History of Exclusively Analogue

1991

Exclusively Analogue started life in 1991 as a way for Tony Wride to channel his expertise in analogue synthesizers. This was the age of Techno music and there was a demand for good MiniMoogs, TB303 bass lines, and other analogue synths. With a passion for restoring and repairing the old ‘classics’ Tony spent the early period of Exclusively Analogue restoring several large Moog Modular systems. He was fortunate enough to fit a MIDI kit to the Moog Modular owned by Keith Emerson, arguably one of the most famous.  Tony also worked with several well known artists and studios including Vince Clark (Erasure), The Human League, 808 State and London Beat.

1993

The first custom project by Exclusively Analogue was to build a 6 channel ‘ARP Style’ sequencer for Vince Clarke for use in his studio. This was followed by a second project, labelled “The Aviator“. This was a project Tony had always wanted to undertake and was a combination of what he considered the best parts of the ‘classics’ placed in to one powerful rack unit.  ‘The Aviator‘ took its name from Tony’s day job as an airline pilot. It was never mass produced but each of the 35 were hand built to order.

Vince Clark, Erasure, 1995 – “Tony Wride made me this superb six-channel analogue synth which we used constantly on I SAY I SAY I SAY. It’s invaluable for getting all the parts in a drum pattern, for example, up and running at the same time.”

1996

Exclusively Analogue stopped production of “The Aviator” in 1996 as Tony’s situation had changed. With promotion in his day job it meant he had less time available to devote to hand building the systems he had designed.

2012

Whilst there were regular calls for the return of “The Aviator” during the 16 year period that Exclusively Analogue had been dormant it wasn’t until early 2012 that Tony finally had the time available. He now plans to build a very limited number of “The Aviator” systems based on the original designs and has already begun work on designing and building some related systems.

2013

The first Aviator to be built in 16 years was shipped to France at the start of 2013 with additional systems due to be built throughout the year.