Either the person/automaton in charge of Hummer's marketing campaigns is a huge LFO fan [having now used TWO of their tracks for commercials], or Mark Bell really loves rolling in oversize SUVs that get shitty gas mileage. Hummer is obviously going for our demographic [upwardly mobile droids who enjoy bleep-y schizophrenic techno], even if this forward-thinking robot isn't a Hummer fan.

They're also trying to turn robots into car salesmen. Check out their current site with the ad they premiered during the Super Bowl, then get a load of this marketing weirdness. I guess it is possible for robots and monsters to fall in love after all.

Since I've put up this site (actually, since Styledroid convinced me to do it and got me started), I've been a big fan of Google Analytics. For those of you unfamiliar with this tool, basically it keeps track of your site statistics (how many visitors, new vs. returning visitors, keywords people used to find your site, how people find your site, etc. etc.) and allows you to see which marketing strategies are working and which aren't.

It has become my new eBay, much in the same way that I have to check it on a regular basis, just like I used to check my eBay auctions. I'm always interested in seeing which search terms people use to find RobotSound. Unsurprisingly, the most popular search so far has been for the Benni Benassi Satisfaction video. "Ninja pirate zombie robot" has also garnered several hits (see my site title bar on the home page), a strategy whose idea came from discussing the whole ninja vs. pirate debate in the office with my co-worker Qwiki, a self-proclaimed Ninja. Anyhoo, the whole reason for this post is for all the robots or robophilic creatures out there in cyberspace who are searching for actual Robot Sounds. It's interesting to consider the question of why they would be looking for such things, but be that as it may, I have put together a small collection of samples that might satisfy their needs. If anyone would like to submit a sound of their own, they can email me at dr. electro at gmail.com.

My fellow Diskotec resident Gomes has urged me to post something about Italo since we'll be playing some at our club in two weeks. But how does one define "Italo" in 2006? One might be referring to classic Italo Disco which was made in the early 80's in Italy (where Disco hadn't died, like it had in the US mainstream market) on labels like Il Discotto, Disco Magic and Lombardini. If you want a really loose definition, you can even include the rest of European Disco (Euro Disco) and US disco in the 80's (Hi-NRG). Or, one could be referring to the new strain of Italo Electro [what you could call Italotronique), put out by people like Kiko, Oxia, The Hacker, David Carretta, Black Strobe and Vitalic (the French contingent) or by artists like I-F, Alden Tyrell, Freak Electrique, Bangkok Impact and Legowelt (the Dutch contingent). In either case, you have a similar sound that relies heavily on Moroderesque-basslines, four-to-the-floor disco beats, and huge synth melodies that make you feel like an International Deejay Gigolo. What's obvious is that today's electro superstars have clearly been influenced by the electronic space disco that was popular over 20 years ago.

Here is a short list of seminal releases that are a good way of bringing some quality Italo and Italotronique into your life: