The synthesizer reared its ugly head initially with prog rock bands, but by the time New Wave hit in the early eighties, the instrument was nearly omnipresent. In fact, it's pretty damn hard to even find a song from this time period that does not feature the sythesizer keyboard. Eventually, the synthesizer even made its way into heavy metal, culminating in abominations like Europe's "Final Countdown".
Of course, it wasn't all bad. Like anything, it could be used for good (i.e. New Order and Depeche Mode) and evil (i.e. John Tesh and Eddie Murphy's "Party All the Time"). It certainly has it's place, but at some point you get sick of hearing Paul Hardcastle's synthetic "N-n-n-n-n-nineteen, nineteen" and want something real.
No place was harder hit by the dreaded synthesizer than movie soundtracks. One of the main culprits was Mr. Harold Faltemyer - the guy responsible for "Axel F" on the Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack. Faltemyer followed up this success with an electronic theme to Fletch. Officially, the theme song is called "Fletch's Theme", but has come be known as "Irwin F" (after the main character, Irwin M. Fletcher).
It's not a bad song - fairly enjoyable, really. But the "syntheticness" will have you quickly turning on some James Taylor and Jim Croce.
If this is your cup of tea, click HERE for the entire album. Enjoy!
It's not a bad song - fairly enjoyable, really. But the "syntheticness" will have you quickly turning on some James Taylor and Jim Croce.
If this is your cup of tea, click HERE for the entire album. Enjoy!
