some reason I love the extra notes Ben Liebrand adds to it in his remix, even if the original is more simple and solemn:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF9Zi9OLVms

Art of Noise - Moments in Love (Liebrand Mix)

And to commemorate the passing of Edgar Froese, here's some TD:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh82otmaEMc

Tangerine Dream - White Eagle. I guess this is another arpeggio? It starts right in the beginning and goes on soaring through the track.

Pretty sure this is not what anyone was looking for, but I love the synth lick on "Centerfold" during the pre-chorus ("Years go by, I'm looking through a girlie magazine..."). Starts about 0:34 seconds in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-cl=85114404&x-yt-ts=1422579428&v=BqDjMZKf-wg&feature=player_detailpage#t=34

Everything is welcome here, as long it's a synth riff!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2OWcaVJ3Bs

Warp 9 - Light Years Away. This one has more than one memorable riff, but my favourite is the cosmic sound first heard at 1:06. The synth steel drum in the chorus is cool too!

1:57 in Out There Somewhere is one of my favourite few seconds in music (also then the bass comes in around 2:30 followed by the drums)!

The original "Danger Zone" had one short synth riff that was so memorable that this whole remix was built around it, you can hear it right from the beginning:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIqxHSGG2KQ

Planet Patrol - Danger Zone (Remix)

Anyway, speaking of Orbital, my favourite synths of theirs must be in "The Box":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cONv26K0vL8

First the bell-like riff starts at 0:10, then the whooshy synth comes to support it at 0:14, that's just sublime!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU9o-aCXqCg

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4Dur1UXySw

but this is catchier, just totally devastating

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLExozlYhtU

those cascading upper runs that flower around 2:23 = yesss

If we want to go deeper into old school synth vibes, the riff that opens Laurie Spiegel's "East River Dawn" (from 1976) is breathtaking:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIqS5_bh4nM

the riff starting at 0:22 of this
surfing - lifetime

is just mesmerizing to me. sampled from some 80s track, i imagine.

Tuomas: Well, the riff was used by Rob Hubbard on the soundtrack to the Commodore 64 game "Wiz"... but if you haven't played a lot of commodore 64 games I don't know where you'd know it from!

the echoed synth riff that opens duran duran save a prayer

^^yesssssss

can i just

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Swzp1eeOMj4

Originally wanted to post the studio version of this, but I was lucky enough to see Gary Numan on the volcano-interrupted "I'm hauling out all the old synth sounds and playing Pleasure Principle in full" tour a couple years back. My gf filmed this at the show...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gmmWbaKsY4

Everything about this is great, but the ending at 4:02 onward was pretty transcendent esp at high volume.

i saw that tour too, great stuff.

My Numan choice, though, is the gorgeous first theme from "I Almost Married A Human".

Foreigner - Waiting For A Girl Like You (synth by Thomas Dolby)

OMD have a whole bunch of beautiful synth moments, like all of Stanlow for instance.

OMD have a whole bunch of beautiful synth moments, like all of Stanlow for instance.

― MaresNest, Sunday, February 1, 2015 10:00 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Definitely. Not to mention the instrumental first half of 'Sealand'!

My Numan choice, though, is the gorgeous first theme from "I Almost Married A Human".

― a drug by the name of WORLD WITHOUT END (Jon Lewis), Sunday, February 1, 2015 3:42 AM (8 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, that's a good choice. For me, I love the instrumental portion of 'The Aircrash Bureau', especially when it gets joined with the piano. I also find his verion of this achingly beautiful...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acId5ftnjnE

*verion=version.

1.10:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4_t6IwfaDY

the synth riff from Out Of Sync by Devo is really pretty, I think

http://youtu.be/c8yt7t-WO7M

Vangelis: 3+3 - this is one of the prettiest synth parts I can think of; Vangelis has dozens of these but this one really gets me
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qddMZSXGkk

P-Model: Moon-Plant II - one thing I love (and P-Model does this a lot) is when a song has some rhythmic element that's a little goofy or wonky ("Once in a Lifetime" by Talking Heads comes to mind) and it just repeats it through the entire song. "Moon-Plant II" has the king of all wonk-riffs but it plays it into something really beautiful. This song was my ringtone for years!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oE903xV53E

Two very simple little woodwindy refrains that manage to be very melancholic and affecting for some reason, It's My life - Talk Talk and This Must Be The Place - Talking Heads

COMPUTER LOVE!

You can check the balanescu quartet cover for extra appreciation on how beautiful and memorable the synth riffs are.

Giorgio Moroder - Evolution

The synth riff of the gods is at around 7:19 in the video below. Classic Moroder at his best right there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-kfUW6Ttq0

Xpost there are some really devastating little synth lines on the it's my life and colour of spring albums

Other xpost vangelis, whatever other flairs he has, is a genius melodist

Such a wonderful thread! Thanks Tuomas, thanks everyone…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORs5-C6Mf5w

Yazoo - Midnight - 0:48
The cascading figure that appears here is one of my favorites, and the song is a nice example of the productive tension between the blues-inclined Alf and Vince's precisely-clocked aesthetic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovnj8mfoYxg

Erasure - Waiting for the Day - 2:30
Really it's the way lots of interlocking riffs (rifflets?) work together that make this passage special. That's what I admire about Vince Clark's programming in general.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Re4aDJL3heA

New Order - World in Motion - 1:13
Yes, the tune (like the video) is just good, campy fun, but the highlighted riff is one of NO's most sublime.

Hmm, "cascading" is the wrong word for that bit in Midnight. Percolating?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1N6EecRJu60&spfreload=10

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opkzgLMH5MA
A Flock of Seagulls - Wishing came to mind as soon as I read the thread title.

I can't see the youtubes so sorry if this was already posted but it's prob quite unlikely as I was probably the only person who voted for it in the Italo poll (which is maybe fair as it isn't Italian and is as much hi-nrg or something else entirely as italo I suppose)

Hypnotic Samba - Hypnotic Samba (1983/1984?) 0:44 onwards
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgqfb1tY2ls

The opening/chorus of Harmonia's "Deluxe (Immer Wieder)" is a thing of wonder and beauty...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fd1BH7Nbk8c

The main part that repeats throughout Eno's "The Big Ship" is fairly awesome. The higher bit that fades in between 1:20-1:30 makes it transcendent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCCJc_V8_MQ

Surely the part at 1:40 of "Age of Consent" is New Order's best synth moment...?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ahU-x-4Gxw

...though "Lonesome Tonight" gives it stiff competition at 1:25 and then 2:50:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjVEfvffmWs

This is the other song that came immediately to mind when I saw this thread... I always loved the instrumental break with the arpeggiated synth in Ultravox's "Passing Strangers" - it was probably the first song where I really fell in love with a synth sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUyd8JJaMIM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbMjwXgmvB0

http://youtu.be/k861k3OrqNc

Simple Minds - 20th Century Promised Land

Love the way the riff plays off against the bassline and then those triplets (not sure if they're on guitar or another synth) that creep up in the mix.

From the underappreciated Silkie, one of the last bastions of decent straight-up dubstep (3.16):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSBdNAmwa9E

Main riff on this one is cool as well (1.24ish):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGxUxz5Y5b8

Also, how has there been no BoC?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7bKe_Zgk4o

The Wire thread that has just been revived reminded me that on The Finest Drops there is a lovely combined synth brass and bells riff that happens after the choruses, which makes the song for me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQsWotO6Kn0