New Wendy Carlos biography

[mburgh]

Wendy Carlos and Mike Oldfield both experienced the worst thing that can happen to an artist: instant world-wide fame. No one who hasn't gone through this can understand how traumatic this experience can be to a sensitive person. Oldfield has mental issues and Carlos has gender identity issues. Both essentially withdrew after the massive success of their work. Those of you who discount Wendy Carlos's work don't realize that this forum would not exist without her and that any synthesizers would be locked into academic avant-garde composers instead of available everywhere from tiny Korgs, to Massive Moogs and everything in between. Wendy Carlos wants to be left alone after that brutal experience of Switched-On Bach devastating her privacy, her choices, her life. She wants to disappear, and that's her right. Personally, I have loved all her music, especially her early work. If you haven't listened to Sonic Seasonings, I suggest you find it and listen. Her work lives on in the great films of Stanley Kubrick too. My question to all of you is this: what have you done that even comes close to the world of synthesizers that Wendy Carlos opened?

[doombient.music]

I found myself listening to S-OB the other night (the Sony Gold Master CD, in that oblong box), and even though I find some of the performances a bit bland, and some of the timbres used a bit meh!, the final movement of Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 is still giving me shivers running up and down my spine.

I can very well relate to Bob Moog's report, that "people were jumping out of their skins" when they were listening to this for the first time.

The all-electronic score to A Clockwork Orange will always have a very warm place in my heart, too.

Stephen

[SynthBaron]

Wendy Carlos and Mike Oldfield both experienced the worst thing that can happen to an artist: instant world-wide fame. No one who hasn't gone through this can understand how traumatic this experience can be to a sensitive person.

Not a lot of people know that she was actively trying to break into the meat grinder of the music industry with synth stuff before S-OB. Her main job at the time was being a recording engineer, so she had inside knowledge of what that business entails. There's a handful of recorded copyright entries for original Carlos pop songs we'll probably never hear, and we know she was actively trying to market synth covers of pop songs to record companies back in 1967 with What's New Pussycat and Cherish. One of her original pop songs actually gets released, but never goes anywhere:



And then she agrees to do the Bach album, after nobody really gets the synth pop stuff, because she's eventually convinced that it will be the most commercially successful. I think it's a little ridiculous to say she was too fragile for fame because she got exactly what she had been trying so hard to do at the time.

[Licudi]

Those of you who discount Wendy Carlos's work don't realize that this forum would not exist without her and that any synthesizers would be locked into academic avant-garde composers instead of available everywhere from tiny Korgs, to Massive Moogs and everything in between.

Carlos’ importance is greatly overstated and all of the above is opinion not fact.

[doombient.music]

[...] I think it's a little ridiculous to say she was too fragile for fame because she got exactly what she had been trying so hard to do at the time.

Always question what you're longing for -- you might get it eventually.

Wonderful example of psychedelia btw, thanks for the heads-up -- I wasn't aware of this little gem!

Stephen

[Fog Door]

Carlos’ importance is greatly overstated and all of the above is opinion not fact

As is your contention that her importance is overstated!

[Licudi]

Carlos’ importance is greatly overstated and all of the above is opinion not fact

As is your contention that her importance is overstated!

True.

[Rob_C]

We should rock a Wendy Carlos/Vince Clarke listening session!

Coming soon!

In this pre-Covid photo, Wendy Carlos and Vince Clarke (collaboratively known as Wenzoo) mix down their Hamilton-like crossover project Bach Street Boys.

[3hands]

We should rock a Wendy Carlos/Vince Clarke listening session!

Coming soon!

In this pre-Covid photo, Wendy Carlos and Vince Clarke (collaboratively known as Wenzoo) mix down their Hamilton-like crossover project Bach Street Boys.


Wenzoo.jpg

Finally!!!

Haha! That’s pure gold!!

[Fog Door]

Funny, but no doubt you will be hearing from Wendy's lawyers very soon

[doombient.music]

Wendy Carlos and Mike Oldfield both experienced the worst thing that can happen to an artist: instant world-wide fame. No one who hasn't gone through this can understand how traumatic this experience can be to a sensitive person.

Not a lot of people know that she was actively trying to break into the meat grinder of the music industry with synth stuff before S-OB. Her main job at the time was being a recording engineer, so she had inside knowledge of what that business entails. There's a handful of recorded copyright entries for original Carlos pop songs we'll probably never hear, and we know she was actively trying to market synth covers of pop songs to record companies back in 1967 with What's New Pussycat and Cherish. One of her original pop songs actually gets released, but never goes anywhere:



And then she agrees to do the Bach album, after nobody really gets the synth pop stuff, because she's eventually convinced that it will be the most commercially successful. I think it's a little ridiculous to say she was too fragile for fame because she got exactly what she had been trying so hard to do at the time.

Having listened to this several times, I now know what it reminds me of: I'm sure The Dukes Of Stratosphear knew this one when recording 25 O' Clock.

Stephen

[SynthBaron]

Wendy Carlos and Mike Oldfield both experienced the worst thing that can happen to an artist: instant world-wide fame. No one who hasn't gone through this can understand how traumatic this experience can be to a sensitive person.

Not a lot of people know that she was actively trying to break into the meat grinder of the music industry with synth stuff before S-OB. Her main job at the time was being a recording engineer, so she had inside knowledge of what that business entails. There's a handful of recorded copyright entries for original Carlos pop songs we'll probably never hear, and we know she was actively trying to market synth covers of pop songs to record companies back in 1967 with What's New Pussycat and Cherish. One of her original pop songs actually gets released, but never goes anywhere:



And then she agrees to do the Bach album, after nobody really gets the synth pop stuff, because she's eventually convinced that it will be the most commercially successful. I think it's a little ridiculous to say she was too fragile for fame because she got exactly what she had been trying so hard to do at the time.

Having listened to this several times, I now know what it reminds me of: I'm sure The Dukes Of Stratosphear knew this one when recording 25 O' Clock.

Stephen

Wow, you're not joking. Both sides of this 45 would fit in just fine on that album.

[SynthBaron]

I finally finished reading it this morning.

My biggest takeaway from it as a whole is probably that it's a cautionary tale about getting caught up in obsessing too much over the details. Like spending thousand of hours getting lost in "too much" parameter control on digital synths, restoring her back catalog with too heavy a hand, the sound quality of digital music distribution, and how people talk about her life.

Her most appreciated body of work is probably always going to be when she was limited artistically by the use of 7 tracks on an 8 track tape recorder and a capricious Moog Modular.

[SynthBaron]

Who knows how long this will stay up before it's pulled, but:

[subbasshead]

Wendy Carlos and Mike Oldfield both experienced the worst thing that can happen to an artist: instant world-wide fame. No one who hasn't gone through this can understand how traumatic this experience can be to a sensitive person.

Well said.
I thought 'public' issues for famous people was just par for the course, but I never imagined that included serious death threats, rape threats etc, until I read this post by (author/blogger/podcaster) Tim Ferris - skip to the section near the end: ON THE DARKER SIDE, SOME VERY REAL ISSUES

https://tim.blog/2020/02/02/reasons-to- ... me-famous/