The Technology of 80s Synthpop

Roland SH-101 and Juno 106 too.

And yes, Vail's book is essential.

I spent about 3 years on the Analogue Heaven list in the mid 90's, I don't get to talk about this stuff much anymore. Nobody wants this stuff anymore, everybody wants softsynths and VA's. I cannot really blame them, the cost of maintenance is outrageous these days.

because yer the King of ILX Numanoids, Colin :-)

geeta if you really want to buy a synth you are going to have to think more about capabilities and not eras... modern synths can make old sounds and vice versa. the older the synth, though, the more it will come down to your will to program patches, and, in some cases, to memorize or write them down.

i would really advise starting slowly with something that is not too expensive, and will keep its value. if you can exahust the possibilites of a SCI prophet 600, roland juno 106, or alesis ion, then you can go from there. an xpander as starter synth would be a headache for anyone, even if they went to MIT like you ;-) The first two of those are vintage, the third is modern, the first two should be $400-500 for excellent condition, and the last can be bought new for $650 if you look around for good deals. after years of dithering, i am going to get the Ion.

ultimately, there are a lot of great synths out there, and it comes down to ability not fashion (not accusing you... i went through a period of fetishizing old gear, being indecisive due to limited funds, and i ended up with no gear, and no music). there are actually so many great synths that the choice is rather arbitrary. i put together a studio on paper that only consisted of synths with reflective silver metal casings and i am sure if i owned it all it would all sound amazing (yamaha cs6x as controller, alesis ion, yam dx-200, roland tb-303, elektrom machinedrum, korg er-1, roland tr-606, etc.).

Favorite Numan album: 'I, Assassin'

Beat that!

I have 'Numan By Computer', the early fan book. OK, it's not exactly mine, but it belongs to my flatmate and it's IN MY HOUSE. BEAT THAT.

This is, of course, all limbering up in the weeks before we are thrown into the ring.

The 80s sound was based on 70s keyboards. The early 80s one, that is. The late 80s one sucked anyway. Typical 80s keyboards such as the Yamaha DX7 are now deservedly buried by history and will hopefully be forgotten in shame.

and the synthesis techniques will forever live on in the midi scene as most Midi (GM / soundcard synths are the legacy of the DX-7)

but there will always be a fondness in popular culture for the classic analogues of the 70s.... well they just keep turning up.

i know some 'proper' musicians (i.e. they actually do it for a living), and rather than use softsynths they buy the original analogue synths because no amount of digital modelling will reproduce the sounds exactly. yes its expensive but you can always resell the instrument once you are done.
having said all that i've just bought a brand new MicroKorg. its ace!

Roughly, they sound the same though, and you also have the advantage that you avoid the oscillator problems that you sometimes had with the old analog synths.

WASP (the only one I owned..the rest were all on hire or borrowed from generous friends and acquaintances; I lent my Wasp to someone and never got it back)
ROLAND JUPITER 8 (my favourite polysynth)
ROLAND JUPITER 6
ROLAND SH-2
ROLAND SH-101 (mainly for guitar-like posing at PA's)
SEQ. CIRCUITS PROPHET V
SEQ. CIRCUITS PRO-ONE
LINN LM-1 & LINNDRUM
ROLAND TR-808 & TR-606
MOVEMENT DRUM COMPUTER (a fairly obscure British machine used by the Thompson Twins amongst others; we used it because we were sick of the Linn sounds and there wasn't yet much else available)

..and of course a trusty FENDER RHODES (not synth obv. but, until the advent of the DX7, vital for pad chords in soul/jazz/funk/disco).

1984 onwards I also used:

YAMAHA DX7 (became the staple keyboard of course)
FAIRLIGHT (on hire, with operator, on one occasion)
EMULATOR II
YAMAHA RX-11 (horrible machine)
DRUMULATOR
SEQ. CIRCUITS DRUMTRAKS (I quite liked this one)
AKAI S-612 (their first sampler, I think)

i've got one of these, i got it for £25 from a car boot sale!
the kick drum sound is amazing....

That's great that 'I, Assassin' is your favorite. Amateur Numan listeners tend to overlook it.

Are you a fan of the fretless bass then? It's the instrument I play and I think it makes the best sound ever. I can't imagine how the album (or 'Warriors') would sound without it.

In terms of drum machines I recently bought off ebay a Jomox xbase drum synth, fully analogue. They sell for 900 USd new but can be had for half of that used. It's a great sound (not worth 900 bucks tho).

I have a thing called Syndrums that's basically two trigger pads connected to a waveform generator. It's great for loopy downward spiralling percussion sounds, or siren noises. I saw it in an old Chaka Khan video.

That gives me an idea. I would like to put my 303 through a talkbox.

But back to Gary. 'I Assassin' is probably his best album - he nominates it as one of his favourites - and (I've said this before) is just too, too dark and funky, especially 'White Boys' and 'This Is My House' - just the whole thing. Of course, the crazy edge this album owes a lot to Pino Palladino and the other musicians - not to mention copious quantities of speed a steady diet of hamburgers and chips, and an unhealthy interest in firearms. An acquaintance who helped recorfd this album said the session ended abruptly when Britain's most famous stunt pilot let off a few rounds in the studio - but that's such an apocrphal story isn't it...

I have heard it said, too, that 'I Assassin' is one of Prince's favourite albums. But I cannot track down the source of that fascinating little tidbit.

It's out on CD now with bonus tracks but I haven't bought it - damn it, I just want to move with the times, not revel in past glories.

Mainly the ARP Odyssey, with a Roland CR-78 for percussion.

Gary Numan - Minimoog, Polymoog mostly, but some ARP Oddyssey

Simple Minds - Jupiter 8, Oberheim OBX

Check out photos of Depeche Mode and New Order at http:///newwavephotos.com

The Alesis "Ion" looks really interesting, and the word of mouth on it is very good but I haven't tried one yet.

You really can't beat Karn and Percy Jones. And I was disappointed with the direction Pino went it (all that really commercial stuff, though he had some great Paul Young tracks...and it was interesting to see him show up on D'angelo's 'Voodoo' album).

It wouldn't surprise me if that was one of Prince's favorite albums. That's cool to hear. I suppose it's not too far off from 'Dirty Mind'.

Are you sure Numan did speed? I always hear about him doing coke and stuff, but in his autobiography he said he never did drugs, if I recall correctly. Maybe people are confusing him with Sylvian? :)

Colin, you have to get the reissue of 'I, Assassin' because it has a bunch of bonus tracks that are actually really good! One ("Nameless and Forgotten") has never seen the light of day until now. And, though he's not credited, Karn plays on the early version of "We Take Mystery to Bed," which is a totally different song.

There's some great fretless playing scattered about 'Berserker' and 'The Fury' as well. It's really too bad that Numan pretty much lost it all after that.

Do you own all of his albums? I admit that I don't own 'Machine and Soul' because 'Outland' was total garbage. Not a fan of his nu-goth that he puts out now either. I wonder when the new album comes out. I'd be interested in hearing it anyway. He's got to get rid of those loud guitars though.

He has a new album out in January called 'More Better Different.' I can't wait to hear it.

Wasn't this the super obscure (maybe not to you, but I THINK there were less than 1,000 of these made) drum machine that Dave Stewart from the Eurhythmics used in the Sweet Dreams video? You had some super tasty stuff back in the day.

Also, Yamaha FM synthesis kicks a Chinese mule's ass. Don't trash talk the DX series, those synths are absolutely fabulous. If you can program your own patches you can pull out a lot of interesting sounds from those boards. They get a bad rep because every last session asshole from LA used either the presets from either the DX7 or the Roland D50 for all those bad "keyboard" sounds on pop singles during the mid to late 80's.

considering Whitehouse's main synth was a Wasp, this doesn't surprise me

This is the Movement. Looks like something out of Dr. Who, doesn't it.

Naming patterns and patches I guess. I don't remember it that well..it was 1983! I think the engineer had used it before so he handled that side of it. I know I programmed the beats but I don't remember how (ie whether it was step time or real time - those look like pad buttons on the right).

the Ion gets a lot of great reviews, yadda yadda yadda...
i have logged time on a roland xp-10, sci prophet 600, roland juno 106, and a nord lead 2 (when i audited a class on subtractive synthesis) and i have to say that sitting down with the ION felt more "right" to me than any of those other synths. the way the knobs are laid out, the way the screen responds immediately to knob twists, i felt really comfortable, and i felt that i could transfer my ideas to sound really quickly. another thing i appreciated is that it seemed to be less of a nostalgia device than other V/A synths. they really take advangtage of their DSP power by adding a mod matrix and other nifty little things like flexible wave-shaping tools, instead of just trying to make the synth feel more like an older one. when was the last time when you got to choose whether your attack section was inverse or obverse? did that synth cost $650 new? lastly, the menus work "horizontally" and are only one level deep. its probably not perfect for everyone, but i would really go so far as to say that it would be irresponsible to buy another synth before checking it out. and its silver with red glowing lights! hott.

and do either of you two have anything by Nash the Slash?

I think if we're going to be salvaging some dignity for the early digital synths, then we might also want to mention Yamaha's DX100, bassline hero of many an early Detroit record.

While recording the "Meat-Edge" album with Factor 8 back in 96 or 97 in Angelo Morelli's Pittsburgh basement (AKA SoundWorx Studios), we used his minimoog (that he picked up at a garage sale in the early 90s for like $25) for the synth/vacuum cleaner sound on our cover of "Mongoloid" by Devo.

For the original recording of "Boogie Down With JackolanTron" we (Josta Baby) used Mike's uncle's weird old 80s Casio Synth Guitar (with strings and wired fretboard, not a keyboard on a shoulder strap) for the lead line.

Frank (AKA Dr. Rock) could play this old red Yamaha guitar-style keyboard (a keyboard on a shoulder strab with the left-hand horn that had a pitch-bend grip thingy) in a very interesting way. He'd use almost dead batteries and manipulate in in ways never thought possible.

The Synths I own are Korg MS2000, a modern (digital) take on old analog synths w/ a vocoder, a Yamaha PSR-225GM ($130, basically something a parent would bay a kid who wanted piano lessons, but it's MIDI capable and if you run it through a guitar amp modeler (w/FX) and an EQ stompbox it sounds okay). My Vintage keyboard collection consists of 3 Casios, all with wee-little minikeys:

A Realistic Concertmate 450
A Rapman
An SK-1

The SK-1 is the coolest, you can hit record and belch into it and then play chopsticks with belches. But they're all basically toys. A cool thing to do is take a Korg Electribe ES-1 and sample the drum noises from those old casio cheapo toy keyboards for a cool dinky ping-pong drum track.

BTW, I am a guitar/bass play by trade. I'm just now getting into the keyboard thing.

here's a question: when did it become popular to use sequencers?

...although i suppose Curve counts neither as "synthpop" nor particularly '80s...

I presume you want it for live use. Can't think why you'd want it otherwise because it's a horrible machine (and that's based on using it at the time ie late '80s). Nasty rubber buttons that don't work consistently, horrible display, no disc drive. It was a poor man's
MC-500 (now there was a nice machine).