Franz Ferdinand are posting video diaries on their website as they record their new album in Scotland (here's how the recorded the last one). They're very entertaining little films, showing that not much work is being done. In one, guitarist Nick McCarthy sets off into the countryside with a laptop and an M Box to "record a river and see what it sounds like backwards". In another, Alex Kapranos tries to demonstrate their Ackuset gear, which he says is the key to the Franz sound. But it doesn't work. Ackuset were a Swedish music company who built great-looking tape delays. Franz also have an Acuset mixer, which Alex says is one of only 7 in the world, four of which aren't working. Does anyone know why the Ackuset mixer is so special?
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Zelle are a jewellery company, who make a huge range of fantastically geek-friendly products, like a necklace made of ¼" jack plugs, MIDI plug keychains and best of all the gold microprocessor bling necklace. But lurking at the bottom of their online catalogue page is this Electronic Musician's Emergency Adapters Kit - a $60 bag of bits and pieces. The idea is that "When Radio Shack is closed, you'll feel confident that you can handle any venue's crazy sound system setup".
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$699 gets you one Fliptone, a fantastically sexy-looking acoustic guitar amp in an aluminium briefcase, with rechargable batteries, digital effects and a flat-panel speaker. If you see a busker on the way home from work tonight, give them a twenty - they'll be saving for one of these. (via Harmony Central)
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A guy in Mississippi is making and selling condenser mics out of beer cans. He's got a Pabst Blue Ribbon one for sale (currently at $15). It must be pretty hard to design and build your own condenser mic, and he's not getting much for his labours. The last Pabst sold for $24.99, although a Schlitz went for $51... (via TapeOp)
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The Bent 2005 festival is a four-day festival of circuit bending. The full schedule is here. Random highlight: "Touch it! The Suzuki Omnichord” workshop with Joker Nies" (via Make)
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This is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time. I was planning to keep quiet and bid myself, but the seller will only ship it to Germany. It's a Wersi CX-1 Drum Computer, which looks incredible and is a combo analog drum machine and auto-rhythm machine. The two mp3 samples are awesome: Rhythms and basslines. So, if you missed out on the Movement Drum Computer that sold on eBay for $3,300 a couple of weeks back and you live within driving distance of Paderbom, Germany, then 1st May could be your lucky day. Currently, it's just €55.
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You decide: Spend three minutes watching Dennis Madalone's America We Stand As One, which has convinced me that music is, in fact, inherently evil. OR, spend 45 minutes listening to this Radio 4 play about Delia Derbyshire, the genius British producer/musician/engineer who made the Dr Who theme music and lots of other things (scroll down a bit, it's at 13:00). Then, read more about Delia here. (Thanks, Bing and Jon)
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JD writes to tell me about BoSSA, the 'bowed speaker array' that's been built at Princeton: "This is a polyhedral ("spherical") speaker array that incorporates some kind of bowed interface to produce ungodly electronic noise/chamber music." The site has lots of video, sound and pictures. It's well worth a look, and considerably more original and musical than the everyday 'For my art project I strapped a MIDI interface to a
If your cult effects pedals box is looking a bit empty, you could do worse than pick up a Maestro Rhythm'n'Sound - a very weird guitar pedal with built in rhythms, fuzz and octave. Inevitably, the Beastie Boys and Crystal Method have used these, and it may or may not have the same Fuzz circuit as the Maestro Fuzztone, which was used on Satisfaction by the Stones. (Thanks, Brandon)
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Chay from Kingston-on-Thames has built a self-powered speaker and amp into a normal police cone. He says: "I'm sure you are wondering 'how does it sound?' In a word, shit. However in its favour it is very loud, presents music quite acceptably, and is perhaps a little controversial." He's also built some kind of CD playing robot, . Good work, Chay. The world salutes you. (Thanks Simon!)
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It's the sort of thing you normally see in a VEMIA auction: One person is currently selling two Fairlights (currently at £102 for the Series 2 and £52 for the series 3), one Synclavier (already £1,120) and a Maplin ETI 4600 (which as any Music Thing reader knows, is a big modular designed by Kim Ryrie, who went on to design... the Fairlight.)
Nothing sounds quite like an ice cream van, and this post on EM411 left me wondering how they work. This is what I found: 
3) Modern chimes, like the Micro Miniatures Harmony 64, have dozens of melodies burnt onto a chip, and can play 3-note harmonies, and have a built-in 37.5 watt amplifier to drive the horn. It costs about £220.
If you didn't find the Headphone Porn or Hi-fi Porn exciting, then perhaps this will do it for you: ultraman6996 is a Japanese seller with a LOT of really expensive old music gear for sale on eBay at the moment (including a $30,000 Roland modular). Most of his auctions are straightforward, but his Akai MPCs are photographed being demonstrated by a girl in a swimsuit and stilletos, as you can see from this picture. There's more here and here. (Thanks, Matt)
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Niall writes with bad news about the Soundart Chameleon (a very well-regarded universal DSP box, like a big brother of the Chiclet). It seems they've stopped developing the Chameleon MK2, and are going into 'hibernation' after selling off the last few Chameleons they have left. Having only sold 500 units, it looks like the forces of economics have closed in. More Details.
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Slash writes: "I figure many would like to see these drum pictures." I'd agree. They're of a 1920s gold-plated, engraved snare drum. We don't have enough drum stuff on MT, so if you have any stories, get in touch!
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Jay writes to tell me about Dewanatron, an art/music duo who build very cool-looking synths, but claim they are "a family of instruments which hazard unpredictable behaviors and self playing tendencies. They make all previous and future instruments obsolete.." As Jay says: "I don't quite see where the unpredictability and such come from, except that the controls are all unlabeled". Dewanatron's pretensions continue on the 'About' page: "The operators begin a process which develops into a shape beyond the operator's authorship; the operators become gardeners, watering and pruning, mulching and composting sound. The music becomes a contrapuntal morass." You can hear that contrapuntal morass here. Mainly bleeps, some bloops.
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This great post explains how a PS2 game called 'Singstar Party' comes with a USB mic input which works on a Mac. Best of all, you can buy the thing on eBay for next to nothing. (Thanks, Mikey)
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Line6 have just released their Workbench software for their Variax guitars, which has been delayed since 31st March 2004 when it was first announced. Workbench lets you build virtual custom guitars which can be downloaded into one of their Variax digital guitars. It lets you tweak the thing right down to the kind of capacitors used in the volume and tone controls.
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I was reading about the Deck Keyboard, and looked at the site for it's parent company, TG3 Electronics. Forget that DX-1 DIY keyboard, I want a huge white medical keyboard with built-in trackball, scroll wheels, LCDs and faders. This page is a world of multi-coloured, reversed-out, built-in-monitor keyboard craziness.
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Anthony writes: "I remember in the early nineties, when people would tell me that you could get 303's for pennies back in the mid 80s, and I'd only half believe them. They weren't lying. Today, I received a 1986 copy of Sounds magazine. In the back, there's an ad for Soho Soundhouse (now better known as Turnkey)." The last three TB303s on Ebay sold for and $1025, £600 and $1875 (that one came with a TR606).
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This .wmv video shows Alari Thierry's Scratchophone in action, at a hip hop event in London last weekend. It looks like the thing really works. I'd love to see a marching band of DJs scratching in harmony like a samba school.
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My New Thing is a new regular MT feature. If you've bought something interesting and/or cheap, why not write in with a pic and some sound samples and a story? This week, John has a beauty... 
I intend to run it through a Boss Loopstation to generate thunderous electronic applause at gigs."
Michael writes about the The Ergodex DX-1 - a $149 custom-configurable keyboard system, with up to 50 keys, positioned however you want them on a base station. "They talk about it as, and it is marketed as, a gaming controller," says Michael. "I don't know about YOU, but I don't see a gaming controller! Bundle this MF with Live."
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I've been enjoying the Dream DJ Furniture series over at CDM, but this is the ultimate studio accessory: Red Hot Rock Shop sells three-sheet posters (6' x 9') of 150,000 fans at an un-named rock festival for £29.97. Obviously a crowd that size is a step down for most MT readers, but it's atmospheric nevertheless. [Product Page]
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The other morning, I got a Cracklebox through the post from Steim (thanks, Michel). It's a very nice thing, and I thought I should share it, so I recorded this sample pack for the Freesound Project. If you can make anything musical from the samples, then a) you're an awful lot cleverer than me, and b) I'd love to hear it.
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Thanks to 'Rude 66' on Analogue Heaven for finding this [15mb WMV] - the legendary video for
Frank writes from Kent: "I've been a gigging musician since the late seventies and have never came across a magnetized drum echo device before." He's just spotted this Fender Soundette from 1967/8, which used a spinning magentic disk, rather than a loop of tape, for delay effects (with a cool little orange window to watch the disk spinning.) There's a nice page about the Soundette here. Thanks, Frank!
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Spotted by Paul on the Analogue Heaven mailing list on Till Kopper's website, it's Klaus Schulze playing in Linz in 1980. The big modular in the background sold on eBay a couple of weeks ago for £14,000.
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Trent Reznor has released the original studio multitrack from his new single: "What I'm giving you in this file is the actual multi-track audio session for 'The Hand That Feeds.' This is the entire thing bounced over from the actual Pro Tools session we recorded it into. I imported and converted the tracks into AppleLoop format so the size would be reasonable and the tempo flexible." Details here, actual 70mb download here. Now, can someone strip out the sound files, so non-Mac users can have some fun? (Thanks to everyone who sent this in)
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Swedish boutique synth makers Elektron have announced a new version of Machinedrum called Userwave, with basic sampling capabilities. It costs €1590 and has just 2mb of memory and 12bit samples. They say: "memory is limited for ROM/flash so you need to think about what you put in there. No endless sample library to stop creativity." Elektron have always been controversial. They sell synths whose specs could be duplicated by spending $50 on eBay (simple FM, SID synths etc), but cost £1,000+. Very importantly, everyone who has ever used one seems to say they're fantastic (I once spent some time with a MonoMachine. It was pretty baffling, but sounded like nothing else and definitely an expensive, well-made thing.) This slightly bad-tempered thread over at EM411 catches the debate pretty well. 'Djugel' points out that nobody complains about a £1,000 guitar which really does have the same paper spec as a £69 guitar.
Long-time friend of MT Wiley Wiggins has just launched Video Thing which does for video tech/gadget stuff what MT does for music tech/gadget stuff. Highlights of his first dozen posts include: a circuit bent PXL2000, a cute singing kid, an amazing pocket-sized video projector, a mad 360° panoramic video and, obviously, some Analog Video Synthesizers. It looks like a brilliant site, so scoot over to videothing.blogspot.com and pay him a visit.
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And the award for 'Best music-related visual aid' goes to: This page about compression and mastering and why 'Livin La Vida Loca' is the loudest record ever made...
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My New Thing is a new regular MT feature. If you've bought something interesting and/or cheap, why not write in with a pic and some sound samples and a story?
Some highlights of the current VEMIA auction of old and geek-friendly instruments, with current prices:
Thanks to Create Digital Music for opening my eyes to headphone fetishists. They seem to hang out at Headph0ne Phet1sh, collecting pictures of girls in recording studios, radio studios, and the like. I'd imagine that this video (it's just about safe for work) is pretty much the headphone porn motherlode, but I can't really see who's going to get off on this (very safe for work) video of women sitting in listening booths. If you're a headphone fetishist, why not get in touch and write about it for MT?
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David writes from Canada: "Here in Amerique du Nord we get these late-night TV infomercials for guitars by this guy named Esteban. They are astonishingly terrible displays of shameless ludicrousity." Esteban appears on the Home Shopping Network. This is his homepage there, selling four types of guitar and two types of Esteban fragrance. HSN claim that Esteban is an "internationally reknowned guitar virtuoso." This brilliant feature by Gilbert Garcia from the Phoenix New Times tells a different story. 
Esteban is actually Stephen Paul, the 58 year-old son of a steel worker from Pittsburgh. He first appeared on HSN in November 1999, and by July 2001 he was selling 56,000 CDs in a week. How did Stephen become Esteban? He spent an uncertain amount of time in the 1970s with Spanish guitar legend Andrés Segovia, who he claims gave him the name 'Esteban' (Spanish for Stephen). HSN say that Esteban "is one of the few guitarists in the world to earn the coveted endorsement of legendary master, Andres Segovia." That endorsement came when Segovia signed a book for Stephen, writing: "To Stephen Paul, who loves the guitar and the guitar loves him." Segovia died in 1987, so can't clear the matter up.
André writes: "I'm a French reader of your blog and I found him every time so interesting and so astonish." Which is the nicest thing anyone's ever said about MT. He brings news of 'Le Cybersongosse', a fantastically psychedelic music machine for teaching recording and synthesis to schoolchildren. I think it looks like a cross between between Sly Stone's organ, a Buchla 200e and Jörgen Bergfors' incredible DIY modular. This PDF leaflet explains everything. It's a hardware interface to MAX/MSP software running on a G5. If this is what passes for education in French schools, it's no wonder Daft Punk sound like they do.
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So, a Frenchman called Alari Thierry has developed the Scratchophone - a big half-egg shaped drum with a turntable and a gooseneck tone arm. No idea at all if or how it works (I'm guessing 'not at all') but you really have to watch this WMV video, which is amazing.
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It's not an April Fool. It's Vestax's scratch-o-caster turntable guitar. It doesn't really play records - it plugs into a CD player, which is controlled by the 10" vinyl platter. (Pictures and details at Webbeatz.de and Gear Junkies)
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Mark writes: "Here's a dumb flash MPC2000 sampler I made a few years ago: LINK." Thanks, Mark, that kept me entertained for a good five minutes. So, if everyone has a go, that's eight-and-a-half weeks of endless pleasure you're giving Music Thing readers.
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Chris from the increasingly fine Pixelsumo blog writes: Bitbox "is a performance interface by Brian Crabtree. Before I mention anymore, check out this 7mb video (quicktime mp4) which will explain everything. Each row of buttons is a sample. You press a button on that row to start playing the sample and an LED moves along each column providing visual feedback as to the loop position of the sample. Samples can be started anywhere along the timeline by pressing buttons further along."
Gear Junkies have the scoop on iControl - a Garageband-dedicated controller with transport controls, a shuttle wheel, lots of buttons and encoders. Details are sketchy at the moment (It seems to have audio out, but not audio in) and the big questions will be "Will it work with Logic?" and "Will it work with a PC to control Cubase?", but I'm just pleased that:
Reevo at Ektopia has this story about Livid Instruments' video-playing guitar, which seems to take the 'keytar' concept onto a whole new level. It's a good week for 'video instruments', with two mainstream offerings at MusicMesse: Korg's MPC-inspired Kaptivator and Edirol's CG-8 Visual Synthesizer.
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If you're the kind of geek who reads The A-Z of Analogue Sythesisers before bed, then you'll appreciate that few things can't be improved by being rackmounted. So you'll be delighted to learn that Canford Audio sell wine racks, fridges and book shelves. As Gizmodo point out a rack of hot, humming vintage gear might not be the best place to store that bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape, but it will certainly confuse your other half...
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Three interesting guitar effect boxes announced today at MusicMesse:
In the "boring, but interesting" folder: Pro Tools have just announced Pro Tools M Powered. In the past, PT would only work on PT harware - the cheapest of which was the £320 M Box. The new software is a cut-down version of Pro Tools which will work on any modern M-Audio hardware, from the Audiophile 192 upwards, and can make recordings that are compatible with any other Pro Tools system. BUT: The software itself costs $350. So, if you want to start out in Pro Tools, you're probably still better of with that sexy M Box...
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