hi, I’m writing an article about minimal electronics. As deep as I go, the term coldwave, beside ‘minimal electronic’ itself, become extremely abstract. So here is a few questions would help me in my quest:
1. in your opinion, what is coldwave? Also: is it a well defined stylistic genre, a bunch of similar artists scenes or just a shared “mood” in random bands of the minimal/synthpop/post-punk genre? Which artists (that you like or not) clearly define the name?
2. Which influent/proto-minimal bands were famous (then) in the early-electro scene of the 80’s in Europe? Does the electro american-detroit scene influenced England and France minimal bands as much as german new wave and krautrock? Does it influenced american minimal, anyway? (Please answer this item only if it is based on some kind of evidence or if you were already in minimal wave there at that time).
3. Does anybody here have any reference of this name, coldwave, being utilized in the early 80’s?
Every region had it’s own definition of the genre I guess. They called it ’ future’ in the early days in the UK if I’m correct. It was called ‘techno rock’ in California according to the VA - Up another Octave and electro (psycho) rock on the Units first 7’ .
In Holland, an article from VINYL 1981 about the english girl-group Ministry of Marriage mentions the name elektro-wave. Still my preferred moniker.
I agree on the coldwave abstraction. it’s not really clear for me as well but I think maschinenmusik had a nice metaphor for it in another thread.
If you write an article about it, magazine’s like VINYL, or an english (Flexi-pop?) or american equivalent that specialised in avant-garde, underground music from that period are a must.
I’m writing a wikipedia article (in portuguese) about it, so I will keep it more descriptive than opinative. I noticed that, especially in usa, almost all early electronics pop music were called “electropop” (despite “electro” being already a common name in underground hip-hop scene) or “dance”. Also, I found an early sub-pop zine describing one minimal band (by the way, very cool, named Product One) like this: “I guess most people would call this ‘electro-pop’ but I don’t think that sterile, box-like phrase really describes what’s going on here”. “Futurism” I would categorized in the likes of Gary Numan, mid-Soft Cell and so on, which hit the charts and popular culture: similar dystopia/robots/future civilisation themes but with rich textures, polyphonic synths, samplers with high sample rate, complex and multi-layered mixing and a more polite and clean sound, not really “minimal”.
Your methaphor of coldwave reflect probably the most accepted meaning (and mine particular definition of it too). There are, though, some very different meanings being widely utilized, like “gloomy” post-punk with some electronic instrument on it, emotive/melodramatic minimal-electronics, synthetic ethereal, etc.
Thank you both for the answers (and also for the nice scan!).
I believe that the term coldwave originated in Europe around ‘79-80, specifically in reference to British post-punk as well as French and Belgian bands that were working in the same vein. A term used to describe a combination of new wave and cold music (gothic), post-punk bands that used synthesizers and new wave that wasn’t striving to be upbeat pop music.
I wanted to show you two references that may be relevant to your definition:
One is the term “tekno punk” that is printed on the back of a record, from a french band called D Stop. It’s interesting to know that this LP came out in France in 1983, and sounds very ‘coldwave’ - you can hear the use of synths, guitars, and drum machines. Listen here
Another thing I wanted to show you was an excerpt from a piece of fan mail written to an essential ‘minimal’ band called Experimental Products in 1983. It’s from a 16 year old New Jersey boy: he asks if they consider their music “technopop”, then asks if any of the following ‘synth’ bands had influenced them: Depeche Mode, Yello, OMD, Human League, Suicide, Units, Simple Minds, Kraftwerk, Soft Cell, Ministry, SPK…
So it’s interesting that there are these references to techno, and when we think of techno music it’s something completely different. The French ‘techno punk’ or american ‘technopop’ references have more to do with the use of synthesizers, and references to the ‘future’ + technology than anything else. The term ‘electropop’ may be interchangeable here as well.
Ah, that’s interesting Snowy, as i was under the impression from the previous thread D Stop was not considered coldwave but more something like synth-punk.
They have a lot of anger in their sound which doesnt seem very cold / gothic ..?
coldwave as i understood it has more of a fragile character, Visible would perhaps be a good reference, no?
But I must say there are a lot of bands that are hovering in the twilight zone of such a definition. What sounds as agression to one, could sound as frustration to another.
My definition of cold wave: a combination of post-punk, punk and new wave
I was reading some Juan Atkins interviews and he, that is considered one of the inventors of electro, refers to his early Cybotron songs as “techno”, which makes me assume that late 70’s-early 80’s electronics at that time were all tagged the same, in absence of more information on the variety of bands and similarity between some of them. That note Snowy post in some sense reflect this: spk, kraftwerk, depeche mode and simple minds put under the same generic tag. It makes me supose that coldwave, minimal and others obscure electronics subgenres names didn’t appeared prior mid-80’s, but have no evidence of it.
By the way, that D-Stop song selected is coldwave in my opinion. I always understood the cold prefix not as gothic but like: asocial, sad in an indiferrent way, definetly not-emotive and not dramatic (at least not in an explicit way), not angry nor frustaded. Total cold and inconscious egotrip. Any Dark Day song is, for me, the perfect example of coldwave.
By the way, that fluffy yellow thing makes me want to sing along with you all folks. E-le-troni-c dan-cing, exter-nal emotion trigger.
[quote author=“waldo_jeffers”]I was reading some Juan Atkins interviews and he, that is considered one of the inventors of electro, refers to his early Cybotron songs as “techno”, which makes me assume that late 70’s-early 80’s electronics at that time were all tagged the same, in absence of more information on the variety of bands and similarity between some of them. That note Snowy post in some sense reflect this: spk, kraftwerk, depeche mode and simple minds put under the same generic tag. It makes me supose that coldwave, minimal and others obscure electronics subgenres names didn’t appeared prior mid-80’s, but have no evidence of it.
In my opinion ‘techno’ was kidnapped and raped by Derrick May (also the guy that had the most stupid ever description of techno: Kraftwerk and George Clinton stuck together in an elevator). Juan Atkins’ Model 500 was electro in the veign of Cybotron and the technopop tradition. He never claimed to have invented ‘techno’. It was May that started this kind of teutonic chi-house inspired sounds some people call music, and started this Detroit ‘myth’. May he burn in hell for this crime against humanity.
[quote author=“waldo_jeffers”]
By the way, that D-Stop song selected is coldwave in my opinion. I always understood the cold prefix not as gothic but like: asocial, sad in an indiferrent way, definetly not-emotive and not dramatic (at least not in an explicit way), not angry nor frustaded. Total cold and inconscious egotrip. Any Dark Day song is, for me, the perfect example of coldwave.
Yes! This is a perfect description, especially for the french coldwave. And Mecanique Rythmique - Extase is the perfect example of this IMO.
oh no, i didn’t meant he claimed to have invented “techno”, I said people nowadays consider his Cybotron-era as electro pioneer, and that he refered to his early works genre as “techno” meaning what we understand now as “electro”. I guess that in the early 80’s and of course prior the rave-electronics trendy, the word ‘techno’ was, as noted above, interchangeable with ‘electro’ or any other generic word (for the time).
I just remember my first encounter with the name ‘coldwave’ was actually from a review of the Vibo - One to many EP. The review was included with the album, together with a press release. Unfortunately I sold it some time ago, and i can’t find the email address of the guy i sold it to. But the album is from Belgium 1982 IIRC.
It’s interesting to know that this LP came out in France in 1983, and sounds very ‘coldwave’ - you can hear the use of synths, guitars, and drum machines. Listen 
