While ze Germans usually hog all the credit for pioneering electronic music in the 60s and 70s, there was actually a rainbow coalition of northern European nutballs contributing to the rich cosmisch stew that eventually got strained down into "krautrock." Sweden's Ralph Lundsten is just one of those balls.
Raised in a tiny town north of the arctic circle, Ralph was composing quasi-religious ambient space jams on his homemade analog synths back when Kraftwerk's ancestors were still banging on bongos. These days he lives in a castle outside of Stockholm that houses all the experimental instruments he's invented over the years (including the DIMI-S, or "Sexaphone," which produces tones based on how you feel) as well as Andromeda, his space-age recording studio which looks like the control room for planet earth. It's also its very own micro-nation, which is like a regular nation but cuter! (And less internationally recognized!)
In this edition of Motherboard, VBS get our passports stamped at the Andromeda Galaxy Embassy and are welcomed into Ralph's little personal country.
Motherboard - Ralph Lundsten's Andromeda Galaxy
what a trip. totally worth the watch!
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