Who mothered Brian Eno? The earliest electronic pop music I could find.
From Dr. Who to underground psychedelia, here are some of the earliest pioneers of electronic pop music.
Fantasy in Orbit (1963) by Tom Dissivelt.
How can a song be decades ahead of its time in terms of style and technology yet still be a perfect time capsule representative of its era?
During the 1950s and 60s, electronic music ranged from largely inaccessible, avant-garde academic symphonies to Moogsploitation pop rock created by artists who never unlocked the full power of synths. However, there were a few exceptions: the visionary proto-synthpop artists who mothered Kraftwerk and Brian Eno and made some fantastic little bops in their respective niches. These ranged from playful covers of children’s songs, Bach, and Simon & Garfunkel to highly innovative original compositions. While “ahead of its time” is a tired label to throw on a song or artist, sometimes it is warranted. What happens when you come across a 1958 single that sounds like Nintendo video game music? Or a bubbly, proto-EDM track from 1969 that was recently interpolated by Tove Lo? However, despite the fact that we wouldn’t hear sounds like this for decades to come, they are unmistakably retro. I’d like to introduce you to some of these electropop pioneers.
The 1950s: Our Dutch Grandmothers
The earliest electronic songs that I could describe as traditionally “poppy” are the singles “Syncopation” and “Whirling” by Dutch composers Tom Dissevelt and Kid Baltan. The songs are shockingly complex for being the “firsts”—there are waves of synths, unique layers, clear melodies, and an extremely upbeat tempo that never lets up. “Whirling” nearly feels like the score to an episode of Tom and Jerry or The Twilight Zone! The duo produced many electronic albums over the following decade, most notably 1962’s The Electrosoniks: Electronic Music, which David Bowie placed in a list of his 25 favorite albums in 2003.
Delia Derbyshire and Dr. Who
In 1964, Delia Derbyshire composed the groundbreaking new theme song for Dr. Who at the BBC Radiophonic workshop. This was probably the most mainstream electronic song of the era and exposed millions of nerds across the world to samples, loops, and weird spacey synths. In this video, she shows her process for composing the theme. She sampled unconventional instruments, chopped up the recordings, and played with tempo to pitch them either up or down. Did I mention she did all of this purely analog, on tape? Her process nearly resembles a live DJ set in a club, as she uses simple repetitive components layered together to create a more complex song. MOTHER.
The Mid-1960s with Jean-Jacques Perrey and Gershon Kingsley
While French Jean-Jacques Perrey was creating transcendent, droning electronic music as early as 1958, his early electronic pop collaborations with Jewish German-American composer Gershon Kingsley are going to be the focus of this section. Both composers were cutting-edge users of early synthesizers, with Perrey specializing in the Ondioline and Kingsley making extensive use of the infamous Moog Synthesizer. They collaborated on many albums throughout the 1960s and 70s, including 1966’s The In Sound from Way Out! which included upbeat electronic reimaginings of classic pop and country melodies. The album has a very distinct, retro 60’s sound that sounds like a spacey take on nursery rhymes. However, their music is distinguished by the very wacky looped instrumentals that use sci-fi inspired synths and other unconventional sounds. The real weirdness comes in when Kingsley and Perrey cut the whimsical melodies and allow the unique beats to play on their own.
However, most of Kinglsey and Perrey’s innovative contributions to music came from their solo work, such as Perrey’s 1968 album The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound of Jean-Jacques Perrey. A mouthful, yes. This album, like his earlier collaborations, combines kitschy synth melodies with unorthodox beats, but on this album, the melodies draw from a broader range of influences, and the energy is amped up even more. These songs are so fast-paced. Imagine barnyard tunes meets Star Trek bossa nova on coke. Have I sold you?
Finally, I want to spotlight Gershon Kingsley’s 1969 album Music to Moog To. Aside from great tracks like “For Alisse Beethoven,” an arpeggiated, detailed Moog take on Fur Elise, the album features the cult hit song “Popcorn,” which was recently interpolated by Tove Lo in her 2022 song “2 Die 4.” This speaks to the song’s timelessness and is a standout track in Kingsley’s discography. It ditches old-timey, avant-garde synths for fresh dance-pop goodness.
One more fun fact about the duo: Their most famous song, 1967’s “Baroque Hoedown,” was used in Disneyland’s Electrical Parade from 1972-1996…without the knowledge or permission of either artist.
The Big Silver Apples
Simeon Coxe and Danny Taylor were a New York based duo who created electronic music with a more abstract, psychedelic twist. The two were previously members of a different band, the Overland Stage Electric Band, but quit when other members were not into Coxe’s oscillators and synth-focus. Instead, the duo built their own rickety, makeshift synthesizer and recorded music on their own. Tracks like “Program” on their self-titled debut employ sampled loops of grainy radio jingles and fuzzy voiceovers. The streams of consciousness that comprise their bizarre lyrics are partnered with steady, club-like electronic beats that do not let up. The vocal delivery is unusually chanty and might be a turnoff, but stick around for the proto-EDM vibes. Deeper album cuts like “Dust” and “Dancing Gods” use cymbals and gongs to create a slower, ceremonial feel.
Their music is practically the polar opposite of the earlier artists I’ve mentioned. If the others were the 1964 Beach Boys or Beatles of electronic pop, Silver Apples is the Velvet Underground: grimier, darker, and druggier. The Silver Apples’ music feels embedded in 1960s youth counterculture and the psychedelic music movement.
Silver Apples actually collaborated with Jimi Hendrix to create a heavy and noisy rendition of the Star Spangled Banner in 1968. I highly recommend it. At their peak, the band actually performed to a crowd of over 30,000 in Central Park! Unfortunately, the band’s success was cut short due to legal issues regarding a failed collaboration with Pan Am airlines. The band influenced renowned artists including Portishead, Stereolab, Spiritualized, and John Lennon.
Wendy Carlos, Rachel Elkind, and Johann Sebastian Bach
After graduating from Brown University with degrees in physics and music in 1962, composer Wendy Carlos moved to New York City to pursue a master’s in music composition from Columbia. Both of these degrees helped her immensely during her career in the 60s, as she worked as a sound engineer and consulted Robert Moog himself on his invention from both technical and musical standpoints. She suggested, for example, adding elements such as a touch-sensitive keyboard to the synthesizer. Without her help, the Moog might not have caught on and become as impactful as it was.
In 1967, Carlos met Rachel Elkind, and they eventually started a business partnership and even moved in together. In 1968, the duo meticulously recorded their magnum opus, Switched on Bach, electronic renditions of Bach’s pieces. Why Bach, you might ask? While Carlos wanted to release an original album, Elkind recommended covering a widely known and respected classical piece to ease mainstream audiences into the sound of electronic music. The patience, energy, and attention to detail needed to produce this work was insane. In this interview, Wendy explained her process, forming one sound, one note at a time and then connecting them.
While the album is classical, I’d call it pop in the sense that it achieved great commercial success. It reached #10 on the Billboard 200, won three Grammys, and was certified platinum in 1986. It was #1 on the Billboard Classical Albums Chart for three years straight. The album had immense critical success as well. It was widely praised for its innovation, composition, and easy listening experience for general audiences. It’s considered to be the album that acquainted the mainstream with the Moog synthesizer. For the record: Switched on Bach is currently not available on streaming or YouTube, so any versions you might see are just stragglers capitalizing off of the title. However, the vinyl is both widely available and very affordable, so give it a shot if you’re interested.
Carlos went on to be an acclaimed film composer. She composed the scores for Stanley Kubrick’s films The Shining and A Clockwork Orange, in addition to the soundtrack for the original Tron movie.
Tonto’s Expanding Head Band
The final band I’m mentioning today is the British-American duo of Malcom Cecile and Robert Margouleff. They created the TONTO, short for The Original New Timbral Orchestra, out of Margouleff’s Moog synthesizer, and over the course of several years added more and more elements to the machine until it was literally the largest synthesizer in the world. They named their band after the invention.
Their 1971 debut album No Time is insane. It’s more ambient and flowy than everything I’ve mentioned prior. The notes are held for longer than, say, a Perrey & Kingsley song, but TONTO retains that same space-age, Star Trek feel of the early 60s albums. Songs like “Jetsex” feel more cinematic, painting a picture and providing an atmosphere. Really, it reminds you more of science fiction film sound effects than a traditional song. “Timewise” is more fast paced, but the notes feel fuller and more layered, not like sharp string plucks.
This album was a massive influence on Stevie Wonder, who, upon hearing the album, tracked down Tonto in New York City and asked them to collaborate. Wonder said: “The reason that I got involved with the synthesizer was because I had ideas in my head and I wanted those ideas to be heard, and I could have Bob and Malcolm and various programmers that I worked with kinda create [the sound that I wanted to hear].” The duo became producers and sound engineers on all of Wonder’s Classic-era albums, which are widely considered to be some of the greatest albums ever recorded.
Mr. (And Mrs.) Worldwide
There are a few more things I’d like to touch on. First of all, the people on this list came from a variety of countries and backgrounds. I emphasize this to illustrate that, while there was a concentration of budding electronic musicians in New York City, this wasn’t a regional movement: artists all over the world were experimenting with this bleeding edge technology. Additionally, some of the most innovative electronic music of the 1970s came out of Japan and Germany from artists like Kraftwerk, Popol Vuh, Isao Tomita, and Yellow Magic Orchestra. Not to mention the man who this article is named after, the English Brian Eno, whose solo work and collaborations with David Bowie led to some of the greatest albums ever made. Electronic music is a global phenomenon.
It’s hard to comprehend just how ahead of their time these 1960s musicians were. This is partly because we are already over fifty years removed from the scene, but also because the music itself often sounds like it only ever could have been released in the 50s or 60s. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course: 60s music rocks! That said, music can be dated and breathtaking at the same time. Show these artists some streaming love and get ready to listen to weird, fun, high energy music.
Below is a companion playlist featuring songs mentioned throughout this article. Any songs not on Spotify are hyperlinked where discussed above, aside from Switched On Bach, which you probably have to buy on vinyl to hear.
edited by Kristen Wallace.
album artwork believed to belong to either the publisher of the work or the artist.