Ferrante & Teicher recorded a trio of treated piano albums for the Westminster label in the mid-'50s with kitschy space age cover art:
Soundproof,
Soundblast, and the Christmas set
Adventure in Carols.
Soundproof uses an image from the MGM motion picture Forbidden Planet on its cover to express the otherworldliness of the sounds within, which are very strange but not overtly spacy in the manner of
Walter Schumann's 1955 album
Exploring the Unknown. Any discussion of
Soundproof and
Soundblast is complicated by the fact that the mono
Soundproof has the same track list as the stereo version of
Soundblast and vice-versa. For the purposes of this review we will compare the mono versions.
Soundblast has a Latin theme, but
Soundproof is more varied, with an assortment of quiet pieces ("Greensleeves," "Baia," "Someone to Watch Over Me"), mutated boogies ("Mississippi Boogie"), and the only real reference to space in the series, "Men from Mars."
Ferrante & Teicher accomplished the album's unusual sounds by using treated pianos and electronic effects, creating something that sometimes resembles a Moog album long before such a thing existed.
Soundproof is less manic and disorienting than
Soundblast, and as a result may be slightly less desirable to listeners who want to experience the full effect of
Ferrante & Teicher's weirdness.