Synthesizers are so ubiquitous in popular music that it’s hard to imagine a time when they weren’t around. The first commercial synthesizer did not exist until 1964, when Robert Moog (pronounced MOHG) invented the Moog synthesizer. It would be another three years until the instrument started to pop up on recordings.
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Its very first appearance came on Mort Garson’s The Zodiac Cosmic Sounds, which featured synth pioneer and early go-to Moog specialist Paul Beaver. Since then, various versions of the Moog synthesizer, including the Minimoog, have been used on countless records, from The Beatles’ Abbey Road to Blondie’s Parallel Lines to Portugal. The Man’s Censored Colors.
Thanks to the research of music historian Thom Holmes, we can trace our way back to the very first recordings that Moog synthesizers were used on. It would be just a few months after the release of The Zodiac Cosmic Sounds that Moogs would start showing up on rock albums. The following four bands were the first to take the plunge—each released their Moog-enhanced works even before Wendy Carlos popularized the instrument with Switched-On Bach in 1968. These aren’t necessarily the bands you would have expected to experiment with such an out-there new instrument; and one of them, incorrectly, wasn’t even considered a “real” band by many.
1. The Electric Flag, The Trip soundtrack
The Electric Flag featured legendary blues guitarist Mike Bloomfield and vocalist/drummer Buddy Miles (later of Jimi Hendrix’s Band of Gypsys). The band was better-known for its 1968 sophomore release, A Long Time Comin’, which also featured the aforementioned Paul Beaver playing a Moog. But their first album featured Beaver, too; it was the soundtrack to the 1967 film The Trip starring Peter Fonda and Susan Strasberg.
Beaver’s spacey Moog sounds helped to create the psychedelic feel of this largely-instrumental soundtrack to a movie about a man’s first acid trip. While the synthesizer was not a prominent part of the album’s soundscape, it showed the possibilities the Moog could bring to rock music.
2. The Doors, Strange Days
Ray Manzarek’s keyboards are such a critical part of the Doors’ sound. But it’s singer Jim Morrison who is credited as the first musician to play a Moog on a popular rock album. The synth is featured on the title track of Strange Days, though it would be easy to miss it.
Beaver programmed Morrison’s vocals into the Moog so they could be played on the synthesizer’s keyboard. Morrison’s voice sounds echoey and distant, which enhances the spooky feel one is accustomed to hearing in a Doors song. While “Strange Days’ was not released as a single, plenty of fans got to hear the track—the album reached No. 3 on the Billboard 200.
3. The Monkees, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd.
In recent years, the Monkees have been getting more recognition for their musicianship and songwriting, rather than being dismissed as a made-for-TV bubblegum pop band. They also deserve credit for pioneering the use of the Moog for pop and rock music. On the Michael Nesmith-penned “Daily Nightly,” Micky Dolenz uses the Moog to create piercing, high-pitched sounds that give the song a sprawling, cosmic feel. It’s just the right touch, given the otherworldly imagery of lyrics like Dark and rolling figures move / Through prisms of no color and Sahara signs look down upon / A world that glitters glibly.
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Beaver also contributed to Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, & Jones Ltd., playing the Moog on “Star Collector.” His bouncy solos give the song its futuristic (for the ‘60s, at least) sound. While The Doors may have been the first band to introduce the Moog to a large audience, it was The Monkees who familiarized listeners with its unique synthesized sounds through these two tracks from their No. 1 album.
4. The Byrds, The Notorious Byrd Brothers
Beaver is one of three musicians credited with playing the Moog on this Byrds album from 1968. Also credited are vocalist/guitarist Roger McGuinn and studio musician Gary Usher, who both played the synthesizer on the track “Space Odyssey.”
The Moog effects on this track are not unlike those created by Dolenz on “Daily Nightly.” They effectively add to the song’s spacey vibe. The use of the Moog feels perhaps more natural on The Notorious Byrd Brothers than it does on the other albums on this list. However a number of enhancements, including flanging and other sound effects, were used that still gave parts of the album an experimental feel.
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