Results for cassette

Some interesting things I found recently:

# Tentacle-box, mobile musicstation with beatsynched lights.

Johan Larsby made himself a portable sound system so he can do shows wherever he goes.

It should be able to work without being connected to an outlet. It should have lights and it shouldn't be to heavy to move around. Ateast not by a small wagon. And it should be loud. Not Mötorhead loud but loud enough. It should also be cheap enough so that I would not cry if it got trashed or stolen after a few gigs/parties.

# The Stretta Procedure: Z-DSP Experiments

Matthew Davidson writes:

I'm one of the lucky few beta testers of the new TipTop Audio Z-DSP eurorack module, and boy is it a lot of fun. The Z-DSP is a lot like the TipTop Audio Z5000, except embiggened. A lot. There are three CV controlled parameters per program. There is a feedback loop that you can tap into on the front panel so you can insert a filter or whatever module you can think of inside a part of the DSP process that is usually closed to tinkering. You can change the personality of the DSP by inserting a different card on the front panel. You can even voltage control the clock. This is serious sound-mangling mayhem.

The short audio files I produced represent only one patch idea using one program on one card on this module. I could spend a great deal of time exploring various options without even changing the DSP program on the Z-DSP. The fact that I could load another program is another whole world of possibilities. If, somehow you got bored of that, you can load a card with a different batch of programs. Egads, this thing is endless.

# Pseudo scratching In Ableton Live 8

Video showing how to emulate a scratch-like effect in Ableton Live 8 using the new delay Modes available in the Ping Pong Delay. This is not meant to replace vinyl, nor will it produce a totally authentic sounding scratch sound, but it is a Ableton Live only solution and is a nice add on to your effects arsenal.

The template is available to download here.

# recycled cassette tape thin necktie

sonic fabric neckties by improbable projects:

the sonic fabric neckties are a limited-edition project made in collaboration with my designer friend julio cesar. sonic fabric is woven from 50% recorded audio cassette tape and 50% colored thread the fabric is actually audible if you run a tape head over it! (if you’d like a demo, please visit my youtube channel at alyceobvious.

the idea behind the tie is that the wearer becomes a beacon for other-dimensional, intangible, subtle forces of good…much in the manner of a superhero. only this part of the superhero garb can be worn on the outside in the most conservative environment without detection! looks equally great with dress shirt or t-shirt. this tie is the thinner version – 2" wide at the widest point. i also make a slightly wider version for more mature audiences.

the sound collages recorded onto the tape for this batch of ties comes from my cd between stations, and is based on looped and layered samples collected on and under the streets of nyc.

Some interesting things I found recently:

# Toy Piano Rescue Project

Ranjit Bhatnager bought a toy piano on eBay, but it got damaged in transport.

For Awesome August I'm trying to make something of this ebay toy piano that got smashed by UPS. The music is Philip Glass's "Modern Love Waltz," inspired by toy pianist Margaret Leng Tan. (I used it previously)

More info: Ranjit Bhatnager / Awesome August

# DOWNLOADMYDRUMS

Dan "Danno" Miller recently posted about my samples on his website. He is running a music production blog that offers free, downloadable, royalty free, high quality, one shot wav file, drum samples with virtually no restrictions of use.

Dan writes:

Whether you’re just dabbling in music production or you’re the hottest mega-producer in the game, you will always need new, crisp, high quality, punch you in the mouth drum samples. Most producers are very secretive with their drum samples. They spend a lot of time and money tweaking their kicks, hats, and snares to try to come up with their signature sounds. While I do feel that developing your sound is important and I would encourage all producers to do so, it’s also important to expand you drum collection so you have a buttload of options. I look at it like this; just because you give two painters the same paints, doesn’t mean they’ll paint the same picture. So I’m sharing my drums, presets, tips, etc. with the hope that someday a producer will come along, be inspired by what i’ve given away for free, think outside the box, and create music that’s completely different.

# ArpShift by Edward Loveall

ArpShift is a melodic, interval based, poly-rhythmic arpeggiator. It’s relatively simplistic in nature with only 3 pages and 7 lanes. However, it is flexible in it’s simplicity, and is able to take stagnant melodies and turn them into flowing, never repeating music.

# Contexture Design: 45 Nano

45 Nano Cases are made from reclaimed cassette tapes, gutted, routered and rebuilt to fit your 4th generation iPod nano.

Some interesting things I found recently, and not so recently (since it’s been a while since I posted short links).

# Guitare à crayon

The idea behind “la Guitare à crayon” is to be able to paint and play music with the same instrument (crayon mean pencil in english). It’s a custom usb guitar with open source software: namely, pure data (for sound) and gimp, blender, flash (for visual).

Guitare à crayon

• Hardware features:
  • Accelerometer X-Axis (for example controlling the octave)
  • Accelerometer Y-Axis (for example controlling an effect)
  • 6 analog strings giving around 10 bits of resolution
  • External input: 1 analog, 1 digital
  • 4 positions switch
  • 8 buttons
  • 4 pots
  • 1 piezo with velocity filter (for example trigging any sound)
  • 1 ir distance sensor (+-6cm – +-20cm)
  • 1 unuseful led (for tapping the bpm)
  • Pressure-sensitive tablet
  • Foot controller (using a led & a photoresistor)
  • Foot switch (looper, change sound, …)
• Software features:
  • No driver (firmware & bootloader)
  • Linux, Windows, Mac
  • Pure Data poweful DSP (sample, soundfont, fx rack, multiple looper)
  • Gimp for 2d (drawing, painting, photo, …)
  • Gesture tracking on the tablet (linux only)

# 8 Track Walkman-Pod thing (Retro-tech)

Instructables user XenonJohn writes:

This is an admittedly mad project to see what might have happened if Sony had invented the Walkman earlier than they did – and made it so it took 8 track tape cartridges (which came before cassette tapes were invented).

In other words, can I make a personal 8 track player with just headphones in the style of a Walkman?

# CASSETTE IS NOT DEAD – A lamp made of cassette tapes by ooomydesign.com

You can replace the cassette tapes with your own as well

Available in transparent and colored cassette tapes, 20x13x12cm, price 35 EUR.

# Palalab’s Free Music Loops, Samples in ACID™ .WAV format

Palalab is offering free multi-instrumental sample loops in a variety of styles designed to be different, inspire your songwriting and fill out your mix. All loops can be used royalty-free, are properly ACID™ized for quality pitch and tempo transposition, and loop seamlessly.

Every week Palalab posts a new sample pack consisting of 5 loops. Each pack stays up for 4 weeks only, so be sure to bookmark this page and check back regularly.

# Download Free Korg nanoPAD, nanoKONTROL Scripts for Ableton Live

Peter Kirn writes:

The KORG nanoSERIES has a rabid following among many Ableton Live users, and with good reason. The nanoPAD and nanoKONTROL street for about US$60, provide basic knobs + faders + transport (KONTROL) and pads and X/Y control (PAD), plus a fully-featured, cross-platform editor, but still fit in a backpack. They’re small enough to use in coach on an airplane.

Having to open Live templates, however, just to get the mappings you want is a big pain. So, instead I’ve created a basic set of MIDI Remote Scripts and Kontrol Editor templates for Mac and Windows, Live 6.x and later, and wanted to share them with you.

# Techniques for dealing with Phase

Jon @ Audio Geek Zine takes a look at what phase is and how to avoid problems with it in your productions.

Phase is a constant concern for recording and mixing engineers. Problems with phase can ruin your music, they can be easily avoided or corrected, but first you need understand how these problems occur.

This guide will attempt to explain almost everything there is to know about phase, what it is, how it happens, what it can sound like and some techniques to deal with it.

Goldbaby Productions is a household name when it comes to quality drum machine samples.

Goldbaby’s love for tape machines, vinyl and vintage instruments has resulted in a bunch of top notch sample libraries.

With Tape-101, Goldbaby brings yet another collection of sounds treated with some analog tape love. But it’s not a drum machine this time around.

The SH101 is a legendary 80′s analog synth. A small synth with a large sound. It can be warm and phat or nasty and raw. Some say the sound is a cross between a Juno and 303.

So… I have taken this little synth and created a sampled instrument library. Of course I haven’t just sampled the synth naked. Oh no… I had to let the sounds get caressed by tape first!

Analog synth plus analog tape… Mmmm.

Tape-101 includes 1,658 24 bit samples, and over 70 instrument patches for both Kontakt and EXS24 (most of the instruments are multi-samples from every key on the SH-101).

I used the Kontakt version of The Tape-101, which has its instruments divided in 3 folders:

• Drums & FX, 2 Drum Kits and an FX instrument with wobbles and such.
• Gold Presets, almost 40 mono- and polyphonic instruments, extended and enhanced with the Kontakt sampler software (the SH-101 is monophonic).
• Raw Ammo, 35 multi-sampled instruments with little or no software sampler modifications.

Tape-101 in Kontakt (red HOT!)

The samples are available as .wav files and like the Kontakt instruments they are clearly labeled so you can tell which kind of processing was done.

Goldbaby used the following gear:

• Otari MX5050 1/4 inch 2 track, recorded normally and HOT.
• Hitachi Cassette Deck, for some wow & flutter + Dolby C.
• Boss SE-70, the digital multi-effects processor with an analogue distortion circuit.
• E-mu E4XT, sampled and processed by this ultra sampler.
• Akai MPC-60, for some gritty 12bit samples, dirty & phat!
• A bit of secret extra processing was done on a few instruments (labeled _X) as well.

If you want to get an idea of the type of sounds you will get make sure to check the media player on the Tape-101 product page. Hugo did some lovely demo mp3s.

Tape-101 is available as a download for Kontakt and EXS24 (both formats included) for $49 USD.

So what do I think?

Tape-101 sounds deep, nasty & dirty… in a good way. It appears this synth was actually designed as a strap-on instrument with an optional modulation attachment that stuck out like a guitar neck. Weird, it doesn’t seem like the keytar kind of synth to me at all.

Anyway, there’s a good variety of sounds and they generally sound warm, punchy and fat (or phat if you prefer). Playing some of the instruments I hear the sounds of True Playaz and Dillinja, so I reckon they’re great for drum & bass. The SH-101 is a popular synth so you might also recognize some if its sounds as there are tons of big names who’ve used it (Aphex Twin, The Prodigy, Bjork, Carl Craig, Squarepusher and Boards of Canada to name a few).

Tape-101 is another solid sample library from Goldbaby, highly recommended if you’re looking for some heavy bass and cutting lead sounds for techno, acid, drum & bass, and the likes. Plus you get some lovely drum kits and a bunch of cool LFO effect sounds. What more could you want? (except a real SH-101)

Visit Goldbaby Productions for more information.

Some interesting things I found recently:

# Todd Vanderlin | AR Scratching

Moving it in front of a camera, Todd Vanderlin uses a vinyl record equipped with an AR marker to manipulate music.

I was playing around with some AR markers the other day and came up with this idea. taking just a plain old vinyl record and attaching an AR marker to the label you can track the record in 3D space. The next question was, can you scratch the record? So by figuring out the velocity of the records rotation and applying it to the payback of the audio you can scratch.

… playback of course.

# Leadtowill: spring reverb

Leadtowill writes:

This was a cassette radio. I removed the motor etc and added an input to the amp section of the circuit, mounted a spring and converted the speaker to a driver with a knife – the result is a roomy sounding spring reverb.
Future additions —- a filter and feedback section, maybe make use of the radio section as a white noise generator…

Goldbaby Productions has released the Tape MR-16, a free pack of samples from the Korg MR-16 MIDI Rhythm Sound Unit.

Hugo writes:

It’s been a while since I gave a sample pack away. So here you go… the Tape MR-16.

The MR-16 was Released in 1985. It has 19 drum sounds… I think they are either 12 bit or 8 bit PCM samples (not sure). They sound pretty LoFi but solid. I have done the usual tape treatment using an Ampex 1/2 inch valve tape machine and A Hitachi Cassette deck.

The Tape MR-16 is available for download here.

Also make sure to get your copy of any Goldbaby product today for a change to win that MBase 01. There’s only one week left in this giveaway.

Check Goldbaby Productions for more information.