EDP Wasp - New Flickr Shot

Title link takes you to more shots in the set. Shots by PTCowan.



Upate via PTCowan in the comments:
"Hi Friend. The shot was taken on the 3rd March at Forest cafe in Edinburgh. Its of my friend Joni Hawley who is synth mental he has a spare room bursting at the seams with analogue gubbins. The photo set is of the night which was very impressive with lots of vocoder and Moog action. The t-shirt was a home made job I think. Anyway cheers for using the shot on your blog."

The Casio DM-100

Trip. I've never seen one of these before. Retro Thing has a post up on the double decker Casio DM-100. It's a Casio PCM based home keyboard with an SK-5 sampling keyboard built in. Title link takes you to more.

The Sonic Emulsifier

Title link takes you to more. Via Frank Vanaman. Update: Looks like Carbon111 beat me to it on Synthwire! I was wondering when this would happen. : ) Oh well, the more the merrier in my book.



"I call it the Sonic Emulsifier, a name coined by someone at work who knows nothing of analogue synthesis or sound processing."

"The History:
It started out with a WersiVoice card, which is basically a triple BBD contraption that was very commonly installed in Wersi organs, that gives both ensemble and rotary speaker effects, and, for its time, was actually pretty decent sounding. What it turned into:

(1) the Wersivoice BBD device
(2) a Ken Stone bandpass filter (SH-5 Bandpass clone)
(3) a Ken Stone Real Ring Modulator (two transformers, four diodes)
(4) a Paia “Roctave divider” board
(5) a multi filter band pass unit tuned to vocal frequencies (based on the VP-330 filters)
(6) a 566-based VCO using Thomas Henry’s schematics
(7) a 4-in, 1-out DC mixer, and
(8) a 4-way mult

The VCO is there basically so that if you want to use the ring modulator with a single input, there’s something there to modulate with. It’s a strange assortment of things, some of which are included because I happened to have the boards sitting around (like the PAiA Roctave).

I couldn’t resist the desire to make something that looked “technical’ from the front. The big central dial is the main frequency control for the oscillator. Pots to the upper left control the PAiA divider; pots to the right are for the mixer, the oscillator has an output attenuator control (left of the big dial) and a wave-shape sweep control (to the right of the big dial). Switches at the bottom left select the Wersivoice modes, switches to the bottom right control the selection of groups of filters in the vocal filter matrix.

Nothing’s blown up yet, so I’m assuming I’ve managed to put it all together right the first time.

MP3s? Eh, eventually…"

Frank

The Mighty Logan Vocal Synthesizer

Shot pulled from this auction. Description pulled below. If you know more feel free to comment.



"Logan Vocal Synthesizer is fully working. Was stored 25 years in heated room."

Sanctuary - New Flickr Shot

Shot by Luca Capozzi. I saw this shot and the first thing that came to mind was how un-Moogy a Roland JP8080 was. I thought of perspectives on how Roland has not come out with something innovative in years, how "digital" the JP8080 was, and how far away from the mighty moog analog sound it was. A lot of people see Roland and their digital synths as the anithesis of Moog. Then I saw the title of the shot, and I remembered how Bob described himself. He described himself as a tool-maker who made wonderful musical instruments for people to enjoy; magical instruments at that. There is no doubt in my mind that a JP8080 is capable of bringing this magic to its owners. Bob brought synthesis to the mainstream, making it affordable and accessible. This shot forces you to see that. A shot of the Roland JP8080, the magic synthesis brings and respect to Bob.

Grunge MS10

Shot by Luca Capozzi.

Racked Synths Done Right

In the comments section of this post, Mr. Array posted a link to the Sudio Electronics Museum page with a number of classic synths in rack format. Above is a Roland Juno-106. Beautiful. Title link takes you to more. Thanks Mr. Array.

Alesis Fusion

Title link takes you to another gear p*rn thread on HC. I particularly liked this shot of an Alesis Fusion.



Shot by Carbon111 who also posted on the Alesis Fusion on Synthwire.

Sequencers Cooking - Infection Music Zeit Sequencers

Hubba hubba. The Infection Music Zeit Sequencer x 5 burning in for 24 hours. In via the lovely Cikira.

"David Hughes, the desigher of Infection Instruments Zeit, updated his list of patient devotees thusly:
-----------
This is "Burn In Day" when all of the current batch of machines are "burned in" for 24 hours.

In the foreground is the prototype machine which was in the workshop for a software upgrade.

Incidentally, in case someone asks, the LEDs are bright but not eye-seeringly bright. We didn't just fit a bunch of lasers to the front of the sequencer. That's a 4 second time exposure!"

Tricked out EMS VCS3

EMS VCS3 project by jhaible.



"Basically a VCS3 on steroids with focus on signal processing(phaser, analog delay, two frequency shifters, envelope follower added)"

http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_in_progress_1.jpg
http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_in_progress_2.jpg
http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_in_progress_3.jpg
http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_in_progress_4.jpg
http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_in_progress_5.jpg
http://www.oldcrows.net/~jhaible/matrix_fx/matrix_fx_osc3_noise_filter.jpg

Racked Roland SH101

DVDBORN put up some shots of music stores in NYC in 2001. Below is a racked red Roland SH101. Note the 101 Sound by Armen. Armen was the tech for Rogue Music. He's made a few people unhappy with service in the past, including myself. I have no idea how things are today. Title link takes you to DVDBorn's post.

Casio SK1 and Oscilliscope

Love this shot. Title link takes you to the post on GetLoFi.

MoS 042 Cropped - New Flickr Shot

Access Virus C, Jomox XBase 09, Doepfer Schaltwerk and Regelwerk. Shot by knuckledragger.

McDonald's and an SH-101 - New Flickr Shot

Shot by kick ass.

Roland Juno-60 - New Flickr Shot

Hmm... I swear I've seen this before. Actual advert?

GPF on Analog Industries

Gear P*rn Friday. It's a synth one. Title link takes you to another shot.

100 New Sidstations

Looks like Elektron found 100 more chips. Title link takes you there.



Update via xonox in the comments:
"I've been checking that page every week since january and sidstations were available all the time i think. It's a shame they raised the price, they used to sell for 580$us a few years ago... "

Doh! Nevermind. Nothing to see here, please move on... : )

Front 242 on DVDBORN

Video. Title link takes you there.

The Song That Made String Synths Famous

Well, in my world at least. Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart. I beleive this is an ARP OMNI 2. If not please correct me in the comments and I'll update the post. For years I've heard it's either a Solina or OMNI. In the video it's clearly and Omni. I do know New Order later used and ARP Quadra for their strings. ARP all the way for them. Links below.



Two videos:
The official processed video. The OMNI sounds silky and smoothed out a bit.
The live/raw video. You can really hear the raw sound of the OMNI hear.

Silicon Teens, a Wasp and an ARP 2600

Moogulator has a post up on some more synth goodies from YouTube including New Order, Fad Gadget, Human League, and the Silicon Teens. I picked the Silicon Teens for this post for two resons. One it's not every day you see an ARP 2600 and EDP Wasp in the same video, and two I completely forgot about this song. It was a nice trip back in time. BTW, there is a third synth in the video. If anyone know what it is please feel free to comment. Title link takes you there.

Rhodes Chroma Brochure

Shot pulled from this auction.

Moog Polymoog and Oberheim OB8 Schematics

More scans from ChristianH. I previously posted his Memorymoog scans. He added a scan of the Polymoog and OB-8. Notes below. If you can help, feel free to post a comment.

Udate: Looks like Jordan Gibson on the AH list came through. He ran a full scan of the Polymoog Service Manuel and Brandon Daniel is hosting the whopping 180M file on fdisk.com.



"Hi all,

I finally spent some time and did some joyous 30 year anniversary
Polymoog scanning to acompany the Memorymoog schematics scans I did the
other day.
This is the complete Service Manual, Volume II (schematics).
Some of the sheets are pretty large, but luckily I have access to large
format scanners at work :-)
Considering that some of the original manual sheets are some kind of
ancient 70s blue prints, which have severely yellowed background
(actually the paper deteriorated to a hot red in some areas), the end
result looks quite nice after some heavy processing, you all know the
routine - EQing, noise gating, compressing, and a tad of Exciter to
improve sharpness:
http://www.chrismusic.de/synth/schematics/polymoog.zip
12 MB ZIP file, but by today's download standards, this isn't that large
anymore.
All missing page numbers are blank pages, nothing has been omitted for
scanning.

I NEED YOUR HELP: Now, if some kind soul would do the same for Volume I,
I simply don't have that one. I assume, it contains calibration info and
circuit descriptions, and thus should be more suitable for small format
scanners. I'd be glad to host Vol.I on my site as well.

And maybe the additional "Polymoog Keyboard" filter board schematics
would fit in here nicely, if anybody has them available.


And while I was at it, there's an almost legible scan of the OB8 voice
board component layout:
http://www.chrismusic.de/synth/schematics/OB-8-voice-board-600dpi.tif
On all scans I found before, the component designator numbers were
pretty hard to decypher, which makes locating measurement points on the
boards quite tedious.
This one comes from an original service manual. Not on the light side,
at 600 dpi grey scale - a whopping 4MB for one page.

cheers
Christian


P.S.: maybe a little long-shot, I'd be glad to do a similar scanning job
with the giant CS-80 schematics diagram.
The one to be found on the net is a godsend nevertheless, but due to
small format scanning, the pieces won't really fit together.
If someone could lend the schematics to me for scanning, that would be
great.
If there is a CS-80 owner in the western Germany/Netherlands/Belgium area,
I'd even opt for a personal pickup (and maybe some synth geek talk as
well... ;-)"

Korg Radias Samples on Sequencer.de

Title link takes you directly to the Korg Radias page on Sequencer.de. New samples are at the end of the page.

Juan Atkins Interview

Title link takes you to a classic interview of the godfather of Detroit Techno and House.



Some synth bits (make sure to read the full article):
"'During the summer of 1980 I bought myself a Korg MS10. I messed around with that synthesiser all summer, and I'd got to the point where 1 was making up all sorts of drumbeats on it. 1 had two Kenwood cassette decks and a little Yamaha four-channel mixer, and I'd make up my drum beat and record it on one deck, then bounce it across onto the other and overdub another part at the same time. I became a real master at doing that; I knew how to EQ my drum sounds to start with so that by the time I'd finished four or five overdubs the music still sounded clean.'"

"Instruments in the Atkins arsenal include a Korg Poly 800, Yamaha DXlOO, Sequential Pro One, and Ensoniq Mirage and Akai S900 samplers. Like Saunderson, Atkins is not interested in sampling old records. He prefers to devote himself to the delights of synthesis - and in particular to one synth.

"The Pro One is my heart. I'll use that Pro One until it falls apart, and then I'll probably still use it if it makes any sounds. "These new synthesisers now, I think they're scaling them more to interface with the consumer. Synthesisers used to be synthesisers that a synthesist could play. Now manufacturers are going for presets and they make it really hard to get beyond those presets to program your own sounds. "

"Atkins has a similar preference for old drum machines.
"I still use the 808 and 909. I don't like Roland's latest drum machines, but the 808 and 909 are classics. The 808 has a real techno feel. Everything on that drum machine has an electronic feel, it's not like digitally-sampled real drums."

"'We unveiled our secret weapon, which was that we'd brought a Roland 808 to the party to play live rhythm tracks between the records.'

The crowd went wild and the Direct Drive crew got mad. But a new idea was born which was to have a profound impact not so much on Detroit as on Chicago."

Cream's Mini Up for Auction

Title link takes you to an auction for Jack Bruce of Cream's Mini. Details below saved for posterity. There was only one shot below, so the title link just takes you to the auction while it's up. Via Dylan Gaffney.



Jack Bruce's Mini Moog synthesizer Model-D
serial number 1058 circa early 70s (model D serial numbers started with No.1001 in 1971) - the side panels to the casing on the right-hand side are missing and in generally used condition. This instrument was used by Jack Bruce in recording and composing. Mini Moog synthesizer is now, due to its unique sound, a sought after collector's item.

Accompanied by a letter of authenticity from Janet Bruce.

Pulse Wave on OSC-3 Please

Title link takes you to more cat shots sent my way by First Last. That cat is fixated on OSC-3's Wave selector, or he's wondering where the keys went.

The New Moog

Almost here... Moog Clue #1



"You Know IT'S Coming...But What Is IT?

Can You Feel The Anticipation?

Moog Music is proud to announce the advent of a much anticipated NEW product at Musik Messe in Frankfurt, Germany, March 29, 2006. Come visit your Moog friends in Hall 5.1, Walkway B, Stand 43. Along with showcasing our "hip" new product, we will have world-renowned thereminist, Pamelia Kurstin demonstrating the Etherwave Pro. You all remember her from the Moog Movie.

Although we can't tell you what IT is right now -- we promise to continue to update this location with news and plenty of CLUES. Here's a picture of your first one. Any guesses? Please feel free to share your thoughts with others on the Moog Forum where speculation grows stronger each day.

For those who think that patience is sometimes, but not always a virtue - you can also Click Here to subscribe to our newsletter.

These are the best two ways to collect your clues before everyone else.

See you in Frankfurt!"

Twins

Wow. This shot takes the cake for CAT shots. Stunning. Shot by Rui Peixoto.

M-Audio on One Blue Monkey

NAMM 2006 video is up on One Blue Monkey along with shots and summary. Title link takes you there. Video link under date under title. Axiom controllers pictured on the left.

Kitty Goes Modular

Yep... Shot below from Eric on AH. And then there's KatFish via Jason Proctor.



Update: Another cat shot from Justin Maxwell. What's interesting is that it always seems to be cats in synth shots. Never dogs, never birds, never rodents, never fish. What's with synth people being into cats? I'm into cats as well. So...

Update via the comments. Thought this was pretty funny.

"That's because dogs would be sitting on the floor, looking at you, going "I wuv woo, I wuv woo.."

Cats would be climbing up onto your gear going "For goodness sake, that's not how you patch a modular synth. Here, connect the OSC1 sync here and...

Bloody humans, think they're great at everything... Now where's my dinner?" "

ARP 2600 Grey Mini Shots

Title link takes you to shots put up by Cary Roberts. Click on one to get to its photo album.



"I'm in the process of refurbing my early model grey face ARP 2600. Most
folks would call this a gray meanie as it has all first rev boards and
all op amps are octal not DIP. It does not have a 4410 ADSR. The ADSR
in the unit is labeled "Board 4-1" and is a good bit larger than a 4410.
Board 4 also has odd header locations for the 4019 VCA so several of the
legs on 4019 are bent to make it work. This was fixed in the next rev
of the board.

I'm replacing all the jacks with new Switchcraft 142As and disassembling
and refurbing all the pots. Also, contrary to popular belief, the Cinch
Jones S-306-DB keyboard connector is still manufactured although it's a
couple week lead time from most distributors. In a pinch you can take a
standard S-306 socket and replace the defective socket in the S-306-DB
metal bracket.

While perusing the pics note the silk screened trimmer functions and
jack normalling symbols not present on later units.

http://www.retrosynth.com/gear/arp2600/"

Bob Cash's Keyboards & Synthesizers

Bob sent me a link to his site filled with high res shots. Title link takes you there. Enjoy. Thanks Bob!

Iconweevil - New Flickr Shot

Salute!

Love this shot by unrest.

Previous weevil post.

Drum Triggering Your Modular

Analog Industries has a post up on building a drum trigger for your modular. Surprisingly it is relatively affordable. Title link takes you to the post.

Love this shot

Audio Damage 914 Fixed Filter Bank Now Available

Title link takes you there. Samples on site.



The Audio Damage 914 Fixed Filter Bank is a faithful recreation of the Moog Modular Synthesizer's 914 module, and a major upgrade to our original 907A plugin. This plugin creates unique filter textures by passing the signal through twelve band-pass filters, as well as a low-pass and high-pass filter.

The 914 is a subtle effect, capable of adding rich luster to pads, and giving percussive and lead synth sounds a vocal quality. It is an excellent tool for the sound designer's palette, simple to use yet capable of complex and unique timbres. Improvements over the original 907A include a bandwidth control, separate level adjustments for wet and dry signal, makeup gain, and four extra frequency bands.

Features:
» 24db Low-pass and high-pass filters.

» Twelve fixed-frequency band-pass filters.

» True stereo operation.

» Separate wet and dry level controls.

» 15dB of makeup gain on the wet level.

» Full MIDI learn mode, for MIDI CC control of every control (VST only; handled by host in AU version).

914 is available as a VST effect for Windows, and as a Universal Binary AU/VST for OSX. PPC version requires OSX 10.3.9 or later.