May the Pang be with you

A short track made using a Commodore 64 running Mssiah.
(Drums and vocals in Waveplayer so all samples in glorious 4 bit, 8 Khz! Synth lead in Monosynth. Recorded and mixed in Logic Pro)

Kawai Battery Replacement

Recently I was lucky enough to aquire a Kawai K4r. A 1989 digital classic!

Cosmetically it was in great condition but upon firing it up the machine gave me an Internal Battery Warning.

Contrary to what I'd expect, fixing this was very easy. There isn't much about it online however, hence me writing this post to help anyone else in a simliar situation.

First thing to do is to get a Cr2032 battery. You can get these EVERYWHERE! Mine cost me a quid.

Next open up the beast; as you can see from the photos the battery is easy to find AND in a clip holder, so no desoldering required.

Remove old battery and insert new one. Screw the beast back up.

You will have now lost all your preset sounds but do not fret,  KAWAI have them all available for download! How cool is that!

These can be transferred to your machine either with SysEx using something like SysEx Librarian or Elektron C6 SysEx Manager or with a MIDI file using any MIDI sequencer program that can play it.

I decided to go for the MIDI sequencer file option.

Import the downloaded .mid file to your favourite DAW. I used Logic.

Set the K4 to: INT PROTECT = OFF, RCV EXCL = ON and RCV CH = 1.

Then play the file on your DAW - make sure the track header is set to external MIDI.

And hey presto you're up and running!

I love this machine already so more Kawai K4r posts to follow...

Laurie Spiegel Reissue

This is such an wonderful LP, I cannot believe it is over 30 years old.

To my ears it still sounds so fresh - I highly recommend it!

Salad Needs More Slew

A live-late-night-wig-out-session.

Salad Needs More Slew

Made using a Korg Er1 triggering an oscilator randomly through a morass of cables and pedals.

Recorded Portsmouth 2012

Neal Beard and his Machines hope you enjoy listening to their musical creations.

Spaghetti Triffid Structures

A self generating patch on a doepfer a100 is used to create random pitches and timbres and a Korg Er 1 is used to create rythyms. These are fed into an array of feedback loops and guitar pedals which is then manipulated and spread around the stereo field using a home made matrix mixer in real-time.

Neal Beard and his machines hope you enjoy listening to their musical creations.

Neal Beard EP 8

EP 8 is finished and available for free download here.

Neal Beard and his Machines EP 8

01 Bit Rot Cycle     6:48  
02 Trajectory Error     17:48 
     

Recorded Portsmouth Nov 2011.


Neal Beard and his machines hope you enjoy listening to their musical creations.

The first track Bit Rot Cycle is also on Soundcloud below.

  Bit Rot Cycle by Neal Beard & his Machines 

The EP was recorded using a home made matrix mixer, feedback loops, piezo mikes, a High Hat, an EHX small stone, a circuit bent Belcat analog delay pedal, LSDJ, a MFOS WSG,a EHX Memory Man, a EHX Pulsar, an EHX Holy Grail, a circuit bent Speak and Maths, a cosmic choir from hell and several home made filters, mostly recorded and mixed in a single take in real space-time.

Commodore 64c Mssiah Mods

My Commodore 64c internally modded for use with Mssiah.

All the mods were sourced through the Mssiah forum, so thanks to all for sharing. I've tried to credit all those responsible, and to help anyone else wanted to do the same I've also added a few photos of my build.

MODS

Composite Video Out

RCA soldered to GND and rearside of motherboard. I ran a GND bus joining video out, and the two audio jacks in BK wire to rearside of motherboard. Connections described in more detail here.

Audio Out Jacks for SID#1 and SID#2

Audio Out for SID#1 soldered to rearside of motherboard.

Audio Out for SID#2 wired as described in Mssiah pdf. Both Audio outs go through 1uf capacitors +side to SID -ve side to jack.

DPDT Switch to ground audio ins or send audio ins to Feedback pots.

This is wired using AlphaA's excellent schematics. 

The DPDT either sends both Audio In's to GND through 1uf cap and 100k r, or through 1uf cap to 470k linear pot connected to Audio Outs to create feedback loops. I also added a 1k r in series with the 470k pot as I was wary of sending sound directly back into the SID's- not sure if this is necessary though.

4 pots with InactiveX's no-dead-spot-calibration circuit

Pots are wired with Inactive X's schematic below. Link to thread here.

DPDT to cut lines to port 2 when using Mouse in Sequencer

DPDT cuts lines 7 and 8 to port two. Not sure it's necesary to cut both but I only had a DPDT switch so I thought why not be double sure of preventing any conflicts!

SID2SID

Wired as described in Mssiah pdf however I removed r8 and added an Audio In cable to SID#2. Audio in cable is wired to DPDT switch as outlined above.

SID#1, SID#2 and Video Out in progress.

Audio Out SID#1 and SID#2 jacks almost finished showing 1uf capacitors. 

Blue cable is SID#2 Audio in, white cable is SID#1 Audio in.

Yellow RCA is Composite Video Out (with Purpley Blue wire)

I ended up using a screened and grounded cable for the Audio IN and OUT run across the circuit board in an attempt to stop unwanted noise.

Rearside of Pot board showing sticky fixers to keep it in place

Rearside of motherboard showing Pot solder points

Top view of motherboard in progress

SID2SID installed. I drilled a small hole for the Blue Audio out cable to run out of the topside of the board. SID#2 Audio out is soldered  to pin 26 of SID#2 on the rearside.

Rearside of motherboard showing connections for SID#1 audio out, GND, and Video Out. Audio out is Orange, Audio in is White, Video Out is Purpley Blue.

Lsdjmc2 mod

When I originally built the enclosure for my Lsdjmc2 I was using a game boy colour. Because I'm now using a game boy classic had to add an extra cable to the other side of the enclosure.
(the port on a DMG is not only a different size to a GBC, but it is also on the opposite side, something I should have thought about when I originally built it!)

Running an extra cable off the original link connections sorted it. Now I have the option of using a classic or a colour for my chiptunes.

One thing to watch when adding game boy link outs is shielding. When I first wired it I didn't use shielded cable internally and the audio picked up an huge amount of scan noise in between notes. I guess the link cables are heavily shielded for a reason!

Amiga right-click-mouse-mod

A mod taken from the mssiah forum to enable right-click on an Amiga mouse.

Solder a 22k resistor between pins 7+9.

Job done!

Gameboy Mods

My latest modded LSDJ GBC - with the following 3 mods:

1 - 3.5mm stereo prosound line out.

Previously I've put in shielded cables that have dangled out of the GB to a 1/4 jack out, but no matter how careful I've been with them, the cable has always broken so the internal jack is a much better solution. I had to bend two capacitors out the way to make room for it.

2- Brand new screen from DJTRANSFORMER

Yeah, no more scratches!

3- DPDT toggle to switch between original crystal clock and 1 octave lower clock.

I bought a good quality switch that is able to flick between clocks whilst LSDJ is running without crashing. When used with LSDJMC2 to externally clock the tempo the lower octave clock affects the pitch only, which is very handy!

Things I might add

LTC1799 circuit for variable pitch. I think there's just enough room to cram it in...

Backlighting - necessary for live performances.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas fellow lo-fi-synth-freaks...

Here Comes Santa Claus by Neal Beard & his Machines