Automated Mould

This track didn't really fit in with the forthcoming Drone/Noise EP, so here it is...

Automated Mould

(If you're interested it was made with a matrix mixer, some guitar pedals, a piezo sound driver sending sound through a high hat, a circuit bent speak and maths, some home made filters and feedback loops. The speak and maths was the only sound input.)

Drone Noise Soundscapes

Recently Neal Beard and his Machines have experimenting with drone/noise sounds-capes largely inspired by the early tapes of the brilliant band Emeralds.

Here are a couple of experiments created using free running A100 oscs being modulated FM by random LSDJ sequences and guitar. The first example is more melodic, the second more fractured and noisy.

Experiment 1.47

Example 3.67

The ideas explored in these sessions are gradually evolving into two new EP's of improvised compositions which should be available for download soon...

Bleepotron

Another machine joins the merry throng.

The Bleepotron is a MIDI synth kit that uses a dsPIC digital signal processor. It's a very easy build and has a great lo-fi sound. It's even possible to edit patches and save on it!

I housed mine in an old vid box.

I ran through all it's presets sounds here.

(sorry about the crap loop)

More info about it below...

Bleep-o-tron has the following features:

• monophonic

• 2 x oscillators (timbres)

• 8 x phase-modulation waveforms + combinations (36 in total)

• white noise

• 6 x ADSR (attack-decay-sustain-release) envelopes

• 6 x LFO’s (low-frequency oscillators)

• 6 x LFO waveforms (sine, square, triangle, rising sawtooth, falling sawtooth, noise)

• detuned second oscillator by octaves, semitones or cents

• connects to standard MIDI keyboard (velocity sensitive)

• keyboard transpose (up to +/– 2 octaves)

• keyboard split

• play notes using PS/2 PC keyboard

• pitch bend and modulation using PS/2 PC mouse

• ring modulator

• oscillator synch

• flanger (swept comb filter)

• portamento (constant rate and constant time)

• selectable MIDI channel #1 to #16

• 16 x preset patches

• 8 x user patches (non-volatile)

• master volume control + gain x 2

SD2iec

The SD2iec board is a quick and easy way to save and load Mssiah projects.

I bought mine and the accompanying the daughter board from nk electronics.

It's cheap, simple, and works great. Just make sure you change the default device in Mssiah from 8 to 11. (that foxed me for days!)

I am using a power adapter to run it, but I think it is possible to take 5v from the datasette port instead.

Also in retrospect I wish I'd used a small ribbon cable to connect the two boards, rather than placing them on top of one another, as this would have made it a less awkward shape to house, but I was desperate to get it working as soon as possible...

Noise 567 sic box

Another machine joins the merry cacophony.

This has to be one of the simplest schematics ever - but don't let it's simplicity fool you, it's an extremely effective noise maker! I tried adding a power starve but it didn't do much, so I changed it to a pot to work in parallel with the LDR.

Here's a film of one in action from getlofi.com

Samples to follow...

Old Casio Casio SA5 Tape

I came across an old tape of a 60 minutes Casio Sa5 based improvisation - all recorded live in mono.

I can't imagine anyone else would want to listen to it in it's entirety, but I've posted it up as I found some of it's ideas interesting, and I thought I might like to revisit them later at some stage.

60 Minutes Casio Sa5 Improv

Noisy Power Pill (experiment)

LSDJ + 2 channels of circuit bent distortion = Noisy Power Pill (experiment)

Noisy Power Pill (experiment)

MSSIAH Mods

Mssiah has to be one of the coolest bits of software/hardware ever.

Rather than dive straight into modding my beloved C64 directly, I decided to make break out boxes for Analog Pots, Audio In/Out, Video Out and Feedback, to help fine tune designs.

Analog Pot box in progress

Finished Analog Pot Box

Analog Pot Box and Feedback, Audio In/out, Video Out box

For the feedback mod I used AlphA's amazing website

and for the external pot box I used InactiveX's schematics here...

New Neal Beard Music

Two new Neal Beard tracks have just gone up on Soundcloud...

Failed BMSR with FM by Neal Beard & his Machines

The Devils Noise by Neal Beard & his Machines

Blast Fed Disaster

Another new machine joins the merry band - a Blast Fed Disaster built from schematics by the excellent Squarewave Parade.

It's a very squirrely but fun synth. If you build one yourself I'd recommend putting the body contacts in as they are the most expressive way to play it. My enclosure is an old Sennheiser microphone box. The body contact plate was salvaged from a crappy electronic steel drum toy.

This new track called The Devils Noise uses it...

Here's what The Squarewave Parade says about it,

"here is an elaboration on Forrest M. Mims III's stepped tone generator, which has also been refered to as an "Atari Punk Console". my version has a little more potential for sound creation, from quantized synth notes to harsh variable digital static. a total of 7 knobs, a hand full of switches and two control voltage ( marked CV ) inputs."

Fridge Squidge (parts 1+2)

More new music from Neal Beard and his Machines.

Two new tracks Fridge Squidge (parts 1+2) have just gone up on Soundcloud.

Fridge Squidge (part one version 5) by Neal Beard & his Machines

Fridge Squidge (after one week version 5) by Neal Beard & his Machines

Made using various oscillators, some circuit bent stuff, a korg Er1, a c64 running Mssiah and a guitar. Vocals by Victoria.