We are all just pygmies living in His shadow....

[Marketblandings]

In case you've never heard this. Here is where William Orbit was in 1983. I can't even imagine how this was possible with 1983 synth technology!

http://youtu.be/mo563FKZMeg

[Gaja]

Well it's a nice song, but to my ears (I wasn't even born at the time) this sounds really 80's.
Yeah there are certain really creative elements in there, and the song sounds quite progressive and experimental for the time.
However all I hear are squares and saws and some FM sounds. Oh and some choir samples. That was all well within reach at the time no?
Vocoders have been publicly demonstrated in 1939.
Maybe I'm hardcore off topic here and didn't understand what you meant at all... Sorry if that's the case.

[Benedict]

With all due respect it is a bit cute but if you want to hear this sort of thing then go to 1981 and get John Foxx's "Metamatic" as that is/was a really futuristic record and did define a lot of later Techno

ignore the silly dancing spiderperson

[Marketblandings]

uh-ohhhhh...... I'll just bow out now. But before I go listen to the Orbit thing and chart in your mind how many completely worked out entrances and exits there are. How many different synths (FM or not).
How the song has a plan and arc. Not just a few tracks punched in and out. Also, at the time, nothing else had achieved that granular stuff or the synthesized speech. Sequencers that could do more than a 16 note loop had only fired up about a week earlier. He was years ahead on all that.  There is months and months of work in there!

On edit: I re-read and realize that the sound might be what we are dis-agreeing on. I never meant the synth patches so much as the leaps ahead he took with sequencing and structure. I feel like Electronica rarely approaches that level of composition even today. Still very much a punch in/punch out world.

[Purpleb]

Heard Foxx's stuff before love it!

Have not heard torch song before - love it too! Im going to have to check them out. I am a sucker for this kind of early 80s uptempo, experimental synth stuff.