At the tail end of 1976, with the majestic Oxygene, French composer Jean-Michel Jarre became electronic music’s crown prince, savior, and rock star all rolled into one. Overflowing with lush rhythms, tasty textures, and earworm synth melodies, it earned Jarre international fame and eventually sold some 15 million copies. Four years prior, Jarre was just a scrappy young buck finding his feet in a genre that barely existed; scarcely out of his teens, he was part of the pioneering electronic music collective Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM), co-founded by legendary avant-gardists Pierre Schaeffer and Pierre Henry. By the early ‘70s, Jarre had dallied in rock, classical music, pop, and radical experimentalism, and his first album reflected it all.

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