LIFE IN THE AGE OF WIRELESS

Perhaps in another century, Thomas Morgan Dolby Robertson would have been an explorer of science. I imagine him in an antique laboratory like another Thomas— Edison, endlessly devising, improvising, extending the limits of communication. His would be no mere dusty research, but instead a quest to discover some new way to make human connection and then make it palatable to a world of cynics, doubters and escapists.

As Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, the photograph, and the principles behind movies and tape recording, so Thomas Dolby, a hundred years later, applies light, sound and visible motion to an album neatly disguised as the latest electronic pop music. Thomas Dolby, an intently serious, pale young man who is dresed in an immaculate tan suit on a hot summer day, is providing new dimensions in response to the onslaught of synthesizer-based dance music that may seem pleasant, but can neither shill or thrill. The Golden Age Of Wireless, in a delicate, thoughtful manner, does both.