Rob Papen Subboombass

YouTube via audiomidicom

"The brand new bass and drum virtual instrument from Rob Papen Instruments with earth-shaking low end. Here audioMIDI'd Mitchell Sigman puts Subbassboom through its paces. Available now, just $99- call audioMIDI.com at (866) 283-4601 for more info!"

audioMIDI.com presents Arturia Origin- Part Three

YouTube via audiomidicom.

follow-up to Parts One and Two.
"audioMIDI.com's Mitchell Sigman shows off Arturia's new Origin hardware DSP modeling synthesizer- part three of a series. Call audioMIDI.com at (866) 283-4601 for more info!"

audioMIDI.com presents Arturia Origin- Part Two

YouTube via audiomidicom.

part one here

"audioMIDI.com's Mitchell Sigman shows off Arturia's new Origin hardware DSP modeling synthesizer- part two of a series. Call audioMIDI.com at (866) 283-4601 for more info!"

Celebutante- Kids

YouTube via celebutante.

When it starts, click on the HQ icon on the bottom right menu of the vid.
"Lou Dawson and Mitchell Sigman of LA-based synth band Celebutante performing MGMT's "Kids" live in the studio 3/24/09. More on Celebutante @ www.celebusite.com."
via Mitchell:
"This is a video of myself and Lou Dawson from my band Celebutante shot 3/25/09 performing the MGMT track "Kids" live. I'm playing a Roland Jupiter-4 and a Synthesizers.com modular controlled by a customized Studiologic MIDI controller. Lou is playing a Yamaha P-70 piano. Drums are a Linn LM-2 (started and stopped by footswitch). All live!"

audioMIDI.com presents Arturia Origin- Part One

YouTube via audiomidicom

"audioMIDI.com's Mitchell Sigman shows off Arturia's new Origin hardware DSP modeling synthesizer- part one of a series. Call audioMIDI.com at (866) 283-4601 for more info!"

I Am The Law

YouTube via celebutante

"Mitchell Sigman of Celebutante performs the Human League classic "I Am The Law" live at his studio 3/14/09 using Korg Delta and Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 synthesizers.

Delta is going through an Electro-Harmonix Memory Man w/Hazarai. More Celebutante stuff at www.celebusite.com."

Update:
New York Girls


you might recognize the girl from this post.
"First video from Los Angeles alternative electro band Celebutante, from the upcoming "Nightlife" full-length release. For more info go to www.celebutantemusic.com or www.myspace.com/celebutantemusic. Please add us on myspace if you like it!"
Moog Polymoog, ARP Odyssey, Simmons drum pads

audioMIDI.com presents Native Instruments Maschine

YouTube via audiomidicom

"Mitchell Sigman and Olivia Arthur demonstrate Native Instruments Maschine rhythm workstation. Coming soon to audioMIDI.com!"

Korg nanoPAD USB Controller

YouTube via audiomidicom

"audioMIDI.com's Mitchell Sigman shows off the new Korg nanoPAD."

Korg nanoKEY and nanoKONTROL

YouTube via audiomidicom

"Korg's super nifty new ultra-compact controller's, demoed by audioMIDI.com's Mitchell Sigman. Neat-o!"

Mitchell Sigman's Synthesizers.com Modular System!

"http://www.celebusite.com
http://www.analogsuicide.com
http://www.synthesizers.com
Filmed by Maf Lewis in December 2007, Mitchell Sigman takes us for a divine tour of his beloved synthesizers.com modular system from his North Hollywood studio."

Ken Stone and MFOS DIY Modules

Two pics via Mitchell Sigman of Celebutante, and Keyboard Magazine. You might also remember Mitchell from these previous posts.

"I have a .com system with modules that I've built from Ken Stone and Music From Outer Space PCB's, and I just finished doing my own silkscreening for the panels (I'm not that good at it yet though... you can see some glitches). I did all the artwork in Photoshop. I got the "tic mark" patterns for the knobs from yusynth.net, who has a lot of his own .com style art on his site.

Here is a single panel with both a Ken Stone CGS31 Digital Noise module as well as a CGS RR Real Ring Modulator (my system needs some passive attenuators to make the ringmodmodule more useful)."





Update: one more image via Mitchell.

Why Do You Play Synths? Poll

I posted the following to the Waldorf list in response to someone leaving a snide comment asking "where's the music" in regards to Cikira's synth shots. I see someone left one in the comments of the previous posts as well. This seems to be a reoccurring theme in response to people with larger collections of synths. I thought it would be fun to put up my reply along with a poll on what others do. Feel free to comment. In the end, for me, people do different things with their synths and I can respect that. What I can't respect are people that are inconsiderate of others and feel the need to tell others what they should be doing just to justify their own perspectives on things...

"The thought of people dictating what others should or shouldn't do is kind of sad. Not everyone enjoys the composing part of making music. My favorite thing to do? Grab a synth off a shelf and explore it. The music comes out of the exploration, not the other way around for me. And 99.9% of the time I do not record it because the music comes in spurts and the focus is definitely not in making a piece of music but listening to the sound and the effects of different parameters. Does "music" come out of it? Usually yes, but it's different. The sound drives it.

The following is a loaded question, but why would anyone who only wants to make music have that many synths? Note that I'm not saying that people who like to compose music shouldn't have that many synths. What I am saying is if you do have that many synths, you probably appreciate them in a slightly different way - not just as sound sources for making music, but rather for the love of synths and all the different characteristics of each.

This always reminds me of the difference between the art of synthesis and the art of keyboard playing. They are different. I'm reminded each month when I get my copy of Keyboard Magazine. I see synths, but it's about 90% music composition and keyboards, not synthesizers. Thank you Mitchell Sigman! His column on synthesis techniques is about the only bit I'm guaranteed to enjoy every month. That and the reto synth section as well as Peter Kirn's articles (Peter also runs CDM). The rest might as well be on pianos... The point of this is there is an appreciation of synthesis I think most of us enjoy that is very different than the focus you might have in composing a piece of music. I like to think Cikira shares this enthusiasm for synths with the rest of us. In my book, anyone that makes the comment of "show me the music" is either ignorant of what synthesis is about or is just trolling." That or just plain inconsiderate. So are you a synthesist/ sound explorer, musician, or both?

MATRIXSYNTH THANKS!!!

The following people have been supportive of the site in one way or another and deserve a special mention.

• Chris Randall
• Chris Carter
• Jacknife Lee
• Laurie Spiegel
• Thighpaulsandra
• Mitchell Sigman
• Velvet Acid Christ
• Peter Grenader (Buzzclick and Plan B)
• Allesandro Cortini (Modwheelmod, NIN)
• The Chemical Brothers
• Richard Lainhart
• Barry Schrader
• Nick Batt (Sonicstate)
• Cynthia
• Ken MacBeth
• George Mattson
• John Bowen
• Parallel Worlds
• Tom Whitwell

Mitchell Sigman - Celebutante and Berlin

Mitchell Sigman, keyboard player for Berlin, sent me some shots. Pretty cool as I grew up on Berlin, specifically Pleasure Victim, with Metro being my favorite track. The year was 1982.

Mitchell also has his own project, called Celebutante. Check out this video for some ARP Odyssey, Moog Polymoog, and green on black retro monitor action - gotta like that. Mitchell Sigman is on guitar and vocals. The video features both beauties on the left. Who is that btw? I sent Mitchell an email asking, but haven't heard back yet. Update: Her name is Diana Dencker. She's done a few commercials.

Title link takes you to Mitchell's My Space site. Make sure to check it out. I'm listening to the track Electrolux as I type this and there is some good Polymoog action happening on that track. BTW, definitely flattered Mitchell lurks on my site. Pretty cool... Thanks Mitchell. : )


Update: Udpate via Mitchell in the comments:
"Actually every synth in that song is either Logic Audio's ES2 or Native Instruments Pro-53 (except for the little square wave lead after the chorus which is Logic ES1). I swear it's true. If I fooled everyone with the Polymoog, well, cool, that was the idea (the strings are all ES2)." Nice. That definitely sounded like a Polymoog to me.

Links:
www.myspace.com/celebutantemusic
www.celebutantemusic.com
www.berlinpage.com
shots