Check out this amazing video of micro/click House guy, Andreas Tilliander.



Pretty cool in this day of soft synths to see a new-school guy with no DAW in sight....

But look how much gear he has running...

    

Came across Boards of Canada Old tunes Vol. 1 & 2 (~1995, but I believe older than that) recently and I'm simply blown away. Classic Boards of Canada that many may have heard from the Skam releases, but two things definitely stood out. The humor and levity and the amount of tunes here (60+)...

I do feel a bit ill-at-ease with having gotten these through questionable sources (I'm firmly against piracy), but more so because this music wasn't intended to be released outside of their circle of friends. Oh well.

Lots of interesting stuff in here. Early versions of other tracks, pieces that were reintroduced later on Music Has the Right to Children, funny samples. Really, really cool stuff. And I most certainly hear a WaveStation on Magic Teens.

BoC definately suffered a post-IDM backlash (wow, are we post-IDM now). I'm reminded of an interview with Matthew Herbert, wherein he told us he was "bored of Canada." mmhmmm....

Regardless, this is the stuff that keeps me going. And it still sounds fresher than more than half the stuff out there now...

But I do feel a little guilty. I think I'll send them a copy of my vinyl release. Fewer people have probably heard that!

    

I'm addicted to ebay. That's just a fact of life, but when I see something like this I know I'm not the one with the problem.

I was involved in an auction for an Oberheim Strummer, a simple piece of kit that performs various functions on midi data to make your incoming data sound more guitar like. It's something that could easily be created in Logic's environment or Ableton's midi racks... Regardless, I'm a big proponent of trying everything old again, if for no other reason than to discover a sound/technique you may not have experienced. It's also interesting to recontextualize retro gear in today's thinking.

Here's a description of said device:

Your keyboard may have a great guitar sound, but can you play a great guitar part?

Yes. The Oberheim Strummer will transform your keyboard playing into a stunning and convincing performance featuring realistic guitar articulation. By looking at such factors as the range of the guitar. the number of notes being played. chord position, and the velocity of the performance. Strummer can transform the incoming MIDI data out into performance data emulating that of a real guitarist. Performance data may be delayed, echoed, harmonized, transposed and sent back out on multiple MIDI channels. In addition to control over strum direction and speed, the Strummer also features Chord Capture for real time single finger chords. Individual picking patterns and riffs may be assigned to a single key. for real time performance playback. You can even control the number of "strings" being strummed via keyboard velocity. Strummer Keyboard players now can emulate guitar techniques on their synthesizers and samplers to create incredibly authentic guitar sounds. The Strummer listens to chords played on a MIDI keyboard and plays them back through a MIDI sound source (synthesizer or sampler) just as they would be played from a guitar. Chord voicings will now be correct to accurately reproduce guitar sounds and the chords can actually be "strummed".

The Strummer can change the speed and direction of the "strums" just by changing the way the keyboard is played. Also, the Strummer has the ability to distinguish between chords and single notes, allowing chords to be sent over one MIDI channel, while single notes are sent out over a different channel (like a solo lead guitarsound).

In addition, the Strummer includes many other important features:
· MIDI Delay (Echo)
· Adjustable delay and decay rates
· Multiple MIDI channel output
· Velocity switching
· Keyboard splitting
· Chord voicing variations
· Arpeggiation
· Chord Capture (adjustable single finger chords)
· Transposition of MIDI delay (great for MIDI harmonizing)
· Synchronizes to MIDI timing clocks (External Sync)
· MIDI program changes
· Supports MIDI Sysex for storage transfer of user defined patches

So I've got my snipe in at a whooping $76, a fairly high price for something so outdated....

Well, how ridiculous is it that a bidding war ensues and it goes for $310!

In the course of 6 minutes they walk it up from $55 to $310. Unbelievable! I'll be watching this seller to see if he relists, as no one in their right mind would pay that... oh, free-darnell, do you know something I don't?

    

via Harmory-central:

The much-anticipated and much-talked-about Moog Guitar will debut at Summer NAMM in Nashville. The Moog Guitar is "a fantastic axe designed to be played by the best musicians in the world," says Moog Music President Mike Adams.

According to Adams, The Moog Guitar opens the guitarist to a whole new musical vocabulary: "It's not a guitar synthesizer; not a MIDI guitar; not an effects processor," Adams said. "The guitarist is intimately connected to The Moog Guitar because it works its magic on the strings themselves." See the attached FAQ for additional details.

The first public demonstration of The Moog Guitar will be at the Moog Guitar Showcase, featuring Kenny Vaughn and Fareed Haque with Garaj Mahal. The Moog Guitar Showcase will take place at Nashville's renowned 3rd and Lindsley on Friday, June 20 from 7:00 - 9:00 p.m. Tickets are $10.

The Moog Guitar will be demonstrated to media at NAMM at a press conference at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, June 21 in Moog Music's NAMM Booth 2030.

The first ever Moog Guitar will be the limited edition Paul Vo Collector Edition Guitar. The AAAAA maple top guitar with a mahogany body and ebony finger board will be a much sought-after axe even without the addition of the patented Moog electronics. Each guitar will be individually signed by Moog associate and guitar inventor Paul Vo and will carry a sealed Certificate of Authenticity identifying it as the first ever Moog Guitar.

Got to admit the colors are ghastly....

    

I've been trolling Youtube for old 70's TV promos that feature synthy bits.. why? I have no idea, but the results are fun.

First up, how about a minute and a half of variations on a theme for sister stations under the Post-Newsweek umbrella:



Well ain't that something. I love the whistle-y/theremin-y patch. How the heck did they make those graphic back then any how?

Next, a childhood favorite:



That sounds like a Prophet-5 to me. I have a nearly identical factory patch a Six-trak. Definately curtis chips...

Sadly, PBS decided to go with a glissando, plucked logo treatment in the 80's, but The Anneberg/CPB Project and EFC productions kept it real:



Let's not forget the grandaddy of all PBS stations, WGBH BOSTON:



And the grandaddy of all media, VIACOM. Interesting how the synths move from RCA/Columbia lab coat roomsized modular to Moog 70's to DX7 to Wavetable to VST. A bit of synth history in this one:



And a mega-mix, of a ton of logos, some synthy, other not so much. This really illustrates, for me, the nature of composing for logos. You've got to make a big impact in a short amount of time. It's really no wonder that agencies turned to electronic composers for their treatments.



Not a whole lot of synth work in this, but how could I exclude this GEM:

    

While perusing craigslist DC, I see that Deep Dish is selling their studio. Whether or not you are a fan of their tunes, I always love reading about what gear people use. Wonder what they'll be using now...And why ever get rid of a Jupiter 6?!

House music superstars Deep Dish are moving to a new location and a smaller setup! They're selling tons of great gear. All equipment was used in their private smoke-free studio and can most likely be heard on every Deep Dish record made in the past couple of years! Pictures available upon request although all gear is in IMMACULATE condition!


Mackie 32x8 Mixer
Mackie D8B Digital Mixer
Pioneer DJM-1000 DJ Mixer

Yamaha NS-10 Monitors x2
Genelec 1031a Monitors x2
FBT Monitors x2
EV Speaker x1
Genelec Subwoofer

Kurzweil K2500RS Sampler x4
Korg Triton Rack
Waldorf Q Synth
Roland Jupiter 6 Synth
Roland CompuRhythm Rhythm Machine
Studio Electronics SE-1 Synth

Line 6 POD pro
Line 6 POD
Lexicon MPX-500
Roland Chorus Echo
Pioneer EFX-1000
Mutronics Mutator
t.c. electronics - D-Two Delay
t.c. electronics - finalizer

Tascam CD-RW2000
Pioneer CDJ-1000 x2
Technics 1201 x2
Lacie CD-RAM??
Sony PCM -R500 DAT
Tascam 302 Tape Deck

Apple 23” Cinema Display
Dell Monitor
Samsung Syncmaster 17”
Fender Jazz Bass
Studio 4 MIDI Interface x2
M-Audio Radium 49
Neutrik Patchbay x3
Presonus Central Station
Emagic Unitor 8
Art SP 4x4 Powerconditioner x4
Rack Rider Powerconditioner x1
Digidesign Digi002 x2
MOTU 2408 mkII x3
UAD-1 PCI Card

all REASONABLE offers considered!

    

I'm no stranger to modding gear, as I love the opportunity to do so. I've modded Boss Pedals, a Korg EX-800, and built my own guitar, so when I recently acquired a new guitar; things were inevitable.

In the next few weeks I'll be blogging about the transformation of this:

I'm going to replace the pickups with a Lace Sensors (a somewhat trendy-in-the-nineties, now out-of-fashion) set of pickups, a new wiring scheme called a Fat-O-Caster (allows 11 pickup combinations), a synth pickup (going to drive all my synths)  and a tortoise pickguard (I like it).

I'm very much looking forward to playing pizzicato violin arpeggios with it.

    

So moog is about to unveil the Moog Guitar.

From a blog post that is getting the rounds:

The guitar utilizes built-in ebows - I'm not sure how many are built into the guitar however there is a least one per string. As many readers here know, the ebow imparts energy to a string to set it into vibration and keep it vibrating forever. The engineers at Moog took things to another level -- for ebow technology can do the opposite: it can be used to remove energy from a string, too. Each string is independently settable - some can sustain, others can sound in the normal (unsustained manner), others can produce a staccatto pluck in fact, one of the sounds is a strum followed by a bow.

Allow me to speculate....

Could Moog have built a guitar that allows control over amplitude, resonance, envelope of each string independently.

How far from a normal synth would this be? The obvious question is whether they waveshape the strings to produce sawtooth, square or pulse waves. Regardless, it seems that a lot of synth tones could easily be produced. LFO's would be a snap (even square & pulse). ASDR envelops would also be a snap. Long attacks with long releases or really short releases without physically muting the strings.

And let's not forget that the oscillators are guitar strings, so we aren't talking a cheap-sounding Rompler here. Can't wait to see if this is anything like I imagine.

One more piece of speculation: MSRP $2999.99

Can't wait!

    

The folks over at Hack-a-Day have just posted a how-to on making your own digital synth. I may have to break out that breadboard I got for Christmas.

Go here

    

Check out this awesome Korg catalog circa 1984. I got this one with yet another ebay purchase of some obsolete drum machine no one cares about...

PS-3200 with "tone color memory" no less...

    

Just acquired a few more pieces from Ebay: a Kawai K3m, a digital wave synth with real analog filters and envelopes (yummy), and a Casio VZ-8m, a really digital synth with nothing analog about it. Being the sadist that I am, I love reading through the manuals, but alas, ain't got none.

Then comes Mark S. Glinsky to save the day. He has manuals in pdf form for a few bucks each... Highly recommended.

    

I love everything about this promo for the KLF's ill-fated movie for the album "The White Room," particularly the way the pedal steel mixes with the rest of the track and complements the imagery perfectly.

From the comments:

"The guitar for Madrugada Eterna was originally recorded at a party at Trancentral in summer 1989. It's by "Evil" Graham Lee, of Australian band the Triffids. His improvisations were recorded direct onto Cauty's mixing deck, who then turned them into a dance choon. A proposed single released in March 1990 fell through, sadly"

Some musing from Graham Lee from his site pedalsteeling.com:

"The pedal steel is a recent invention - a steel that we'd recognize as the same beast played today was not seen until the sixties. It was developed to solve a basic steel guitar problem - that slanted bar positions were required for anything other than standard chords on a non pedal guitar. If you used a major tuning you'd have to slant the bar to get your minors (or use two note formations). Extra strings, extra necks tuned differently - all these were tried and resulted in some wonderful instruments and playing styles that persist to this day.But the first time we really got to hear the pedal steel was through the medium of Bud Isaacs. In November, 1953 he played on a session for Webb Pierce. The song was the beautiful Slowly and Bud used the string bending from his single pedal not simply as a way to avoid a slanted bar, but as an integral part of the melody. Jaws dropped and lightbulbs went off. Steel players headed out to their sheds and began dismantling sewing machines, tinkering with their steels so they could get with the programme."

In my opinion, the pedal steel is the most beautiful sounding instrument ever when in the hands of a master.

Update: You can hear the original version here, if you never have.

    

We've started selling loops on Beathive. Check them out!

You can click the TrackPack icon to audition individual loops.

• Good, Bad and The Badass: Ennio Morricone inspired beats. I used some production techniques to get the french horns to sound old and crusty, as if sampled from vinyl.

• Brooklyn Nights: 6/8 might be the greatest time signature ever. Smoothed out sounds.

Anyone have experience with BeatHive, either has a user or a producer?

    

Every week or so, I'm going to try to post a technique that will provide a unique way of approaching your music studio to create unexpected results.

I'm naming this series Oblique Strategies after the Brian Eno & Peter Schmidt card set of the same name. In short, they created the card to be an indispensable tools for busting artists' block; the idea being, that if you are stuck-in-a-rut, you simply pull out a card and do what it says.

Well, I'm going to attempt to simplify it a bit (if it can get more simple than "Use an old idea"), after all it was Eno that said too many options is a bad thing.

So here goes...

This is a old technique that many may be familiar with, but I enjoy it nonetheless, quite simply:

• Get a drum machine (or drum machine softsynth with a midi out)
• Send all the midi events to a synth of your choice
  
• Dial up some patterns and mix the drums and synth together

Sound lame? Try another.

Now many may be thinking, "Isn't this just a lame, limited sequencer, with results that I could replicate in about two seconds in my DAW?"

Well, yes, but the patterns were (hopefully) created for drums and you weren't thinking about key signatures and proper musical counterpoint, so experiment. It's good enough to create some loops that can be chopped up and re-organized, or at least provide a jumping off point for something else.



It's going to work better on synth patches that have long release times, or short attack times, give it a try.

    

How good of a name for a music/sound design company blog is that?

We'll be using this space to share interesting finds related to music and sound design.

We'll also be showcasing some demos of vintage gear, tools, techniques and the like...