The strange story of the KeyToSound synth

Here’s a strange story. This eBay Auction is for one of the only prototypes of the KeyToSound synth – a Danish-designed hardware synth with a large touch screen and some kind of internet connectivity to trade patches and MIDI files. It’s being sold by the musician Gaeoudjiparl/Goodiepal. Looks like a very cool box, from around 1999, when it was expected to cost around £6,000. Key To Sound still exist, and develop the iNet Synth which seems to be a strangely-marketed software synth. They used to be Koblo, an early soft synth developer. On the auction page: Item #7353185962 are links to a series of entertaining and bizarre MP3 files of Goodiepal himself telling stories about the synth and it's history, including a mysterious American investor, and Max (who seems to run Key To Sound), who gets a special message all to himself. By 2003, the thing had become the NetSynth, a similar looking thing mounted in a rack with a separate control interface - claiming to have 128 oscillators, 64 filters and 80 envelopes.
If you’re wondering who Goodiepal is, here is a description of a recent gig in London: “Mr Scandinavia (I believe he is from the Faroe Islands) did a hell of a lot of whistling whilst moving toy planets around a graph paper. He then produced his mechanical bird which continued his whistling through the PA to sound like sitting outside on a summer's day. He then went back to his music box and whistling, now moving small bells around the graph paper along with the toy planets. To be blunt, it was terrible.”

Posted by Tom Whitwell.

Comments:

You might also be interested in Goodiepal's last record... http://www.discogs.com/release/467338

It's truly bizarre, I'll try and get some photos up...

# posted by

Anonymous : 11:38 pm

Well, this equipment looks a little too hi-tech for me, but I have to say Koblo was rad. The Vibra was the first cool real-time computer synth I got to play with on my new G3 233. I still drag it out e'ery now and then and boy does it sqwawk.

# posted by

Anonymous : 11:55 pm

Just wanted to let everyone know that this thing will soon be in good hands (mine) and that I do intend to let anyone who cares know what it's like as soon as I receive it and have had the time to figure it out.

If you want to get in touch about this thing, I have a gmail.com account called modularsynth.

# posted by

Anonymous : 9:58 pm

Seriously, the Vibra synths are possibly still my favorite sounding soft synths. I have an old iMac sitting next to my G5 JUST so I can use the Vibra from time to time on a track. The filters on the thing are just heavenly.

# posted by

Anonymous : 9:44 pm

GoodiePal - right! His art is way to advanced for anyone to comprehend this millennium, but give it some more time, it will either sink in and you'll get it, or it will get old really quick. It got old for me really quick, just like all of Goodiepal offerings (professional and quasi-entertaining).

I'm a good friend of Max, and also have worked with him to get KeyToSound where it is today. If you have any questions regarding the role of Goodiepal (and why he's soooo upset with Max) please contact me at jason at keytosound dot com.

Also - for those who are still koblo and vibra fans, drop me a line if you're interested in some secret information about these products.

Thank you. jsnwolf

# posted by

Anonymous : 3:01 pm