The Tic Tok Men

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The Tic Tok Men
Origin United States
Genre(s) Electronic music
Synthpop
Electro
Retrotechno
Years active 1985-2007
(hiatus in new music
between 1995-2000)
Label(s) The Compound
Website Official Website


The Tic Tok Men (sometimes abbreviated TTM or TTTM) were a synthpop, Krautrock style electronic quartet founded in Seattle Washington USA that existed between 1985 to 2007. They state they "generated their being out of collective necessity". The original members were Brian VonHorst (Voice, Keyboards, FX) Seven Graylands (Keyboards, Voice, FX) and Atian Kroft (Voice, Keyboards, FX). Later that year Dieter Blank (Drum patterns, Keyboards, Noise.) joined the band.

Contents

[edit] History and Early Years

In 1989, the Tic Tok Men refused to perform live and began construction of the Tic Tok Men Compound (TTMC) their distribution entity and recording facility. The TTMC contains a large collection of synthesizers and electronic instruments [1]].

After their last early years album Remote Control in 1995, the four disassembled and embarked on separate projects. Dieter and Atian returned to Berlin, Seven surrounded himself in computing and Brian has mysteriously vanished somewhere in the United States. Before disbanding, the Tic Tok Men decided to regroup on February 20, 2000 (02/20/2000).

Dieter, Atian and Seven regrouped in 1999 to record in the newly finished Tic Tok Men Compound. On January 1st they finished the final mix of "Conduit", the first song recorded by the Tic Tok Men in five years.

The Tic Tok Men have remained mostly underground but enjoy a large cult following. They often refer to their existence as "reclusive".

[edit] Later Albums

In 2000 the Tic Tok Men released Arecebo, a space-age theme electronic album. Many consider this album to be the quintessential Tic Tok sound. A 10 minute song called Flatline has been compared to Kraftwerk Autobahn. Arecebo was the top selling CD at online music distribution company Ampcast for over two years.

2001 saw their next album Decomputerization which ventured into the IDM / Darkwave genre and away from their traditional self-proclaimed "retrotechno electronica" sound. The main theme of this CD is directed at propaganda, lying governments, covering up truth, war, and death. The album artwork depicts The Tic Tok Men blowing up and shooting computers with shotguns [2].

Decomputerization was followed up that same year by two Recomputerization : Collective Decomputerization albums. The two CD's are a collaboration between The Tic Tok Men and 20 other artists [3]. The artists were given the raw vocal and musical tracks from the song Decomputerization and allowed total artistic freedom to mutate and bend as they saw fit. Some tracks have been completely reworked and sound nothing like the original concept. The different interpretations convert the song into Dance, Acoustic, Rock, Techno, Breakbeat and various other genre styles.

In 2003, again changing their tune, The Tic Tok Men released an ambient experimental album titled Borderland. Borderland was created using only a small number of organic and synthetic sounds. These short two or three second clips were tuned, lengthened, shortened, and otherwise mutated into variations of themselves. The sounds were then layered in digital editing software to created the melodies and rhythms.

[edit] The Final Albums

Work started on at least three new albums after 2003, Tape Op Refugees, Return of the 100 Foot Robots and Borderland II. Before any of these albums were released the Tic Tok Men disbanded. No explanation has been given. Their website states many of the older material will be re-mastered and released but there will be no new material written. Some of these songs are available for free download on Seven Graylands' website [4].


[edit] Discography

  • self-titled (1986)
  • The Volt Age (1988)
  • ASR (1989)
  • Remote Control (1990)
  • Conduit (EP 2000)
  • Remote Control v2.0 (2000)
  • Arecebo (2000)
  • Decomputerization (2001)
  • Recomputerization : Collective Decomputerization 1 (2002)
  • Recomputerization : Collective Decomputerization 2 (2002)
  • Borderland (2003)
  • Tape Op Refugees (2005; never released)
  • Return of the 100 Foot Robots (2005; never released)
  • Borderland II (2005; never released)

[edit] External links