Technology For The Youth - an album about the hidden stories of the space race

Circuit3 · 2022-08-01T12:02:19.137Z

First time to share here. Hope it’s of interest to some of you.
My 3rd album has recently released on AnalogueTrash (multicoloured vinyl LP variants, extended CD and Digital)

Bandcamp link to preview and , if you wish, purchase

https://circuit3.bandcamp.com/album/technology-for-the-youth

A little background to the album:

Ireland’s future-retro electronic artist Circuit3 presents his third album ‘Technology For The Youth’ LP. Released via the UK’s AnalogueTrash label.

Named after the Soviet science & technology magazine, the album arrives like a fragment of an abandoned space station, virtually destroyed upon re-entering Earth’s atmosphere. Evoking different times and ambitions – the space race, moon shots, heroic achievements in the name of science, and unlikely Cold War collaborations in the USA and USSR - this album oscillates softly between hope and the limitless possibilities that fired up the imagination of young Circuit3 as he watched Apollo launches on his family’s TV set.

*“As a kid, I’d been fascinated by things like Apollo 13,” he remembers. “I was the kid who built the Airfix model of Saturn V. I was the kid with a pop-up book about Skylab. I wanted to be an astronaut when I grew up, and I had no fear whatsoever about going into space. At that time, everything seemed to be so futuristic, and for a lot of my childhood I genuinely imagined that I’d be like Martin Landau’s character John Koenig in ‘Space 1999’.” *

*Like the previous two Circuit3 albums – ‘siliconchipsuperstar’ LP (2016) and ‘The Price Of Nothing & The Value Of Everything’ (2019), which received praised by Martyn Ware (The Human League, Heaven17) – we find Circuit3 building crisp electronic pop songs from the enviable array of analogue synthesisers assembled in his home studio. Focusing squarely on that period before digital synthesis, much like how the lyrics on this new LP were informed by those space exploration endeavours occurring before the first Space Shuttle left Cape Canaveral. *

*If a fascination with space provided the emotional narrative arc for Technology For The Youth, it also informed the sonic structures that his lyrics float over. The pieces are fragile and minimal, built from layers so sparse that you can almost see the stars between them, each one edged with reflective, metallic textures like the exterior surface of an orbiting rocket. *

This was the album he always hoped he would make and one that he has poured his entire heart and soul into. Retro-futuristic but undeniably human, ‘Technology For The Youth’ is electronic pop constructed from the brave ambitions of forward-thinking scientists and politicians, and the remembered hopes, dreams and fascinations of a young Dublin boy.

Francis · 2022-08-01T17:56:16.638Z

I will check this out. Great description. I usually start describing my music then fade badly and often stop mid sentence. Look forward to listening to this.

Circuit3 · 2022-08-01T21:14:07.407Z

Thank you. I had some help with that. I’m using a PR for the first time. Has made a big difference.

konputa · 2022-08-01T21:21:01.245Z

This sounds like it could be interesting. I’m done with travel for a couple days so I’ll check it out.

Circuit3 · 2022-08-02T13:14:07.073Z

Thank you - it’s the first time I’ve managed to put together a collection of songs/tracks under a single ‘vision’ and theme. I hope you enjoy it.