ELECTRONIC INSTRUMENTS 2003 - 2005

BIFF is a freezer lunchbox. This instrument uses three light sensors, called "eyes-cubes," to melt the patterns of a basic stamp microcontroller. The eyes-cubes are resistors that respond to any type of light, but I mostly use a Bic brand lighter to flicker the cold twinkles out of the freezer into the warm room. Biff is powered by four AA batteries. He can be heard prominently in the Slow Dudes song, "College Town." [ VIDEO SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

THE WIGGLE WAFER is fall instrument that was specifically built to interface with Peter Blasser's Fyrall Computer. There are separate groundshares and a "power leaf" signal made for this purpose. The contents of the box include: the twix wafer (tones from a circuit bent keyboard) the twix wrapper (patterns) and the arrowhead (controls the speed of the arrow). The arrowhead can shatter the rhythms into the sound of a million leaves falling or a crumbling glacier. [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

SIPPY is a very dumb little munchkin. He squeaks and squiggles up and down like a drunken school girl. The box is meant to sit on your lap, speaker towards your face (it isn't very loud, the amp inside is only from a pair of computer speakers I found on the street). The box used to contain a fancy bottle of liquor. [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

THE SLIDER is also called "The Dickstick," a name coined by my friend John Fashion Flesh. Inside the shaft is a modified keyboard with a strip of rubber in place of the keys. The tones can be easily slid across, since the outside of the rubber is covered in black silk. The wood case is in the "pinewood derby style." Also shown is the VOswitch which I made to switch the Dickstick to various inputs, and a little amplifier used for practice. [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

THE HOBOSTOVE (with Mark Rothko Gamepad) is a very large birdhouse where I imagine that hobos once warmed their shoes and cooked things on. Light sensitive resistors divided by three paddles are rotated inside of scotch tape tubes. The paddles block and reflect the light from three bulbs inside the box. The amount of light changes the hobo ramblings (a basic hobo computer). There is also a simple oscillator that is controlled by two copper zones on the surface of the Mark Rothko Gamepad. The rubbing of the copper makes the stove wail for dinner. This instrument can be heard at the start of (and throughout) the Slow Dudes song, "Hi Hi Hello." [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

MUNCHY is a cottonmouth jabber that uses two very standard LM555 chips in combination with a primitive radio. I reconstructed the radio according to my memory of a crystal diode radio kit I had when I was a kid. The radio only picks up signals very very low on the FM band. The LM555s chop the stations into rhythms, and then spread them out with square wave pops. There are also effects knobs called "krakler" and "stinger." Rhythms from Munchy can be heard prominently on the Slow Dudes song, "Gimme a Call." [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

SPANKY is the very first instrument I built. This guy is just the parts from two circuit bent keyboards, with the addition of a "drinking bird" spring head. A small microphone inside the spring head picks up tones from the external speaker and feeds them back to a separate output. If you spank the drinking bird up and down, the tones flip and flop with feedback. I don't have any MP3 samples of Spanky unfortunately, but I can tell you that he is named after a "robot" I built when I was a kid, which was actually just a remote control car with a milk jug and a strawberry basket on top.

T-BASE was made as a DJ station for playing gameboys and tapeloops at parties. Also pictured is an ornamental pelt.

This is Peter Blasser's FYRALL COMPUTER which I built from a kit that he sent me. This is really an amazing instrument and if you want to find out more you can read Peter's philosophical papers on his website here. The Fyrall is an analog brain with no inputs or outputs that you play by feeling around androgynous nodes. Often it is played with a spoon in the mouth, which acts as a body contact to complete the circuit. [ VIDEO SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

THE AMBRAZIER is the first instrument that Peter B. built as an edition available for sale. I believe mine is one of only three "Fancy Style"' Ambraziers in existence. This instrument combines 8bit samplers with analog synths, leather, fur, and nipple buttons. Of all the instruments I own this is my favorite. It should also be noted that I have thrown out, given away, or gotten rid of every other instrument on this page except for the Ambrazier and the Fyrall. [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]      [ MP3 SAMPLE ]

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