I’m quite shocked that I’ve never discovered this before. But I’m glad that I have anyway. What I am talking about is the mysterious and warped works of two men who worked in the Dutch section of the Philips research department. Or as they call it in Dutch, the Philips Natuurkundig Laboratorium.

What does this have to do with music? It begins with two men who worked there. Dick Raaijmakers (also known as Kid Baltan) and Tom Dissevelt. They were working on some of the earliest iterations of synthesisers, resulting in some incredible work. Here is a video of the two talking about their work on Dutch public television in 1959.

Here is some of their early work, found on the LP “Songs of the Second Moon”. There is a lot of confusion about the naming of the work. What happened was that after many songs were produced, they had names like “Drifting” or “Vibration” and found on 7” vinyl EPs in 1962 under the title Electronic Movements, produced and published by Philips themselves. Eventuall the songs were then collected and renamed and put into one LP called, you guessed it, Songs of the Second Moon.

Here is the song Vibration, but also known as The Visitor from Inner Space on the LP.

What I love about the song is the feeling of space, just from the start. The song is so strange - so out of this world.This is how electronic music tried to represent itself, back when the only people with synthesisers were the people who were developing them.

The songs also feel improvised, like the two didn’t know how they would go about making music. Which isn’t hard to do when the genre in question has been around for less than a decade at least. It also has a bit of jazz influences, as shown in this next song. You can really notice it early on in the song.

Another song with a more pronounced jazz influence is this next one, “Twilight Ozone”:

Unfortunately, the research lab could only go so far when it came to accomodating musicians. Raaijmakers went on to co-found STEIM, a sort of R&D for electronic music. Sort of like how I imagine a 1960s Dutch Broken Social Scene. The two men are not without recognised accomplishments. They both worked with orchestras and Raaijmakers taught electronic music at a conservatory. They helped to start a growing trend in Dutch music, with their influential and highly forward-thinking music, even if Philips did not see it that way. Their music to me sounds futuristic, even today, when electronic music is so much bigger, so much broader and so much deeper in the kinds of music it represents.

I end this blog post with a final song, the title track of the LP “Songs of the Second Moon”. Notice the very Eastern European feel of the music. It almost sounds like something you’d hear on Soviet television. Easily my favourite song off the LP.

dangerousbagpipes:

Going to this convention on Saturday called D-Con.

I don’t know why, since I’m kinda over anime and games.

It’s free and I’m bored.

D-CON? LIKE DEACON? LIKE DEACON BLUE?

If I lost my iPod I would probably kill myself or something. It is the only thing that keeps me sane right now. It’s a bit sad, I know, but such is my attachment to things that I should spend less time on - namely, music. I’m not going through all my music, but the ones that’s on heavy rotation right now.

I have Julia Holter (Julia Holter) on my iPod who I’ve been saying is awesome for ages. Also, Julia Holter. This is off her latest album, Ekstasis, which I love.

It’s just such a beautiful album, that’s so dreamy and so calm. It’s how I imagine what happy people must feel like all the time.

Also I have the debut album of Boy, which is my usual indie-pop female vocalist duo from Europe that I listen to a lot. Very Feist-esque in my view, and I really, really like Feist.

I liked Austra, and the other person in Austra who isn’t the main person (I don’t fucking care) has a side project called Trust. The album TRST is just pure electronic music. If Austra is the calm and ambient music, then Trust is like taking manhole covers and smashing them together.

I like Swedish indie rock, especially when they sing in English. So I like Deportees (Islands & Shores). Here’s my favourite track off the album which I am listening to obsessively. The riff will stick in your mind for ever.

Okay, this song isn’t on my iPod since the album isn’t out yet (I’m really anal when it comes to putting only albums on my iPod, not singles or whatever). But Regina Spektor’s new album is going to be brilliant, since this song is in it.

dangerousbagpipes:

Why did I not watch more Parks & Rec sooner? It just keeps getting funnier and more awesome.

I KNOW THAT.

tnaf:

This ‘artist’ has never once thanked, acknowledged or even asked our permission to use Young Blood. He states: “I wrote this song…” - http://bit.ly/HbGa87

He looks like a douchebag as well. I miss old rap now. :(

dangerousbagpipes:

One of my online friends is determined to get me down to London for the Expo.

You know, I’m pretty tempted. Not sure what I’d say to my parents though. It’s not like anyone else I know would be interested in going to Comicon (ew video games and comics). So I couldn’t use that excuse.

I wonder…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=ZtBDlNEME48#t=32s

THIS PERSON DOESN’T KNOW HOW TUMBLR TAGS WORK