Iconic Synth Riffs -- Can you think of any?
 

Here it is, the potentially longest running thread in the history of Internet forums, emerging as newborn before your eyes yet totally dependent on you for it's survival :) Post now if you got one, post later if you think of one. There are no correct answers or notion of right or wrong, there is no prize money to be had. If doesn't even need to be a riff by definition, the keyword here is really iconic. Some synth part of a song that you always notice when you hear it, and it reminds you why you involved yourself with synths in the first place. Identifying the actual instrument used is not required but highly encouraged with the research tools we have in front of us today. Even if it doesn't sound as good on a modern ipod or youtube or whatever as it did back in the day on vinyl (let's face it, it's sometimes hard to bring the true sound back over sound media that it wasn't originally optimized for), throw it out there and see what happens. Links to the song containing riff in question also not required but encouraged?

Many examples come to my mind, but I don't want to bogart the thread, so I'll throw one out just to get us started, and will circle back to post more later:

"Let Me Go" - Heaven 17... their use of that TB-303 was an early example of "wubawub" bass that a lot of folks now think is something new:

As far as I can tell, this is the version most of us are familiar with (the song not the video playing here):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2FmWZSQoG0

Original 12" (not the radio version most remember but highlights the TB303):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj8GBas6AJs

Quickly turned into modern trance track (like with UmpteePhooPhee BeePeeEms! wooooooo):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SetP4hyzdA

Old geezers coming back at it, with a JP-8000 on stage no less. Makes me feel good that I don't look my age yet ... My dad has held up better than this :)
:) : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH8kN5g_2ec

Well thanks a lot for reminding me about awkward high school disco moments...You bastard! Had my tops & almost fingers to this tune ;)

Hehe.. Its amazing how warm that TB line sounds on a decent setup.. most of the times when I hear that tune (like in those vids, on SiriusXM in my car, or Pandora on the phone etc.) so much of the original fidelity is lost. Heaven 17 wasn't even a particularly great band but that track is definitely memorable.

Van Halen
 

Jimp-1984

I think this qualifies as a synth riff-

-dj

Yep, and a very iconic one at that, the good old Oberheim OB-Xa

Well the whole album is brilliant but this part does it for me every time...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DDEl...1F37861E622D6A

Steve Winwood
 

I love this one as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j6g_uUhH2c

-dj

Love this one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lza2H-fj5Es

This track really takes me back, and if the lead isn't an iconic riff I don't know what is. I just wish I could find out what Geoff Downs used. I'm sure its accurately identified out there on the interwebs somewhere, but I have not been able to find it.

To me it sounds like a DX7, which I think would be about right for the day, although a brass lead like that could have come out of many synths from that era without revealing what it's made on.

Here's a live performance of the song but I can't make out what board he is using, definitely doesn't look like a DX7.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mqfSkeSarw

Ahh yes, played there first self titled album over & over. One of the supergroup's that worked for a time ;)

And how about that video, how fucking epically historic is it to have so many watt consuming CRTs stacked atop each other? With LCDs, that's something that the average play station gamer has in their bedroom these days, yet back then was financially unapproachable.. not just from the fact that most folks didn't have a neighborhood store that had enough of the exact same TV in inventory to even pull that off -- or the fact that the TV's themselves would have been something like six grand in todays money, or the fact that the power consumption would have shut down a Detroit auto-making plant :) Also gymnast cameltoe was pushing the limits of sexy back then. haha

But I digress, the 80's culture nostalgia is one thing and great synth riffs are another. There was some stuff out of the 80's that clearly sucked, but every time I hear this one play I turn it up.