This is from 1982, which maybe takes us into the digital area, and I have to wonder if some digital sampling (of a not-advanced type) is happening on some of these numbers. Two organs are played on this Lowrey Christmas promo--the Cotillion Model D-575 and The Lowrey Holiday Model D-350. It should be noted that Pete Townshend used a much earlier Lowery--a 1968 Berkshire Deluxe TBO-1--to create what sounded like a sequenced synthesizer on Baba O'Riley. A repeated-note feature was employed, as shown in this YouTube video. Electronic organs, which date back to just before 1900, are the obvious ancestors of synthesizers, but (in my tech-limited mind), I've always considered them the original synthesizers, since the things had to generate waveforms, right? By one means or another, they had to create artificial sounds. In fact, doesn't sound synthesis date all the way back to the telephone? Voices don't literally travel through wires, any more than music literally swells up out of record grooves.
Anyway, I'm old enough to remember when the sounds on this LP sounded stilted but not comical (that took a few decades). They sounded, well, modern. And you've got to admit that a number of the voices--including the notes produced by the "Solo, Orchestral and String Symphonizers" (to quote from the notes)--were likely sampled. "Symphonizing" is obviously an elaborate, if cheesy-sounding, manipulation of a waveform or waveforms, so if much of this sounds like a cheap synth of today, it's only because the same sounds can be accomplished more simply and within a far smaller space. Notes: "Choir introduces the unique sound of human-like voices singing in perfect harmony"--a sound which starts out the LP, and I could swear Lowrey sampled a vintage vocoder. To call the effect unconvincing is an act of kindness, but it's sure cool in a "Dear God, that probably sounded cutting edge in 1982" type of way. I remember being highly annoyed by electric organ rhythm effects back in the day, and, while I haven't grown to love them (in fact, they have me appreciating my Casio WK-3800's way better built-in beats), I've come to regard them as pricelessly hilarious. This album is like Christmas Day on the Love Boat.
The occasional cool voice is followed by ultra-cheesy ones, and rarely is the fake percussion remotely convincing, suggesting that sampling was a very new art in 1982. But the frequent juggling of voices adds a lot to these tracks--it makes for fun, often ill-advised mood changes mid-track. The players are all very skilled, of course, but, all these years later, they sound like they're messing around on modern stocking-stuffer make-your-own-music (Ages 3-10) toys. Exception: the basic, classic Lowrey organ voices, as heard, for example, on Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree. Just take away 80 percent of the special voices, and you have some superb-sounding organ--nowadays, a sound easily sampled and offered in a keyboard-only unit (with an little add-on box for registration effects).
Verdict: Some awesome(ly dreadful, in a fun way) vintage effects mixed with the classic Lowrey sound, all made hilarious by percussion on the level of the effects I used to create for my own homemade comedy tapes--such as, putting a mike inside a shoebox and rapping on the outside of it. I just can't believe that, at the age of 25, I would have found these tracks modern-sounding. But I did. Because nothing changes faster than modern. Even retro evolves. In the 1920s, everyone was making fun of the pop culture of 1870-1915, or thereabouts. Then it was hippies making fun of the 1950s. Then the 1970s were a hoot. Now, I guess we're at the 1980s. I've lost track.
Hey, an almost cool effect at the end of Auld Lang Syne: a synth-sax sound which quickly degenerates into that horrible synth effect used on TV police show themes of the 1980s. I think I heard some pitch swerve.
DOWNLOAD: Lowrey Brings Joy to the World (Lowrey 802219; 1982)
Lee
