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.