The term 'collective' would be a fitting one to use for us, because not only are we a collective, but our project focusses highly on the collection of discarded electronic devices and kids toys. Circuit Bending is a very 'collection'-based hobby... trawling ebay for vintage keyboards, trawling charity shops for interesting sound devices.
So I tried a few names with 'collective' in them, and came up with...
THE BENDS COLLECTIVE
Not only is this a reference to the bends we perform on our instruments, but because our finished products sounds like they've got The Bends: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decompression_sickness
Plus it's a nice merging of the Radiohead album and Animal Collective... two of my absolute favourite bands!
It sounds ugly at first, but say it over a few times and let it grow on you. It's just a suggestion so feel free to discard it and think of others. It would be good to have a name for the submission though... even if we change it at a later date.
Casio VL Tone
In other news, here's a couple of pictures of my new toy, it's a Casio VL Tone, my friend has had it kicking around his studio for years. It's a nifty little thing, it's got some interesting drum beats plus a tiny ADSR section where you can modularly create a custom synth sound by entering an 8 digit number. Each number represents a different element of the sound, e.g. Attack Time, Decay Time, Vibrato, Wave... This is a very neat system and so simple. The sounds are awesome too, so simple and child-like!
You can also record your own melodies and have it play them back quantised with the drums... Amazing! I can't wait to get hacking it. As soon as my new supplies are delivered I'll be delving into this one...
Casio VL Tone opened up
Jordan
Aaaahhh, I've been wanting one of these, but they're just ridiculously expensive and very hard to find in charity shops. Ebay has of course caught up with the circuit- bending craze and expect you to fork out at least 40 pounds for one of these cuties. Like you say, the sounds are brilliant! The ultimate, 80's "primitive" pop synth. Maybe this link here will help you find your first hacks: http://casperelectronics.com/images/finishedpieces/vltone/VLtoneBends.jpg, it's from the casper electronics website (excellent site, with an impressive variety of bent devices). Also, this: http://gieskes.nl/circuitbending/?file=casio_vl_tone, from Gijs' website, who admittedly is a legend for the online circuit- bending community.
ReplyDeleteThere was this other one I'd found some time ago, which was impressive and different from most of the bends you usually find for the vl, but I can't remember anything more about the bender or the site I found it on, apart from the fact that it featured a stencil with ants/spiders(?). I'll keep looking though and send it over as soon as I find it again.
That's all for now!
Eleni
Looking forward to hearing the casio! The name for the group is growing on me a bit, too...
ReplyDelete