Various - Early Modulations Vintage Volts

This was one of the first compilations I knew that highlighted the more academic side of electronic music. Released as a follow-up to the 'Modulations' soundtrack, 'Vintage Volts' spans three decades (1930s to 1960s) of early experimental electronic music.
Tape-based composition is one of the oldest forms to develop and is the best represented movement here through compositions produced by Schaeffer, Luening, Cage, and Ussachevesky from the late-30s through the Fifties. The more brief passages by Xenakis (Concert ph), and Mathews (Bicycle Built For Two) are more computer-based--a later phase in the history of the genre that started in the Fifties. They are very short in length but just as compelling; particularly Mathews' piece which features the use of a speech synthesizer (c.1961) almost fifteen years before such techniques became known through artists like Kraftwerk.
The full version of Subotnick's 'Silver Apples' from 1967 rounds out the disc (and was the main reason why I bought this cd). It's an amazing 12+ minute journey into dark and mysterious soundscapes that predates the likes of Klaus Schultze and Tangerine Dream by almost a decade.
Altogether, 'Vintage Volts' is a modest peek into the past but a beneficial release. The small selection of nine tracks is hardly enough to represent 30 years of innovative music but it's only meant as an introduction. I wouldn't consider someone to be a true fan of electronic music without a disc like this. All of these tracks were almost impossible to find before the arrival of this compilation and sometimes you need to take a step back and ask where and how all this stuff came to be...and where it's all going. A great find.