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Escape from the Tardis? Lost Doctor Who tapes found

noiseaddicts.com — The creator of the Dr WHO theme passed away in 1961 but an amazing treasure-trove of 267 tapes were found in her attic, including a techno track written in the late 60's that sounds like it could have been released this year. An amazing find for music and sound geeks.

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  • CherrySmith123, on 07/23/2008, -1/+15cool :)
  • bmph8ter, on 07/23/2008, -0/+22Is the stuff available in mp3 yet?
    • ssquared22, on 07/23/2008, -0/+11That's a whole lot of material to go through. I hope the person that has that duty is into bleeps and bloops.
      • Sonof8Bits, on 07/23/2008, -0/+11If not, i'd be more then happy to take his/her place.
  • steve9924, on 07/23/2008, -2/+23It really is amazing that this stuff was done in the 60's without synthesizers. That techno track is better than a lot of the electronic music I hear nowadays.
    • Glitchwerks, on 07/24/2008, -8/+1No offense to you, and no disrespect to the original music. It's an interesting snippet but is in no way better than any of the music coming out today.
    • supermanred, on 07/24/2008, -0/+10The Doctor Who theme song was way ahead of it's time. For Christ's sake, she had to mix it together by laying out the TAPE across the floor of a corridor at the BBC and tape the parts together in sequence... no Macbook Pro... no Pro Tools... no software.

      It was probably one of the first true multitrack recordings featuring electronic music ever.

      And to this day, one of the most memorable and enduring theme songs in movie and television. Going strong after 30 seasons... Today's Doctor Who theme is pretty much the same except it is performed by the London orchestra.
  • GetSmartGal, on 07/23/2008, -0/+28I loved the original Dr Who...nice!
  • BennyGreenberg, on 07/23/2008, -0/+11What's a Tape? I love the original stuff! This is a great find...
  • neognostic, on 07/23/2008, -0/+13I just freaked out the people in my office by playing it real loud.
    • WNW3, on 07/24/2008, -0/+2Were they freaked out or are they just bad dancers?
  • motivatedmama, on 07/23/2008, -0/+7This is really amazing considering the era. I really dig the sound of, like, drops of water plunking into a tub...or something like that.(the tecno bit)
    Oh yeah, and Doctor Who was one of my childhood favs!
  • Kyrato, on 07/23/2008, -19/+1Escape from the 'Tarded? Submitter who English suck

    Yes I know Its Doctor Who not Doctor who.

    It just sounded really funny in my head. Good article tho.
    • steve9924, on 07/23/2008, -2/+4in what way?
      • Kyrato, on 07/23/2008, -5/+1Read it this way....

        Escape from the Tardis? Lost Doctor "who" tapes found
    • MrPingu, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3Be quite and go sit in the corner.
  • VacuolateTuna, on 07/23/2008, -0/+7Amazing! I've always loved that theme, and its variations...
  • joeytoyota, on 07/23/2008, -0/+32Great article, but slightly misleading title. There are over a hundred missing episodes of classic Doctor Who out there, and I thought one of them had been found!
    • steve9924, on 07/23/2008, -0/+10I can see it from that context. It was actually fairly well known in audio circles that the audio tapes from the work on the show were missing.

      I can see why the title might be misinterpreted. Wasn't meant to deceive - the sumamry under the title is quite clear I think though.
    • steve9924, on 07/23/2008, -0/+7....Also, it's posted in "music"
    • joeytoyota, on 07/23/2008, -0/+7Yeah, I saw it on the front page and got excited, that's all.

      No worries. Still really cool.
      • sardion2000, on 07/24/2008, -0/+6I had the same thought, all of a sudden and then have it vanish in a puff of smoke. Oh well. Those tapes will be found one day(yeah right). I have never seen the majority of the First Two doctors and that makes me sad.
      • MalenfantX, on 07/24/2008, -0/+2@sardion2000:Reconstructions are available of every episode. Some only have still photos over audio recordings, but there are plenty video clips too.
  • Sicarius, on 07/23/2008, -0/+18Damn! The headline got my hopes up. For a second I thought it was referring to tapes of the episodes that the BBC lost. Still, I love that theme.
    • MrPingu, on 07/24/2008, -0/+5Yea.....they got my hopes up to.


      *sigh*
    • supermanred, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3Same here... Im currently re-encoding my collection of 30 seasons to save space and had just finished skipping over those "lost / reconstructed" episodes and was kind of hoping someone had found the lost tapes of Troughton or Hartnell.. oh well...
      • XeRoX2k2, on 07/24/2008, -0/+2yeah i hate up converting stuff to save space

        500 cdrs -> 70 single layer dvdrs ->35 dual layer dvdrs -> 14 single layer bluray-R's
    • XeRoX2k2, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1same here!
  • xerofilter, on 07/23/2008, -1/+26EXTERMINATE!!!!
  • ch1x0r3r, on 07/23/2008, -0/+10Delia Derbyshire is amazing. You should check out her band's (White Noise) first album, Electric Storm. They've got some great sounds that you would not expect from the 60's.

    Here's one of their more well-known songs: http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=K6pTdzt7BiI
  • caramba420, on 07/23/2008, -6/+1Anyone who likes this should take a look (listen) at Kraftwerk. They were putting mad techno ***** out in the 60's, while everyone else was trying to sound like Cream or the Rolling Stones.
    • Henchman24, on 07/23/2008, -0/+8As awesome as Kraftwerk was (is), their first album wasn't until 1971, and most of their best work was mid-late 70's.
    • Glitchwerks, on 07/24/2008, -0/+5And Kraftwerk didn't really begin to define that recognizable techno sound until the very late 70's and early 80's. And pretty soon a very impressionable young brother from Detroit dropped "Clear" and that is what set it off.
  • mishu, on 07/23/2008, -0/+12For the record, she died in 2001, not 1961. RIP, what a legend! Massive influence on all electronic music.
  • OffPiste, on 07/23/2008, -12/+5I had my first orgasm masturbating to one of Dr Who's female assistants. Ah the 70's and mini skirts.
    • nunofgs, on 07/24/2008, -0/+5too much info
    • teessidedazza, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1I bet it was Lalla Ward!
      • graemee, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1No, 70's - It would have been - Jo Grant or Liz Shaw. I'd have fapped to Jo Grant too.
  • Kwipper, on 07/23/2008, -1/+9Holy crap! This track was made in the 60's!? Man. Talk about being before your time.
  • gregh42, on 07/23/2008, -2/+2The music is pretty ground breaking considering it was made in the 60's but I think its a little bit of a stretch to say this music would be considered modern techno. I found the tub dripping sound a little distracting, though the drum beats were good.

    I just started watching Dr. Who this year. I think the show is great, never realized what I was missing before. I have been dvr'ing every episode that the SCI-FI channel plays, including some of the older runs from a few years ago. It seems like some of the slightly older episodes (the ones with "Rose" in them) were better than the more recent ones. I'm not just saying that because she is way more attractive than Donna Nobel, but also because the story line seemed a little better. On the flip side I like the current Dr. better.
    • steve9924, on 07/24/2008, -0/+4I think that one track could be considered modern techno. It's fairly similar to a lot of minimal techno & bleep techno
    • terminal157, on 07/24/2008, -4/+1It's interesting for the time but that claim is just a sensationalistic gimmick. Last I checked, arrhythmic electronic music has never been popular and it's been around since, well, the 60's.
      • Glitchwerks, on 07/24/2008, -2/+1Thank you. Subotnick, Schulze, Tangerine Dream, even Kraftwerk were all experimenting with this stuff in/roughly around the same time frame. This is an interesting find, but I'm sure this is just nonsense hype. The BBC will likely give it to some likely suspects to remix and destroy. I can see an Oakenfold remix now.
    • elf25, on 07/24/2008, -0/+2Don't Blink - whatever you do, DON'T BLINK!
    • bitbytebit, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3hopefully you will get to see the REALLY good eps some day. The ones with Tom Baker at least.

  • jaynemother, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3I can't wait for "Hamlet In Space" to come out.
    • jaynemother, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3Oh wait, there really is something called Hamlet In Space... But it sucks. I want a true Hamlet in Space.
  • Jamfa, on 07/24/2008, -1/+8The beats are more reminiscent to breakcore than techno, very disjointed and more sporadic, possibly like drops of water into a bath, I absolutely love it.
    • waydee, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3Finally someone that knows "techno" is a very specific style of electronic music. Thank you.
  • slifty, on 07/24/2008, -0/+13Clearly she was a time traveler.
  • sisko2k5, on 07/24/2008, -0/+4rock the Who
  • thefamousc, on 07/24/2008, -1/+3Here's a rather good remix of her work.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJSdljaZadU

    And an entire site of other whomixes, some not so good but all interesting.
    http://whomix.trilete.net/?wmid=music

  • Tracon, on 07/24/2008, -0/+6bbc with the audio track mentioned
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7512072.s ...
  • ShoggothDreams, on 07/24/2008, -4/+1Is there a mirror site for the music? The BBC is far too proprietary/locked media.
  • iddybiddy, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1Amazing stuff what a talented lady especially for her time. Alas as a four year old Dr Who and H.R Puffnstuff caused enough damage to keep the local therapist in Beemers until retirement.
  • MrPingu, on 07/24/2008, -6/+1Id work for free.
  • nerdsftw, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1SO cool.
  • XanderDee, on 07/24/2008, -7/+1Eliminate them! Eliminate! :)
  • fluidfoundation, on 07/24/2008, -0/+8Allons-y!
  • supermanred, on 07/24/2008, -2/+3Roxicoroco Phalapatorius!

    Vashta Nerada!

    "We need to feed it with useless information, Brigadeer... Do you have a television handy?"
    -The Doctor.
  • jbmcb, on 07/24/2008, -0/+7[The Dr. throws his hat on a Dalek eyestalk, jams a detonator on it's case, then pushes it down a hallway, waving bye to it. Dalek violently explodes.]

    Dr. Who, a making a face of sudden disbelief - "My hat!!!!"

    The Doctor rules them all.
  • sdubois92, on 07/24/2008, -0/+3Are you my mummy
  • kiwiboyus, on 07/24/2008, -0/+4LOVE Dr Who!
  • Missy1776, on 07/24/2008, -0/+0shout it up!!!
  • cfleap, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1This just in Dr Who fans from around the world simultaneously soiled their shorts;)
  • jeffstevens199, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1i love dr. who...i am not too young!
  • rockyrobins, on 07/24/2008, -0/+1The theme for Dr Who is one of the best TV show themes ever, and one of the best pieces of music I've ever heard. I grew up stuck near the TV with my father watching the local PBS station play classic Tom Baker episodes. Needles to say The Doctor has a special place in my sci-fi heart.
  • nydwarf, on 07/25/2008, -0/+1The volume on the sound player on the BBC's Website goes to 11! :)
  • Trapped, on 07/31/2008, -0/+1Here's a link to the actual BBC News article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7512072.s ...
  •  

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