SK1 Bend Part 2

I finished my SK1 bends.  I added a pitch dial and a poly dial, each with a bypass switch.  I added these to the top portion of the new panel i made out of ABS.  I will post some sound samples of what this little beast sounds like.  Just for fun I also added a video output with contrast control it works pretty good although it doesn't work on all TVs...

Casio SK1 Bend Part 1

I have finally gotten around to bending my SK1. My plan is to do the typical stuff: 16 point patch bay, poly dial, pitch dial and pitch body contact.  I am also going to try the video output mod, it looks pretty interesting and fun, it could definitely be cool for live use.  So far I removed the speaker (adding a jack to reconnect it externally), created a new faceplate to attach the dials and patch points to, attached all 16 jacks to the faceplate and wired them up.  With just the patch bay going I have created some pretty insane sounds more too come as I further develop this beast...

DBX 117

The DBX 117 has been a secret weapon of mine for some time.  This device is capable of working magic with the cassette tape medium (along with dare I say the BBE Sonic Maximizer). In Bob Katz book Mastering Audio: The Art and the Science there is a brief section that describes the process of upward expansion and describes the DBX 117 as the very first commercially available unit.  Katz describes the process basically as "uncompression".  I almost all ways run a cassette tape mixdown through this and it sounds better.  If you can find one for cheap they are quite interesting and useful.  They do run at -10db so make sure you are properly matching your input/output signals. 

Classic Compressors

Analog compression rules and while I love using UAD2 plugins nothing beats the real thing.  At Electric Orange we use the Purple Audio MC77 (arguably the best 1176 clone made), Universal Audio LA2A, UREI LA4, and DBX 160VU on almost every record.  The MC77 gets used on everything from kick drum to the entire drum mix, bass and vocals.  This compressor is known for being aggressive giving audio an edge.  It can go from subtle to crazy destructo pumping madness.  The LA2A also works on just about everything my favorites are vocals and mix bus.  It adds warmth and fatness to everything passing through it.  The LA4 kills on bass and snare it works very well on vocals too. The DBX 160VU rules on Snare and Bass.  The last secret weapon compressor I use is the Summit Audio TLA-50 this is a pretty good all around unit but shines on guitars and male vocals.  It looks and feels like a mini LA2A.

Drone Lab Synthesizer

I finally put my Drone Lab Synthesizer together.  The Drone Lab is a four oscillator analog drone synth with a pretty cool tremolo and filter made by Casper Electronics (http://casperelectronics.com/).  It took me about 6 hours between yesterday and today and it worked perfect on first test! I took some photos documenting the build:

1) Install the Resistors.

2) Install the Capacitors

3) Install the Diodes and Transistors

4) Install the Switches

5) Install the Pots and ICs and Jacks

Here is the Casper Electronics Demo Video:

Cassette Tape Loop

I was making a very long mix tape the other day for an up coming Plateaus tour and after almost 2 hours of recording a plethora of songs from vinyl to cassette tape my cassette player ate the tape.  So after cursing out the tape recorder I decided to make a cassette tape loop. It was actually pretty simple didn't work the first time tried again and it worked (to much scotch tape in the splice the first time).  once I had it working I made sure that it was playing the tape backwards so that you couldn't tell what song it was and it just sounded droning (although I had no idea what it was anyway).  It sounds like this:

Tape Loop Demo

AKG D12

The AKG D12 is one of my all time favorite kick drum (among other things) microphones.  Mine has been in dire need of repair for quite a while, so I finally decided to take it apart and fix it.  The good thing was the capsule is fine and works the way it should, the problem was the wiring and casing.  I installed new higher gauge wire to the transformer and hooked it up for balanced operation.  The entire mic felt unstable and wobbly so I also had to tighten all of the nuts inside.  The one remaining thing I need to do is find some more screws to hold the shaft of the mic together because right now it is held together with 1 screw on the XLR and one at the top of the shaft connecting it to the diaphragm mount. I also removed the switch that was on the shaft as it was totally unnecessary.  Once I was finished the mic sounded perfect.  I think the biggest factor was fixing the unstable mounting of all the components.

Circuit Bent Casio MT-500

A few years ago acquired a Casio MT-500 it is a pretty unique and great sounding casio synth.   It has really nice sounding key tones and amazing lofi drum sounds with assign able pads so you can play with your fingers.   Unlike most 80s Casios it actually has stereo line outputs for recording that.  Unlike most of the MT series Casios the MT-500 is actually pretty obscure and it is difficult to find any info on the intent about them with how cool they sound I am amazed that more people are not talking about them or circuit bending them.  So I decided to hack mine (very carefully) and I have come up with some really cool and stable bends.  First I went after drum mods I added (7) switches that glitch out the drums:

1) Glitchy Delay Sound

2) Glitchy Distorted Delay Sound

3) Sample and Hold 1

4) Sample and Hold 2

5) Ring Mod Type Sound 1

6) Ring Mod Type Sound 2

7) Ring Mod Type Sound 3

The delay mods sound pretty cool and glitchy both can be used at the same time to really obliterate the drums.  The sample and hold switches make the drum loop go in to an indefinite loop #1 is a little bit longer than #2 only one of these can be used at a time or it crashes the drums and the unit must be reset.  The ring mod sounding switches can all be used in any various combo to create a range of cool glitches.  All of the mods can all be used at the same time with the exception of the sample and hold mods. 

MT500 Drum Bends

Next I wanted to go after glitching out the key sound.  I found a spot on the board that just completely destroyed the keys.  I can not even describe what it does but it is different on each different key setting. There were a few spots that did this (each in different ways) but the problem was finding one the kept the volume level the same after some experimentation i was able to get one to work that didn't drastically raise the volume level compared to the un modded sound.

MT500 Key Bend

SoundWork Shop 1280b

I am so excited to have my 1280B back from the shop and ready for use.  The 1280b is a beast of a little mixer it is a 12x8x2 board with direct outs on every channel and tons of transformers (inputs and outputs).  It comes in 3 different flavors: regular EQ, 8 channels of "Super EQ" and allegedly there is a model with 12 channels of "Super EQ".  The model I have has 8 channels of "Super EQ".  The 1280b is currently set up as a sidecar using the 8 preamps with "Super EQ".  This board sounds incredible the pres sound very Neveish not quite a thick as a 1073 but definitely along those lines.  The EQ is similar to the API 550B EQ (The board is rumored to be designed by the same person that designed the 550B) it has a High, Middle, and Low band with a +/- 5 db boost/cut knob and then a frequency selector knob (plus off).  The Frequency selections are:

High 4.8k, 7.5k, 9k, 12k and 12k Shelf

Mid  250, 500, 1.2k, 2.4k, 4.8k

Low 20, 40, 90, 200, 400   

The Audio Technica AT-RMX64

In my humble opinion the AT-RMX64 may be the best 4 track cassette recorder ever made.  It is a portastudio on steroids, 6x4 mixer with two band EQ on each channel, 2 sends and returns, balanced inserts on each input channel, discrete outputs for each mixer bus, dedicated tape direct outs, (4) headphone outputs, pitch control and Dobly B/C noise reduction.  The mixer is allegedly designed by neotek I been trying to confirm this but have not been able to.  The EQ on this is very unique it has (2) concentric dials with pullout switches, one for high band and one for low band.  The high band outer dial is for boost/cut with a center detent, the inside dial is the frequency control, the pullout switch on the inner dial changes it from a peak to a shelf.  The low band outer dial is for boost/cut with a center detent, the inside dial is the frequency control, the pullout switch on the inner dial changes it from a shelf to a rolloff. This 4 track is actually pretty noisy and noise reduction must be used to not have a hissy recording but the deck does sound killer (listen to attached demos song recorded with the AT-RMX64 just a TLA-50 compressor was used on the drums during mixdown).  The only thing bad about this deck is it is very heavy and not very porta-ble but it did come with a very robust case. I want to get a Marantz PMD-740 to do a shoot out.

AudioTechnica ATRMX64 Example

Mono Tribe Modz

I have collected a lot of analog synths over the last few years such as the ultra rare Freeman String Synth to the recent Moog Little Phatty, but one of my favorites has to be my MonoTribe.  Recently I have done some major modifications to it including adding direct outputs for each drum, decay controls for all of the drums and midi in and out.  I have a few ideas for a few more mods that I may do but I am still playing with them (Synth voice outputs and a saturation control to feed the output of the VCA back into the input of the VCF).  See pics and audio below:

MonoTribe Drum Demo