DVD Review: "Moog"

An electrical engineer with mad scientist hair, a nerd shirt and a pocketful of pens: One of the great musical minds of the 20th century. Who'dve thunk?

But that was Robert Moog, inventor of the synthesizer that bears his frequently mispronounced last name (it rhymes with "vogue"). Just flip on the radio and you'll hear his influence. His invention, for the first time, put the ability to create electronic music into the hands of the masses.

Musicians and music producers went nuts about the first Moog when it was introduced in the late 1960s--some because they thought the machine could replace expensive session musicians, others because they wanted to create heretofore unheard sounds.

And while the electronic and computerized instruments heard on songs today may not be directly Moog derived, they certainly come by it indirectly. He opened the door to both technological and musical innovation.

This film, made by director Hans Fjellstad, shortly before Moog's August 2005 death, does a great job showing how it all went down. And it doubles as a remarkable piece of history. When before have we been able to view an inventor talking directly to those who use his invention, as we see Moog doing here?

There are great scenes of Moog visiting with French composer Gershon Kingsley (remember the music from Disney's "Electrical Parade" and the hit "Popcorn"?), P-Funk's Bernie Worrell and prog rocker Keith Emerson (yeah, there was a downside to Dr. Moog's machine...)

Moog himself comes across as mildly eccentric but down to earth and humble. Scenes from his lab and his explanations of how the synthesizer works are fascinating.

There are a few missing pieces of course. It would've been nice to see more attention given to other prominent Moogists such as Walter/Wendy Carlos (whose Switched on Bach made Moog a household name), the Beatles (the Moog is all over Abbey Road) and Stevie Wonder (who made the Moog funky), but that's no reason not to highly recommend a thoroughly entertaining and informative film.