Precursors , one of the major influences on synth-pop, in 1976 Electronic musical synthesizers that could be used practically in a recording studio became available in the mid-1960s, around the same time as rock music began to emerge as a distinct musical genre. The
Mellotron, an
electro-mechanical,
polyphonic sample-playback keyboard was overtaken by the
Moog synthesizer, created by
Robert Moog in 1964, which produced completely electronically generated sounds. The portable
Minimoog, which allowed much easier use, particularly in live performance was widely adopted by
progressive rock musicians such as
Richard Wright of
Pink Floyd and
Rick Wakeman of
Yes. Instrumental prog rock was particularly significant in continental Europe, allowing bands like
Kraftwerk,
Tangerine Dream,
Can and
Faust to circumvent the language barrier. Their synthesizer-heavy "
Kraut rock", along with the work of
Brian Eno (for a time the keyboard player with
Roxy Music), would be a major influence on subsequent synth rock. In 1971, the British film
A Clockwork Orange was released with a synth soundtrack by American
Wendy Carlos. It was the first time many in the United Kingdom had heard
electronic music. Electronic music made occasional moves into the mainstream, with jazz musician
Stan Free, under the pseudonym
Hot Butter, having a top 10 hit in the United States and United Kingdom in 1972, with a cover of the 1969
Gershon Kingsley song "
Popcorn" using a Moog synthesizer, which is recognised as a forerunner to synth-pop and
disco. in 2008 The mid-1970s saw the rise of
electronic art musicians such as
Jean Michel Jarre,
Vangelis, and
Tomita. Tomita's album
Electric Samurai: Switched on Rock (1972) featured electronic renditions of contemporary
rock and
pop songs, while utilizing
speech synthesis and analog
music sequencers. In 1975, Kraftwerk played their first British show and inspired concert attendees
Andy McCluskey and
Paul Humphreys – who would later found
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD) – to 'throw away their guitars' and become a synth act. The
Cat Stevens album
Izitso, released in April 1977, updated his
pop rock style with the extensive use of synthesizers, giving it a more synth-pop style; "Was Dog a Doughnut" in particular was an early techno-pop fusion track, which made early use of a
music sequencer.
Izitso reached No. 7 on the
Billboard 200 chart, while the song "(Remember the Days of the) Old Schoolyard" was a top 40 hit. and with arrangements somewhat inspired by Wendy Carlos's
Switched-On Bach (1968). Although it was highly praised by some critics and musicians (including
Patti Smith and
Lester Bangs), the album met with poor commercial reception. The album has been considered revolutionary in its use of synthesizers, and an early example of synth-pop.
Origins: New wave and post-punk (1977–1980) performing in 1980 Early guitar-based
punk rock that came to prominence in the period 1976–77 was initially hostile to the "inauthentic" sound of the synthesizer, The
do it yourself attitude of punk broke down the progressive rock era's norm of needing years of experience before getting up on stage to play synthesizers. Around this time,
Ultravox member
Warren Cann purchased a
Roland TR-77 drum machine, which was first featured in their October 1977 single release "
Hiroshima Mon Amour".
Be-Bop Deluxe released
Drastic Plastic in February 1978, leading off with the single "Electrical Language" with
Bill Nelson on guitar synthesizer and
Andy Clark on synthesizers. Japanese band
Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO) with their
self-titled album (1978) and
Solid State Survivor (1979), developed a "fun-loving and breezy" sound, with a strong emphasis on
melody. and the band would be a major influence on early British synth-pop acts. 1978 also saw the release of UK band
the Human League's debut single "
Being Boiled" and
The Normal's "
Warm Leatherette", which both are regarded as seminal works in early synth-pop. Sheffield band
Cabaret Voltaire are also regarded as pioneers of the late 1970s that influenced the emerging synth-pop in Britain. In America, post-punk band
Devo began moving towards a more electronic sound. At this point synth-pop gained some critical attention, but made little impact on the commercial charts. British punk-influenced band
Tubeway Army, intended their debut album to be guitar driven. In late 1978,
Gary Numan, a member of the group, found a
minimoog left behind in the studio by another band, and started experimenting with it. This led to a change in the album's sound to electronic new wave. The discovery that synthesizers could be employed in a different manner from that used in progressive rock or disco, prompted Numan to go solo. Numan's main influence at the time was the
John Foxx-led new wave band
Ultravox who released the album
Systems of Romance in 1978. Foxx left Ultravox the following year and scored a synth-pop hit with the single "
Underpass" from his first solo album
Metamatic in early 1980. In 1979,
OMD released their debut single "
Electricity", which has been viewed as integral to the rise of synth-pop. This was followed by a series of key releases within the genre, including the 1980 hit singles "
Messages" and "
Enola Gay". OMD were Britain's first performing "synth duo", and one of the more influential acts of the period.
Vince Clarke, who co-founded the popular synth-pop groups
Depeche Mode,
Erasure,
Yazoo and
the Assembly, has cited OMD as his inspiration to become an electronic musician. Bandleaders
Andy McCluskey and
Paul Humphreys have been described as the "
Lennon–McCartney of synth-pop". Giorgio Moroder collaborated with the band
Sparks on their album
No. 1 In Heaven (1979). That same year in Japan, the synth-pop band
P-Model made its debut with the album
In a Model Room. Other Japanese synth-pop groups emerging around the same time included the
Plastics and
Hikashu. This zeitgeist of revolution in electronic music performance and recording/production was encapsulated by then would-be record producer
Trevor Horn of
the Buggles in the single "
Video Killed the Radio Star"; the song topped the UK charts in October 1979 and it also became an international hit; two years later it was the first song aired on MTV.
Geoff Downes, keyboardist for the Buggles, states, "When we did a rerecorded version for
Top of the Pops, the Musicians’ Union bloke said, "If I think you’re making strings sounds out of a synthesizer, I’m going to have you. Video Killed the Radio Star is putting musicians out of business." 1980 also saw the release of where "Video Killed the Radio Star" came from, the Buggles' debut album
The Age of Plastic, which some writers have labeled as the first landmark of another electropop era, as well as what for many is the defining album of Devo's career, the overtly synth-pop
Freedom of Choice.
Commercial success (1981–1985) performing with
Ultravox in
Oslo in 1981 The emergence of synth-pop has been described as "perhaps the single most significant event in
melodic music since
Mersey-beat". By the 1980s synthesizers had become much cheaper and easier to use. After the definition of
MIDI in 1982 and the development of
digital audio, the creation of purely electronic sounds and their manipulation became much simpler. Synthesizers came to dominate the pop music of the early 1980s, particularly through their adoption by bands of the
New Romantic movement. Despite synth-pop's origins in the late 1970s among
new wave bands like Tubeway Army and Devo, British journalists and music critics largely abandoned the term "new wave" in the early 1980s. This was in part due to the rise of new artists unaffiliated with the preceding punk/new wave era, as well as aesthetic changes associated with synth-pop's movement into the pop mainstream. According to authors Stuart Borthwick and Ron Moy, "After the monochrome blacks and greys of punk/new wave, synthpop was promoted by a youth media interested in people who wanted to be pop stars, such as
Boy George and
Adam Ant". They adopted an elaborate visual style that combined elements of
glam rock,
science fiction and
romanticism. Spandau Ballet were the first band of the movement to have a hit single as the synth-driven "
To Cut a Long Story Short" reached number 5 on the UK Singles Chart in December 1980. Visage's "
Fade to Grey", characteristic of synth-pop and a major influence on the genre, reached the top ten a few weeks later. Duran Duran have been credited with incorporating dance beats into synth-pop to produce a catchier and warmer sound, which provided them with a series of hit singles, They would soon be followed into the British charts by a large number of bands utilising synthesizers to create catchy three-minute pop songs. In summer 1981
Depeche Mode had their first chart success with "
New Life", followed by the UK top ten hit "
Just Can't Get Enough". A new line-up for
the Human League along with a new producer and a more commercial sound led to the album
Dare (1981), which produced a series of hit singles. These included "
Don't You Want Me", which reached number one in the UK at the end of 1981. Synth-pop reached its commercial peak in the UK in the winter of 1981–2, with bands such as
OMD,
Japan,
Ultravox,
Soft Cell, Depeche Mode,
Yazoo and even
Kraftwerk, enjoying top ten hits. The Human League's and Soft Cell's UK number one singles "Don't You Want Me" and "
Tainted Love" became the best selling singles in the UK in 1981. In early 1982 synthesizers were so dominant that the
Musicians' Union attempted to limit their use. By the end of 1982, these acts had been joined in the charts by synth-based singles from
Thomas Dolby,
Blancmange, and
Tears for Fears. Bands such as
Simple Minds also adopted synth-pop into their music on their 1982 album
New Gold Dream (81–82–83–84).
ABC and
Heaven 17 had commercial success mixing synth-pop with influences from
funk and
soul music. Dutch entertainer
Taco, who has a background in musical theatre, released his own synth-driven re-imagining of Irving Berlin's "
Puttin' On the Ritz"; resulting in a subsequent long-play,
After Eight, a concept album that takes music of 1930s sensibilities as informed by the soundscape of 1980s technology. The proliferation of acts led to an anti-synth backlash, with groups including Spandau Ballet, Human League, Soft Cell and ABC incorporating more conventional influences and instruments into their sounds. (
Dave Stewart and
Annie Lennox) on stage in Germany in 1987 In the US (unlike the UK), where synth-pop is sometimes considered a "subgenre" of "new wave" and was described as "technopop" or "electropop" by the press at the time, the genre became popular due to the cable music channel
MTV, which reached the media capitals of New York City and
Los Angeles in 1982. It made heavy use of style-conscious New Romantic synth-pop acts,
Bananarama's 1983 synth-pop song "
Cruel Summer" became an instant UK hit before having similar success in the US the following year. The success of synth-pop and other British acts would be seen as a
Second British Invasion. In his early 1980s columns for
The Village Voice, music critic
Robert Christgau frequently referred to British synth-pop as "Anglodisco", suggesting a parallel to the contemporary genres of
Eurodisco and
Italo disco, both highly popular outside the US. Indeed, synth-pop was taken up across the world alongside the continuing presence of
disco, with international hits for German synth-pop as well as Eurodisco acts including
Peter Schilling,
Sandra,
Modern Talking,
Propaganda, and
Alphaville. Other non-British groups scoring synth-pop hits were
Men Without Hats and
Trans-X from Canada,
Telex from Belgium,
Yello from Switzerland, and
Azul y Negro from Spain. Among a slew of European groups,
Berlin were a rare example of a successful American synth-pop band at this time, though their name nodded to their music's European influences: as with other bands in the genre their breakthrough was aided by heavy rotation on MTV and California new wave station
KROQ-FM. The synth-pop scene of Yugoslavia spawned a large number of acts, a number of them enjoying huge mainstream popularity in the country, like
Beograd,
Laki Pingvini,
Denis & Denis, and
Videosex. (pictured in 1984), frontman of British new wave synth-pop group the Buggles, also produced Frankie Goes to Hollywood's 1984 album
Welcome to the Pleasuredome. In the mid-1980s, key artists included solo performer
Howard Jones, who S.T. Erlewine has stated to have "merged the technology-intensive sound of new wave with the cheery optimism of hippies and late-'60s pop", (although with notable exceptions including the lyrics of "
What Is Love?" – "Does anybody love anybody anyway?") and
Nik Kershaw, whose "well-crafted synth-pop" incorporated guitars and other more traditional pop influences that particularly appealed to a teen audience. Pursuing a more dance-orientated sound were
Bronski Beat whose album
The Age of Consent (1984), dealing with issues of homophobia and alienation, reached the top 20 in the UK and top 40 in the US. and
Thompson Twins, whose popularity peaked in 1984 with the album
Into the Gap, which reached No.1 in the UK and the US top ten and spawned several top ten singles. In 1984,
Frankie Goes to Hollywood released their debut album
Welcome to the Pleasuredome (produced by
Trevor Horn of the Buggles), with their first three singles, "
Relax", "
Two Tribes" and "
The Power of Love", topping the UK chart. The music journalist
Paul Lester reflected, "no band has dominated a 12-month period like Frankie ruled 1984". In January 1985, Tears for Fears' single "
Shout", written by
Roland Orzabal in his "front room on just a small synthesizer and a drum machine", became their fourth top 5 UK hit; it would later top the charts in multiple countries including the US. Initially dismissed in the music press as a "teeny bop sensation" were Norwegian band
a-ha, whose use of guitars and real drums produced an accessible form of synth-pop, which, along with an MTV friendly video, took their 1985 single "
Take On Me" to number two in the UK and number one in the US.
Declining popularity (1986–2000) performing in 2006 Synth-pop continued into the late 1980s, with a format that moved closer to dance music, including the work of acts such as British duos
Pet Shop Boys,
Erasure and
the Communards. The Communards' major hits were covers of disco classics "
Don't Leave Me This Way" (1986) and "
Never Can Say Goodbye" (1987). After adding other elements to their sound, and with the help of a gay audience, several synth-pop acts had success on the US dance charts. Among these were American acts
Information Society (who had two top 10 singles in 1988),
Anything Box, and
Red Flag. British band
When in Rome scored a hit with their debut single "
The Promise". Several German synth-pop acts of the late 1980s included
Camouflage and
Celebrate the Nun. Canadian duo
Kon Kan had major success with their debut single, "
I Beg Your Pardon" in 1989. An American backlash against European synth-pop has been seen as beginning in the mid-1980s with the rise of
heartland rock and
roots rock. Synth-pop was also eclipsed at this time by
funk rock and
dance-rock, as exemplified by
INXS and
Prince's
Minneapolis sound. Duran Duran moved in this direction with their
Nile Rodgers-produced 1986 album
Notorious, which followed the 1985 release of
the debut album by
The Power Station, a funk-rock side project featuring continuing and soon-to-depart Duran Duran members
John and
Andy Taylor alongside
Robert Palmer and Rogers' ex-
Chic bandmates
Tony Thompson and
Bernard Edwards. In the UK the arrival of
indie rock bands, particularly
the Smiths, has been seen as marking the end of synth-driven pop and the beginning of the guitar-based music that would dominate rock into the 1990s. By 1991, in the United States synth-pop was losing its commercial viability as alternative radio stations were responding to the popularity of
grunge. Exceptions that continued to pursue forms of synth-pop or rock in the 1990s were
Savage Garden,
the Rentals and
the Moog Cookbook. Similarly, the
electroclash subgenre began in New York at the end of the 1990s, combining synth-pop, techno, punk and performance art. It was pioneered by
I-F with their track "Space Invaders Are Smoking Grass" (1998), and pursued by artists including
Felix da Housecat,
Peaches,
Chicks on Speed, and
Fischerspooner. It gained international attention at the beginning of the new millennium and spread to scenes in London and Berlin, but rapidly faded as a recognizable genre as acts began to experiment with a variety of forms of music. In the new millennium, renewed interest in electronic music and
nostalgia for the 1980s led to the beginnings of a synth-pop revival, with acts including
Adult and
Fischerspooner. Between 2003 and 2004, it began to move into the mainstream with
Ladytron, the
Postal Service,
Cut Copy,
the Bravery and
the Killers all producing records that incorporated vintage synthesizer sounds and styles that contrasted with the dominant genres of
post-grunge and
nu metal. In particular, the Killers enjoyed considerable airplay and exposure and their debut album
Hot Fuss (2004) reached the top ten of the
Billboard 200. The Killers, the Bravery and the Stills all left their synth-pop sound behind after their debut albums and began to explore classic 1970s rock, but the style was picked up by a large number of performers, particularly female solo artists. Following the breakthrough success of
Lady Gaga with her single "
Just Dance" (2008), the British and other media proclaimed a new era of female synth-pop stars, citing artists such as
Little Boots,
La Roux, and
Ladyhawke. Male acts that emerged in the same period include
Calvin Harris,
Empire of the Sun,
Frankmusik,
Hurts,
Ou Est Le Swimming Pool,
Kaskade,
LMFAO, and
Owl City, whose single "
Fireflies" (2009) topped the
Billboard Hot 100 chart. In 2009, an underground subgenre with direct stylistic origins to synth-pop became popular,
chillwave. Other 2010s synth-pop acts include
the Naked and Famous,
Chvrches,
M83, and
Shiny Toy Guns. American singer
Kesha has also been described as an electropop artist, with her electropop debut single "
Tik Tok" topping the
Billboard Hot 100 for nine weeks in 2010. She also used the genre on her comeback single "
Die Young". Mainstream female recording artists who have dabbled in the genre in the 2010s include
Madonna,
Taylor Swift,
Katy Perry,
Jessie J,
Christina Aguilera, and
Beyoncé. In Japan, girl group
Perfume, along with producer
Yasutaka Nakata of
Capsule, produced technopop music combining 1980s synth-pop with
chiptunes and
electro house from 2003. Their breakthrough came in 2008 with the album
Game, which led to a renewed interest in technopop within mainstream
Japanese pop music. Other Japanese female technopop artists soon followed, including
Aira Mitsuki,
immi,
Mizca,
SAWA,
Saori Rinne and
Sweet Vacation. with the album
Pamyu Pamyu Revolution in 2012, which topped electronic charts on
iTunes as well as the
Japanese Albums chart. Much like Japan,
Korean pop music has also become dominated by synth-pop, particularly with girl groups such as
f(x),
Girls' Generation and
Wonder Girls. In 2020, the genre experienced a resurgence in popularity as 1980s-style synth-pop and
synthwave songs from singers such as
the Weeknd who gained success on international music charts. "
Blinding Lights", a synthwave song by the Weeknd, peaked at number one in 29 countries, including the United States, in early 2020; and later became the
Billboard number-one greatest song of all time in November 2021. This wave of revival not only popularized established acts but also enabled new artists like
Dua Lipa, whose retro-influenced album
Future Nostalgia won multiple awards and was hailed for its energetic embrace of vintage pop sounds. Meanwhile, indie artists such as
M83 continued to explore the boundaries of the genre, blending it with shoegaze and ambient music to create a complex, layered sound in their album
Digital Shades Vol. 2. The genre's adaptability and nostalgic appeal have contributed to its enduring presence and continued evolution in the music industry. ==Criticism and controversy==