Tonto Rides Again [Import]

Tonto's Expanding Head Band | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 11, 1996)
• Format: Import
• Label: Viceroy Music
• ASIN: B000007UHW
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #131,779 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A brilliant and remarkable work., August 31, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Tonto Rides Again (Audio CD)

I feel that too often synthesized music is used in order that the musicians do not have to try as hard. People turn on a drum machine, and hide their inadequacies behind the beat. In the case of TONTO (The Original New Timbral Orchestra - the world's first, and still the largest, multitimbral polyphonic analog synthesizer), this is simply not true. The pivotal issue that most attracts me to this disc is the use of music to paint soundscapes - perhaps an overused term, but very applicable in this case.

For instance, the initial song, Cybernaut, is a painting of an electronic intelligence roaming the stars, done in a very traditional blues 4/12 beat. Jetsex is exactly what the title states.

One central point is that this analogue machine can do things no digital machine has been able to. It produces lower lows and a deep, layered sound that is stunning. Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff have produced an electronic album that remains unsurpassed in my opinion. They were way ahead of their time then, and, in many ways, remain ahead of our time now. This unique disc shows what could be, or at least could have been, for a musical style which has languished in obscurity and ridicule.

For these reasons, this disc would be a great addition to your collection, whether you like "electronic music" or not.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars PLEASE can this WONDERFUL MUSIC be re-released?, August 4, 2006

By 

DSR (out beyond the sticks) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tonto Rides Again (Audio CD)

P.S. Late August 2006... If you type the bands name into a search engine and follow a couple of links, you MAY be still able to purchase a very "limited edition" CD, comprising these tracks (plus a superb "extra" track...) that was prepared for an event in the UK this Summer by Malcolm Cecil himself. To hear this music again, but with such awsome clarity and "body", compared to my LP's, is such a joyful experience I cannot describe it - "Riversong" brought tears to my eyes. Notwithstanding the "analogue" recordings, T.O.N.T.O. really has "never sounded better!"

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The music on this disc is SO important to the history of "popular" Electronic/synthesiser Music that it seems almost a tragedy that it's not available as of mid 2006.... The tracks are beautifully melodic on the whole (except "Jetsex", which is another thing entirely...), disguising their complexity, making the sounds created by Wendy Carlos in the early days seem rather crude by comparison, despite the excellence of the playing.

Living in the UK, I was short changed by the original (UK) LP release of "Zero Time", the first album (on Atlantic). The sound was muffled, although the gatefold sleeve was awsome... I caught the second album, "It's About Time" (1975 on Polydor) by the skin of its teeth and, although not as ground breaking as the first (Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze were well established in this genre of music by now in Europe), the second side (The Pyramid Suite), had some amazingly beautiful tracks.

I was lucky enough to find the re-release of "Zero Time" as a US import in a "sale" and, although the sleeve wasn't as elaborate, the sound quality was much improved, although the LP suffered from crackles here and there.

This CD came and went in a flash in 1996 and I didn't find out about its existance until several years later, by which time it was long deleted! I'm not even sure it was available in the UK...

If anyone reading this is able, PLEASE can you get these wonderful, uplifting and ESSENTIAL recordings carefully mastered and re-issued, so that we "oldies" and younger students of the genre can enjoy them again? The sincere love, devotion and care that went into their creation was immense - T.O.N.T.O. was reportedly a very difficult beast to keep in tune in the early days and deserves to have a book written about its developement and life in various recording studios... - and they DESERVE to be available once more!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A rare gem, June 2, 2005

By 

Michael D. Mcconnell "P700" (Tempe, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tonto Rides Again (Audio CD)

Tonto Rides Again is truly an original musical journey. A compliation of two earlier LPs, to my knowledge the only T.O.N.T.O.'s Edxpanding Head Band product release on CD. You've never heard anything like this before.