Telex (band)

Telex
Telex at a rehearsal for the Eurovision Song Contest 1980
Background information
Origin	Brussels, Belgium
Genres	Electronic, avant-garde, dance, experimental, house, electro, synthpop, new wave, disco, post-disco
Years active	1978–2006, 2009 (hiatus in new music between 1989–2005)
Labels	RKM Disques Vogue Virgin Records Sire/Warner Bros. Records Atlantic Records EMI Records Alfa Records
Website	www.telex-music.com
Past members	Dan Lacksman Michel Moers Marc Moulin
Notable instruments
Moog synthesizer Roland TR-808

Telex was a Belgian synthpop group formed in 1978 by Marc Moulin, Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers, with the intention of "making something really European, different from rock, without guitar — and the idea was electronic music".

In 1979, mixing the aesthetics of disco, punk and experimental electronic music, they released a stripped-down synthesized cover version of "Twist à St. Tropez" by Les Chats Sauvages. They followed up with an ultra-slow cover of "Rock Around the Clock", a relaxed and dispassionate version of Plastic Bertrand's punk song "Ça Plane Pour Moi", and a mechanical cover of "Dance to the Music", originally by Sly Stone. Telex built its music entirely from electronic instruments, employing joyously irreverent humor. The group's debut album, Looking for Saint Tropez, featured the worldwide hit single "Moskow Diskow".

In 1980, Telex's manager asked the group to enter the Eurovision Song Contest. The group entered and were eventually sent to the finals, although they apparently hoped to come in last.

"We had hoped to finish last, but Portugal decided otherwise. We got ten points from them and finished on the 19th spot."—Marc Moulin

The group's song "Euro-Vision" was a cheerful bleepy song with deliberately banal lyrics about the contest itself.

For their third album, Sex, Telex enlisted the US group Sparks to help write the lyrics. However, the band still refused to play live and preferred to remain anonymous—common practice in the techno music artists the group later inspired but, nevertheless, unusual in 1981. The fourth Telex album, Wonderful World, was barely distributed. In 1986, Atlantic Records signed Telex and released the album Looney Tunes in 1988. In 1989, Telex revisited their old tracks and remixed them to resemble house music and other genres then prevalent in electronic pop. The result was Les Rythmes Automatiques, released in 1989.