text=Musique Concrete. I guess this is as far back as you can go without wanting to define what defines electronic music. The idea behind this is that since every musical theory that exists has already been done before, the only thing left to explore is non-musical music theory. Fortunately, just in time for the post-war experimentalist crowd hellbent on exploring the most non-musical music ever was the emergence of technology with which to make all sorts of non-music music with. Things like magnetic tape and transistors and vacuum tubes. But if you want to know where all that shit came from, go read the tutorial. I personally think that the guys, being musicians first and technologists second, got their hands on all sorts of musical equipment that they didn't know how to use, but they were intellectual enough to bullshit their way through using it by pretending their post-modern crap compositions were really nouveau "art". Of course, in 20 years the tables would be turned: electronic music would be made by science and math nerds who didn't know a shred about music. There's probably a poignant lesson to be learned from all this, but I can't think of one without sounding like a pretentious fucktool. --