Bo Diddley vs Oscillator

The 1967 Rolling Stones album Flowers, mostly a collection of singles, odd and sods, does contain a few numbers of worth(PLEASE skip right over My Girl though!). What really impressed me after not listening to it for many years was Please Go Home, a cacophonous  mixture of Bo Diddley guitar, Charlie Watts' pounding drums, Jagger's vocals pushed into an echo-smeared universe, AND, lurking in the mix, a trippy oscillator! I remember digging this alien sound in my teens and not knowing what it was. Was this my introduction to electronic music, other than the joyful activity of tuning in white noise, jarring static and ghost voices on my father's car radio? Who knows...but it's wandering electronic tone still makes me smile.

Headless Potential

After quite a few years lost in the wilderness of Buchla, Serge and euro-rack explorations, I find myself once again drawn to six strings. Starting as a blues player I branched out in to what can only be termed exploratory guitar noise without completely losing my tonal center. Sort of, to use a painting analogy, Cy Twombly meets Robert Ryman in a darkened room...quiet corners erupt into mayhem!

The grey Teuffel guitar and the pink Klein appeal to my need for non-conformity. Perhaps the headless guitars can function as an metaphor for my romantic need for unfettered creative "frequency painting" a la Duchamp. The Teuffel is the first industrial guitar; its controls produce a cacophonous outpouring, grey blasts of sonic detrius and smears. Both instruments can produce an acceptable traditional guitar sound, but as function may well be suggested by form, they beg to explore and experiment.

With all this synth obsessiveness as part of my recent history, we'll see where this takes me?

New Goike Case

Spalted maple, made from a drawing I sent to Matthew, this is a beauty!

Quantum Rainbow

This rainbow produces 5 shades of noise and should prove handy, adding veils of cloudy noise mirages and filth. SSF makes these in the Bronx (along with the great ProModular devices) and are available at CONTROL in Brooklyn. The SSF Quantum Rainbow...handy noise when you need it!

KOMA ELEKTRONIK KOMMANDER

A recent visit with Daren and Jonas at CONTROL in Brooklyn yielded the a surprise purchase, a Koma Elektronik Kommander, a simple but very effective CV/gate motion controller much like a therimin that responds to hand motions. Check YouTube for a demo...this thing is going to be a blast!

SAMPLE & HOLD : yellow swans

I met Pete Swanson, part of the now defunct noise duo YELLOW SWANS at CONTROL in Brooklyn a few weeks ago; I was taken with his smile, his engaging sense of humor and his stories. Simply put, a nice guy...who makes NOISE...torrents of noise, dystopian, crunching industrial beats, and drones that swallow huge expanses of space. While Yellow Swans is no more, their releases are worth searching out.

Bring The Neon War Home, a 2004 release, is composed of 5 pieces that evolve, morphing from Merzbow-ian tumult to cascading drones. Unlike many noise artists, Yellow Swans create music that engages through creative layered sonic variation meant to be listened to...NOT simply exercises in earplug use!

Blue Lantern Asteroid VCF

In spite of all the euro-forum noise that accompanied the introduction of BL's thru-zero oscillator recently, BL keeps producing a startling array of modules. The most recent monster is the ASTEROID VCF, a stunning jumble of knobs, outputs and modulation choices. It really is BUSY and visually over-powering!...But, what really counts is the sound.

The Asteroid VCF  can be aggressive, an in-your-face sound, that while brutal, exhibits an evolving layered sonic palette that can be easily morphed beyond recognition utilizing the myriad of ins/outs, knobs and switches. With all this, the Asteroid VCF begs to be "played," almost an instrument unto itself...quite an achievement in a euro-modular world glutted with the mundane disguised as epiphany.

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