Customer Reviews

Soothing Sounds For Baby: Electronic Music By Raymond Scott, Vol. 1, 1 To 6 Months

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Here's something to annoy your infant with. If you let your infant listen to this he's likely to think he's on another planet. Not that he knows what this planet is all about . Your job is to confuse him even more; make it hard for him to learn how to cope with the snot-nose Disney brats he's likely to meet in nursery school. This will make him a rebel of sorts in the future and unfit for the traditional type of what is called a `job.' This will be the basis of all his future happiness. Think of it as a sort of vaccination against all the bad music he's likely to hear in the future. All us grown infants who could use a bit of infant wonder back in our heads also very much dig this music. It's great stuff. In fact, I prefer this to the two ENO discs I have which tend to make things a little too lethargic. This puts you in a relaxed but demented zone, not too far from the Twilight Zone. It sounds like a PONG gone surreally melodic. This is what you put on in the background when you're ready to read `War and Peace.'

I bought this album for my six week old baby girl, hoping to find a Kraftwerk for infants. And while i have't been disappointed in the least i am actually quite surprised that she likes it as much as she does. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that my girlfriend listened to Computerwelt incessently back when that little tyke was still swimming around in the womb. Still though, some of these songs seem anything but soothing to me. One song in particular sounds like it has a alarm clock blaring continuously throughout its ten minute running time. But what did my baby do but sleep soundly through it. You may object and say that a baby that age, when asleep, would slumber through anything. But i have put this on in the middle of screaming fits and it calms her right down. We love it! Raymond Scott makes me proud to be a parent! I just can't wait now until she is old enough to appreciate Bruce Haack.

I gave this CD to some new parents. They reported that on a long car trip, whenever their two-month-old son got fractious, this CD quieted him down every time. But they are starting to hate it. It has a jangly, grating undertone and a monotonous melody that gets old fast. So 5 stars for meeting its promise, 3 stars for musical merit -- 4 on average.

"Lullaby" is the best song on this disk and it sounds as though Kraftwerk may have listened to this when composing the beginning of "Europe Endless" from "Trans-Europe Express". It's a pleasant, dreamy sort of repetitive piece of music and I've fallen asleep to it myself a few times when I programmed my CD player to stop at the end of it and not go on to the rest of the CD. At 14 minutes, "Lullaby" gives you time to drift off into an electronically induced sleep. The other songs are also pleasant and fun with the major exception of "Tic Toc". "Tic Toc" has no melody and is exactly what the title suggests, an electronic version of a constant "tic-toc" clock sound that seems to go on forever. Maybe a baby would find this spellbinding but, I personally think you could play this to torture people. That's why I gave this CD 4 stars instead of 5.

I had the random chance of hearing the first two tracks of this ingenuous set one late night while listening to my school's radio station. Kind of intrigued by the history of the creator (who also created the first Moog-type keyboard for his daughter who wanted to be able to play piano without lessons), I HAD to hear the tracks that would be played from this album. Well, this album isn't just for babies....the tracks repeat simple melodies arranged in a loop of sorts with little change throught the track. Now, this may seem monotonous, but it isn't much different than what a lot of Baroque music does....this isn't Baroque, by any means, but the effect is the same.....peace achieved through soothing simplicity....and you can't get enough. This album is on my "Must Buy" list...not only for my love of electronic music, but also as it is a cornerstone to today's musical stylings of the world's best producers of electronic music.

Raymond Scott composed these pieces on his own electronic instruments in the early 60s. They were packaged in three volumes, each for a different age group (e.g., Volume One is for ages 1-6 months). Each LP came with a booklet from the Gesell Institute fo Child Development, Inc. Basta has rereleased these on CD, sans booklet, with cute retro cover art.

This is very strange stuff: Five pieces, ranging from four to fourteen minutes in length, of simple, repetitive, almost hypnotically bland music. It is similar in many ways to the minimalist music of Glass and others, but sweet and pleasant rather than ominous and angst-ridden.

If this stuff doesn't immediately drive you up a wall, you'll probably find yourself listening to it over and over again.

--Stefan Jones

Composed & performed by RAYMOND SCOTT on primitive home-built electronic instruments which SCOTT began to design & build in the 1940s. As ambient electronic music, these albums predate -- yet are comparable to; BRIAN ENO/FRIPP, PHILIP GLASS, APHEX TWIN, & KRAFTWERK. The 3 vinyl albums were originally released by Epic & had been out-of-print for over 35 years!

My nephew of 6 months seems to love this record. The minimalist electronic music is not that interesting for adults. It is interesting that it seems to invoke pleasure on babies.
Babies are just weird I guess.

These have got to be the best RINGTONES on the planet. With the right conversion tools and a little bit of editing, you'll have people thinking your telephone is receiving calls from the future!