Once again on Friday night last week, BBC Four were having a music theme and showing the excellent Synth Britnnia, and some performances of Synth bands from the archives. I love the 'something' britannia series of music documentaries and this is my favourite of the series. For two reasons, it covers an area of music that i'm fascinated with and, secondly, it beautifully sums up why i've always wanted to have synthesiser and try to make my own music.
The program serves as a brisk walk through the history of electronic music, from its role on the sidelines or as a tool to make atmospheric film music, through experimental synth pop on to its ubiquitous use as a tool to make formulaic pop. The development of newer and easier to use technology and the pressures of record companies seems to have left too short a period where interesting tuneful, catchy yet experimental synth music was being made.
Take the career of The Human League as an example. They made two excellent albums of experimental synth pop, before a lack of chart success and the ability to quickly make catchy pop songs using new technology lead them to abandon their experimental nature to make pop music that uses synths rather than synth music. Though Dare was excellent, they soon became just another pop band.
For me, there's always been a hunger to hear more like their experimental first two albums and there just doesn't seem to be enough of it around. Synths seem to have developed like computers, as they've become more sophisticated and easier to use, there seems to be less onus to work out how to use it to its full ability.
Therefore, i've always felt that the only way im going to hear the music i want to hear - i'm going to have to try and make it myself.
