circuit bending
Latest
Unearthed Circuits' Drone Machine could replace your Dalek band
If you like your music -- and we mean you really like your music -- with plenty of beeps and buzzes, the gang at Unearthed Circuits have a little something that'll be right up your proverbial alley (especially if your name is La Monte Young and that alley is in New York City, ca. 1963). The Drone Machine is a synth that allows you to control each of four oscillators via the joystick. It's got pitch knobs, photo-resistors, a strobe circuit, and a handful of effects, including: overdrive, fuzz, and a ring modulator. Ready to get your avante-noise band off the ground? You've been talking it up for years now. But first, check out the video of the thing in action after the break.
Video: Furby Gurdy makes "music," trips you out
The Nervous Squirrel's Furby Gurdy (version 2) isn't the first music maker we've seen that's better understood when viewed during an out-of-body experience, but it's certainly one of the strangest. The circuit bent Furby sequencer, which is linked to a Korg SQ-10 in the demonstration vid after the break, combines centuries-old musical methods with some of the strangest characters to ever grace planet Earth. We could talk for hours on end and still not do this thing justice, so just click through and mash play to see what we're referring to. We're warning you, though -- we haven't seen anything this weird since Smash Mouth's lead singer showed up at an Intel press event.[Via Hack-A-Day]
Pikachu! Use Deafening Racket!
Kaseo's Yellow Mouse Orchestra is a cacophonous array of circuit-bent Pikachu toys wired up to a MIDI controller, allowing Kaseo to turn the critter's trademark self-namechecking to create musical compositions. The result sounds oddly chiptune-like, despite being made from voice samples. The video above is a pretty listenable rendition of another Y.M.O. (Yellow Magic Orchestra) song. Hit the "source" link to hear a live performance, which is a lot less coherent.The Y.M.O. is just one of the components of Kaseo's army of cyborg Pikachus. He also has a spikey Bent Pikachu Limited Edition, whose squeals have been turned into reasonably evil-sounding industrial-esque noise.[Via Boing Boing Gadgets]
The CellularRecombomat: a cellular automata video synth that plays itself
When von Neumann created the first system of cellular automata in the '40s it was purportedly to study self-replicating robots. It's taken this long for someone to finally figure out his true intentions: powering trippy video synthesizers. Enter the CellularRecombomat, a masterful example of circuit bending featuring a VTECH Lesson One, a Zenith portable DVD player, and cellular automata circuit board from synth extraordinaire Critter and Guitari. The genetic parameters (algorithm, width across the grid, and generation lifespan) are adjusted by three antenna-mounted optical sensors based on what's happening on the screen, meaning this thing effectively plays itself. But, for a little hands-on manipulation, the silver spheres on either side can be touched and caressed to "freak out the video sync and audio in wondrous ways." Check out a video of those wondrous ways on display after the break. [Via MAKE]
12 circuit bent Pikachu make beautiful music
We're not quite sure what sort of cacophony is produced by this 12 Pikachu orchestra, but honestly... how could you go wrong with this many narcissistic pocket monsters all in one place? Mr. RUN DMC (aka Kaseo) and his circuit bent army here recently performed their various noises in Tokyo, Japan, and if you head on over to his site you can peep the rest of his circuit bending projects, along with with the freaky noises and video of a singular circuit "bent" Pikachu, which is pictured after the break.[Via MAKE]
Music Thing: The Glitchdesk
Each week Tom Whitwell of Music Thing highlights the best of the new music gear that's coming out, as well as noteworthy vintage equipment: Circuit Bending, as I'm sure you know, is when you crack open a Speak & Spell or an old Casio keyboard and poke wires into the innards until it sounds freaky. It's one of those things that's fun to do and fun to talk about, although the enjoyment often ends when the music starts.Highly Liquid build high-end circuit bent instruments. They'll take an old Casio SK1 keyboard and turn it into an aluminium keytar with switches on the neck, or they'll sell you a kit to add a MIDI interface to a Speak & Spell. Their new thing is the Glitchdesk system. $249 gets you a big banana jack patchbay, with some clever extras. You (or more likely Mr. Highly Liquid) take your TR-505, or Speak & Math or whatever and run all the contact points out to an RS232 socket. You can plug that into the back of your Glitchdesk, and get instant MIDI control over the bends. It seems like a cool idea, and a pretty reasonable price, given the amount of development work that must have gone into it. However, Circuit Benders tend to be a pretty serious crowd, and they're outraged about the prospect of anyone spending $249 when they could just solder the thing together themselves, and break out some worms.
