#96: Philip Oakey & Giorgio Moroder / "Together In Electric Dreams"

Writer(s):  Phllip Okey & Giorgio Moroder

Year: 1984

Album: Electric Dreams (Soundtrack)

The Great San Francisco Hysteria of 1984

Some people have called me a music snob, and sometimes, even they don’t really know anything about my life or my personal beliefs, they’ll even smack me with more loaded labels like “music fascist.”

Music is like religion.  It’s a wonderful thing if you choose it for yourself, but terrible if you impose it upon someone else.  This is why I believe in the First Amendment, because if the Jimmy Buffett Majority had its way “Margaritaville” would be the national anthem, and A Pirate Looks at Fifty would be required reading in all public schools.  I shudder at the thought.

To be fair, there are historical contradictions that lead me to question to my principle of free will, like the occurrence in San Francisco on July 20, 1984.

It was the middle of the Regan era, when all things were electronically possible – when a computer could make you a cup of coffee and operate your electric toothbrush.  An artificial intelligence, known as Edgar, hacked into the international power grid and sent 40,000 volts through the telephone line. The result: even though, when the electrical surge reached its modem, the PC that housed Edgar was completely obliterated, the program was able to gain control of all radio stations in the Bay Area – forcing a single, multi-frequency transmission so powerful, the radio waves were instantly converted into electricity within each audio device – effectively, turning all of them on at maximum volume.

Now imagine: you’re sitting in your 8^th grade pre-algebra class – incredibly bored – when your teacher is interrupted by the sound of percolating syntronic notes, magically blaring through the intercom.  Or, you’re at the electronics department at a large retail store and you hear a digital voice say, “This is dedicated to the ones I love,” not only over the PA, but from all of the in-store stereo speakers as well.  Or, you’re in an aerobics class, and your standard Olivia Newton John dreck from a portable tape-player is overpowered by a new, bouncier tune with Phillip Oakley singing, assuring, “We’ll always be together.”

Phillip Oakey is not a great singer, but his voice is clear and efficient – suitable to declare this message of communal harmony.  Granted, the eternal togetherness only lasted for 3 minutes and 51 seconds, but for that fleeting moment, all 3 million plus persons located within the broadcasting range, sunbathers, roller-skaters, tugboaters, were all roused into a mass hysteria and spontaneously danced together – unified through the power of this song.

Oakey is better known as the front man of the Human League.  Obviously, given their name, the group embodied his collectivist ideals.  Utilizing synthesizer technology, the Human League believed in the constructive power of electronic music.

The Edgar Experiment was an Oakley’s side collaboration with the euro-disco producer Giorgio Moroder.  Moroder was an enigma.  Whether this genius was raised in Italy or immigrated to this world from some distant planet, like this biography suggests, is still a mystery.  Though on that day, given all of the massive amounts of simultaneous, impromptu dancing, the hypothesis was proven.  His superior music technology worked.

Sadly, despite Oakey & Moroder’s strong advocacy, the Edgar Theory was largely ignored by scientists, and its methods were never implemented.

A quarter century later, Phillip Oakey’s optimism has apparently soured.  In 2009, with the Pet Shop Boys, he recorded a cynical piece of pop, entitled “This Used to Be the Future.”

“I can remember Utopian thinking,” laments PSB’s Chris Lowe.  “Living in peace and freedom from fear / Science that promised to make us a new world / Religion and prejudice disappear.”

“The future was exciting,” replies Oakey.  “Science fiction made fact / Now all we have to look forward to / Is a sort of suicide pact.”

Has he given up?

Now is not the time to lose hope.  The world is filled with hate, despair, and social unrest.  The Edgar Experiment proved that there is a solution.

Phillip, with your positive, persuasive, unifying voice, and Giorgio, with your interstellar, mind-control technology – the Earth needs the both of you lead a new music crusade.  The dream is still alive.

Maybe I am a fascist.