PART ONE: THE EARLY YEARS 1889-1960

Javanese Gamelan performances - Exposition Universelle, Paris, 1889

According to musician and theorist David Toop, one of the most influential musical events of the 1900s begins 11 years prior to the turn of the century. The Exposition Universelle of 1889, held in the center of Paris, was a worldwide celebration of the French republic and its century long ousting of Louis XVI. While the fair is most remembered for introducing the world to the Eiffel Tower and various devices of modern technology, it was the importation of a so-called "Negro Village" and the performance of gamelan music by Central Javanese musicians that most impressed Parisians strolling through the Trocadero and Champs de Mars.

Present at the musical recital was composer Claude Debussy whose alleged response to the exotic sounds of chimes and gongs was nothing short of revelatory. It was through Debussy’s interpretation of these Eastern, "other-worldly" tones in pieces like Pagodes and Reflets dans l'eau that finally annihilated the Romantic hold of Wagner and opened the 20th century up to modern music. According to Toop, the gamelan performances of 1889 instigated an "ambient century" of music that would flow from Debussy to experimental musicians like Sun Ra, the Velvet Underground, and Brian Eno. Here in Paris were planted the first seeds of pop music and rock ‘n' roll.

Availability of recordings: while recordings of the 1889 performance do not exist, gamelan music on record and CD is plentiful. Gamelan appears in everything from Balinese kebyar to Phillipine kulintang to post-rock electro bands like Mouse on Mars. Performances of Debussy’s Estampes are free on the Internet.

Spooky factor: more gossamer than chilling, but Debussy is still "classical" music…so scream all you want.

Thomas Cahill - Telharmonium Recital, New York, 1906

An invention of engineer and composer Thomas Cahill, the Telharmonium is considered, alongside the more well known Theremin, as one of the very first musical synthesizers. Unfortunately, unlike the very user-friendly and portable Theremin, the Telharmonium was a colossal mechanical contraption consisting of thousands of dynamos, switching systems and oscillators. It took nearly four years and a quarter of a million dollars for the New York Electric Music Company to the build the 200 ton and 60-feet-long machine. The completed synthesizer was moved from upstate New York to Manhattan’s theater district in 1906 for its debut recital at what would be called the Telharmonic Hall. However, the real plan for the Telharmonium was much more ambitious.

The New York Telephone Company allowed the music from the recitals to be transmitted through the phone lines to paid subscribers throughout the city. Major landmarks and institutions like the Museum of Natural History, the Waldorf Astoria, and Louis Sherry’s restaurant were some of the first to sign up for service, allowing patrons to hear this new electronic sound in lobbies, bars, and exhibition halls. Wireless transmitters would eventually replace many of the cables because the high frequencies of the Telharmonium caused widespread phone interruptions throughout the city. The recitals were short lived. By 1908, the novelty of the Telharmonium had waned and complaints of major electric malfunctions from telegraph agencies and even the Navy forced the closure of Telharmonic Hall.

Availability: impossible. Few if any Telharmonium recordings were ever made before the machine was dissembled and sold for parts.

Spooky factor: can you imagine having to explain a Telharmonium issue to the Verizon representative? Dial M for "Moronic Outsourcing."

W.C. Handy - "Mr. Crump"/"The Memphis Blues," 1909

Handy, the so-called “father of the blues," moved to Memphis’s famed Beale Street in 1909 after touring extensively in minstrel shows and marching bands throughout the South and Midwest. His first "blues" was a campaign song written for mayorial candidate Edward Crump and called, appropriately, "Mr. Crump," although it was later changed to simply "The Memphis Blues." While the song was revolutionary not only for introducing 12-bar blues music to the general public, "The Memphis Blues" was also the very first published and thus first commercial blues song.

However this is only half the story.

According to Handy’s autobiography, it was a mysterious guitarist in Tutwiler, Miss., that first introduced the blues to the former cornet and piano player. This moment in musical history has become almost as legendary as the story of Robert Johnson’s meeting with the Devil at the crossroads of Highway 61 and Clarksdale. From that brief audition with a lone blues player, Handy was able to memorize the sound and reinterpret it for thousands with his own recordings. Had it not been for Handy’s ingenuity and questionable opportunism, the blues, R&B and rock ‘n' roll may never have become the definitive American art form.

Availability: easy. While original recordings of Handy do not exist, there are numerous renditions of his work on CD, including "The Memphis Blues."

Spooky factor: One of the first examples of a modern celebrity turned shill for a political candidate. But it still beats Fleetwood Mac’s "Don’t Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow)" used in the ’92 Presidential election.

Son House - Library of Congress Field Recordings, 1941-1942 (released in 1964)

Blues historians and critics may argue over who was the greatest Delta blues musician of the 20th century. Many say Blind Lemon Jefferson, most claim Robert Johnson, but there is no doubt that Eddie James Son House Jr.’s Library of Congress sides - recorded from 1941 to 1942 but unavailable to the general public until 1964 - were some of the greatest blues field recordings ever remanded to 78 vinyl.

As captured live by John and Alan Lomax deep in the Mississippi Delta, House’s blues was a blend of powerful, danceable rhythm and dark lyrical croon. His years spent in Parchment Prison for the supposed murder of a man during a barrel-house brawl taught House the lonely sounds of the prison chain gang. Not only were his songs the definition of deep Delta blues but they had inspired countless other legends like Muddy Waters and Robert Johnson. The field recordings of ‘41-‘42 not only provide a history lesson into blues music’s murky past but they proved a pivotal turning point for future blues and R&B singers who co-opted House’s infectious rhythms and transformed them into the Chicago electric blues of the '50s and '60s.

Availabilty: easy. Seek out the various Lomax recordings or just go straight to Son House’s The Original Delta Blues.

Spooky factor: House’s coal tar voice and songs of life and death in the Delta are as beautiful as they are haunting.

Johnny Ace - Final performance, Houston, 1954

Few blues and soul aficionados talk of Johnny Ace these days, but the 1950s crooner was a firebrand and matinee idol at his career peak. The Memphis native performed alongside B.B. King and Muddy Waters in the Beale Streeters and signed onto local label Duke Recordings, a part of the WDIA radio franchise. A successful solo career soon followed, and Ace recorded one great R&B classic after the next, touring with blues giants Bobby Bland, Memphis Slim, Junior Parker, and "Big Mama" Thornton. His hits include "My Song," "The Clock," "Saving My Love for You," and "Pledging My Love."

However, despite his seemingly overnight success as one of the country’s greatest black singers, Ace’s calling card will forever be as rock ‘n' roll’s first celebrity casualty at the young age of 25. During intermission at a 1954 Christmas Eve performance in Houston’s City Auditorium, Ace reportedly drew a pistol and began waving it frantically at his girlfriend and others backstage. Whether or not he had in mind to play a game of Russian Roulette no one present was certain. Regardless, Ace pointed the gun at himself next and pulled the trigger. The official investigation concluded it was an accidental shooting although some conspiracy theorists claim Ace was actually murdered. Thousands of mourners filed past Ace’s coffin at his Memphis funeral. The blues icon had now become rock ‘n' roll’s first dead legend.

Availability: no known recordings exist from the Christmas Eve show, but there is a wonderful posthumous collection of Ace’s ballads called Memorial Album.

Spooky factor: not only are the heartfelt songs of Ace as simultaneously gorgeous and disturbing as anything put out by Nick Cave, but "Pledging My Love," recorded shortly before Ace’s death, is a momento mori of just how great Ace might have been.

Joe Meek and The Blue Men - I Hear a New World, 1959

Electronics pioneer and pop maverick Joe Meek was an unlikeliest of characters to conceive of indie rock. Tone deaf, dour, and pudgy in his three-piece suits, Meek was a RAF radar operator and radio geek who graduated to studio engineering in the 1950s for British music labels, Parlophone and Landsdowne. After a number of successful production credits, Meek took his increasingly experimental methods and started his own record label, Triumph, in 1960, the very first of its kind in London.

Having investigated early on the possibilities of the studio-as-instrument, Meek perfected such outboard effects as phase-shifting, compression, panning, and plate reverb. In 1960, he also began incorporating stereophonic separation into his recordings, another first in the industry. His experimental debut for Triumph was also the very first pop concept album, entitled I Hear a New World: An Outer Space Music Fantasy.

Performed by a series of session musicians and friends Meek later dubbed the Blue Men, I Hear a New World was a spectacular electronic exploration into distant planets, extra terrestrials, magnetic waves, and psychedelic sounds. Used specifically to advertise stereophonic record players at the time, the album was never released commercially and fell quickly into the dustbin. Meek would go on to establish a major career throughout the '60s with songs like "Johnny Remember Me" and "Telstar" before dying in a mysterious murder-suicide outside of his studio. Only recently was I Hear a New World released in its entirety and now rightly takes its place as one of the most important experimental pop albums ever created.

Availability: easy-moderate. I Hear A New World was re-released on CD in its entirety by RPM Records in 1991.

Spooky factor: in addition to Meek’s mysterious death, his late night investigations into spectral analysis and cemetery field recordings make this album an even scarier prospect.

Stay tuned for part two, which will include obscurities like Unit Delta Plus, Warsaw, and Pussy Galore.