Sound and technology
Affordable synthesizers, effects and larger consoles expanded timbre and mixing.
ERA · KNOWLEDGE GUIDE
1970s
Explore 1970s through technology, music industries, regional scenes and representative recordings—and hear why this decade differs from those around it.
- Recordings
- 191
- Albums and releases
- 62
- Regions
- 10
THE DECADE IN CONTEXT
What happened in this decade?
Album culture, funk, disco, punk, reggae, electronic experiments and urban music scenes expanded at the same time.
People and circulation
Clubs, sound systems and neighbourhood parties created alternative routes for music to develop.
Listen by comparing
Compare a radio edit with an extended mix or dub version and follow what the producer changes over time.
Synthesizers and studio equipment spreadDisco and club culture grewEarly hip-hop practices formed at neighbourhood parties
The decade's key question
How did dance floors, studios and neighbourhoods become centres of innovation?
DJs extended and recombined records in response to dancers, studios turned mixing and effects into composition, and block parties transformed limited equipment into new performance methods. Innovation no longer belonged only to bands and concert halls.
MAJOR GENRES
Major genres of the decade
AROUND THE WORLD
Sounds from different regions
EuropeExplore local scenes and recordingsContinental EuropeExplore local scenes and recordingsNorth AmericaExplore local scenes and recordingsUnited StatesExplore local scenes and recordingsAfricaExplore local scenes and recordingsSouthern AfricaExplore local scenes and recordingsSouth AfricaExplore local scenes and recordingsCaribbeanExplore local scenes and recordingsJamaicaExplore local scenes and recordingsNew York CityExplore local scenes and recordings
ARTISTS
Representative artists
LISTENING PATH
Hear the decade through these recordings
REFINE THIS VIEWFilter recordings from the 1970s
Genre and region are combined; only options with recordings from the 1970s are shown.
ALBUMS
Representative albums and releases
DECADE GRAPH
View relationship graph1970s relationship map
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