When not terrorizing
Mr Bond, from the late 1970s until 1994, Mike Mangino and Chris Shepard were in a basement full of musical toys, novelty space microphones, a
TR-606, and a
SH-09 in
Piscataway, NJ recording cassettes as the band
Smersh. In 1981
Smersh released their first cassette under their own label of
Atlas King. They never rehearsed, they couldn't read music, and they never played live, and they
contributed to far too many compilations throughout the known world. In the early eighties they
established a unique sound that is known and loved, combining cheap electronics and wild guitar sounds with distorted vocals. By trading cassettes they garnered international acclaim
leading to releases on dozens of other labels.
[more inside]
posted by wcfields
on Dec 22, 2011 -
5 comments
"The
StringStation introduces a fresh and inventive playing surface allowing one musician to play in real time on an instrument that offers thunderous bass, compelling rhythm, 3-D orchestration and melody. It uses new ways to approach groups of strings that find amazing intertwined performance techniques. It opens and lays out new paths to evolve tactile music composition skills." It's the baby of engineer/inventor Jim Bartz, who is on a mission to bring his invention into the musical mainstream. Start your exploration of what the StringStation can do with
this video of Bartz playing his prototype model (actual performance comes in at 2:25).
[more inside]
posted by woodblock100
on May 8, 2009 -
28 comments
Terry Riley celebrates
the 45th anniversary of his groundbreaking composition,
In C. A major work in the history of
minimalist music, In C has an incredibly flexible
score and performance guidelines, which have inspired many musicians to make their own versions, including a
French guitar quintet, a
traditional Chinese orchestra, a
keyboard ensemble, an
all-synthesizer group,
CalArts Music students,
French-Canadian hippies, a
Danish vocal and percussion ensemble, another
percussion ensemble,
Japanese acidheads, a
"laptop orchestra", the
Bang on a Can Orchestra, and a
rock "orchestration" by the Styrenes. No two versions can sound exactly the same, but it's still an open question how they will compare to the performance of In C at its
Carnegie Hall debut next month. No recording of the original 1964 performance has ever been publicly released, but some eyewitness accounts can be found
here.
posted by jonp72
on Mar 4, 2009 -
40 comments
The Hammond Novachord: Introduced in 1939, it was the world's first subtractive synthesis synthesizer and built with all the cutting edge technology of the time: 169 vacuum tubes, 12 oscillators, 60 frequency dividers, 60 band pass filters, 72 VCA's, and weighing in at 500 pounds. You've likely heard it in dozens of films and TV shows from the 1940's to 1960's.
Crazy enough to
restore one? If it
sounds like this, why not?
posted by Paid In Full
on Dec 12, 2008 -
19 comments
The Tone Generation is a radio series by Ian Helliwell 'looking at different themes or composers in the era of analogue tape and early synthesizer technology'. The original globe-trotting series:
Great Britain,
France,
Germany,
Italy,
Holland,
Scandinavia,
Eastern Europe,
USA,
Canada,
Rest of World. Bonus programmes:
Expo 58,
The RCA Synthesizer.
All links are to MP3 files, except the first one. Alternatively, you can slurp down the lot in one go by subscribing to the podcast feed.
posted by jack_mo
on Nov 21, 2008 -
4 comments
It seems almost incredible that Ursula Bogner's musical talents should have remained undiscovered
until now.
posted by jack_mo
on Nov 1, 2008 -
20 comments
In the wide world of synthesizer guitars, the Synthaxe may well be the choicest both in its aesthetics and its raw awesomeness could. John Hollis
tells us what we're missing. Some guy
demonstrates it. Allan Holdsworth
whips it out in concert. Also, a
music video from Lee Ritenour's Synthaxe-heavy
Earth Run album.
posted by colinmarshall
on Oct 18, 2008 -
25 comments
In 1975, armed with a big pile of 8-track car stereos and a whole lot of moxie, Dave Biro set out to change the sound of rock music. He failed spectacularly. This is the fascinating and tragic story of one of the rarest instruments in rock music-
The Birotron.
[more inside]
posted by 40 Watt
on Oct 1, 2007 -
19 comments
Hear them all...... The most famous version of the early synthesizer hit "Popcorn" was played in 1972 by a studio group called
Hot Butter, led by legendary session musician
Stan Free. Few people know that the song was actually written by electronic music pioneer
Gershon Kingsley. If you'd like to hear excerpts of Kingsley's original version, along with scores of cover versions,
here ya go.
posted by metasonix
on May 30, 2007 -
47 comments
Have you ever seen a synth and said "Man, what this needs is cartoon eyes?" A bit similar to the
Buchla Box or
theremin in that they don't have a keyboard to control the sounds -- it's probably closest to the Booper, invented by
The Weatherman from
Negativland (or, well,
Circuit Bending), the
Thingamagoop is a photosynthesizer... which means it basically uses light sensors to generate sounds. The signal's run through a couple oscillators and, well, it comes out as somethin' that's
pretty dang awesome. I'm on the fence on pickin' this one up. On one hand, it's a really neat toy that makes noise... on the other hand, um.... um.... I dunno. It's not made of candy?
posted by Rev. Syung Myung Me
on Jul 8, 2006 -
18 comments
Demo Design is neat. Lots of flash to
entertain you. Try the sound section; I feel like I'm Ross from Friends wigging out on my ancient synthesizer, but with modern drum loops. And dig the clock if you click on the middle or right symbols that appear if you click on video.
posted by moz
on Jul 19, 2001 -
4 comments
