[TheOtherHobbes]

If you know synths it’s pretty easy to reverse engineer the sounds on SoB. They’re unfamiliar by modern pop standards, because there’s a lot of layering and paralleling with simultaneous envelopes and multiple filter sweeps that (boringly...) isn’t done much today. But they’re not opaque.

I have no idea how to copy some the sounds Tomita got from his Moogs, and I’m fairly sure no one else does either. Some are easy, some are “That’s really clever.” But there are more than a few that I have absolutely no clue about.

The fact that he patched up and recorded these huge flamboyant orchestral-sounding pieces note by note and line by line with such a creative range of unique and original sounds is just astounding.

[bananaboy]

Yeah I totally agree! I love SoB but the arrangements and patches are way more traditional and straightforward. Tomita really explored and extended the canvas of the synthesiser as a musical instrument in its own right. JMJ too.

[HelloNurse]

It can be argued that SoB, along with early Kraftwerk records, defined the tradition of synth patches. Tomita came a little later.