i built this for my brother Niall using the schematics and parts list from this page. i went with the silicon transistors version. i think it turned out pretty cool and it was a lot of fun to make!
here’s a clip of some casio through it:
Casio SA9 - 2002
i initially had trouble getting the SA9 to glitch until i realized that the trick is quick momentary connections. this little guy spits out some crazy and amazing sounds! you generally have to coax it a little to get the really fantastic stuff, but it’s capable of some great long evolving glitches.
across the top the additions are: 1/4″ output, patch burp switch (causes it to rapidly change patches), rotary switch for ranges of patches burped, overdrive/feedback switch with knob for amount, main glitch button, 2nd noisy glitch button, led and power switch.
here is an example of the burp, overdrive and glitches:
and a diagram of the main bends:
here’s a less abstract version of the diagram above:
mos vox - 2003
based on Dave Wright’s joystick noise synth schematic.
2 oscillators with pitch control, and an overall tone/volume control. the 2 oscs interfere with each other and cause interesting noise and pitch stepping. i added an 555 based lfo and cv inputs with depth control to modulate each oscillator. also cool retro knobs.
the insides.. messy jumble of wires and perf boards..
here is a clip with osc1 being modulated by an external lfo, and osc2 by the internal one:
’slowpoke’ - circuit bent casio pt80 - 2002
the pt80 is a pretty cool little keyboard. it has accompaniment and a chord section, leds that light up with the keys and a rom card slot. the card it came with has ‘thriller’, ‘karma chameleon’, ’still rock and roll to me’ and ‘dont be cruel’ on it. not sure how elvis fits in with those.. but its a sweet selection.
i added a pitch knob which takes it down pretty slow, and when used with the body contacts can drop down to sheer noise. most of the switches are bends that accentuate different drum sounds such as making the kick synthy or turning the hi hats into a snare sound. there is also a tone with a photocell that controls its pitch. in some light settings it gets this interesting filtered drum sound. you can hear it in the clip below.
check it out:
Speak & Spell - 2002
the classic circuit bending candidate - the Texas Instruments Speak & Spell. this one has a pretty standard set of bends - pitch control, 2 short glitches, 1 long glitch, hold switch with release button, body contact, startup sound loop and a reset button. there is also a cv input with amount that controls the pitch.
this guy has been a mainstay in the studio and has been used live many times.
here are a couple of sound samples of it:
basic bends - long glitch, pitch and hold:
this is a held glitch being modulated throught the cv inpuit:
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Speak & Read - 2002
this was my favorite but it died. a Speak & Read that i removed the button membrane on. the Read is a little more wordy than the Spell and has some interesting glitches where it spits out weird phrases. this also has the standard bends - pitch, glitches, hold and distort. what was really cool about it was a bend that modified the hold so that it would change over time.
heres the glitch modify if you want to try it:
(i tried this recently on another read but it didnt work.. so maybe not on all revisions..)
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Speak & Read - 2003
this one has a 555 based lfo and photo cell both to control pitch. also regular pitch knob, glitch and hold. looks pretty nice but ended up not being a playable as the others, although you can get some nifty scratching type sounds from it using the photo cell.
Lumivox - 2001
modified from QR Ghazala’s Lumivox II design, a cool 555 based opto-theremin. the button and switch both activate the sound and the knob and photocell change the pitch. there is also an 1/8″ output wired from the speaker. the spherical enclosure makes it alot of fun to play with.. i have recorded with this and used it live many times.
for the different values i used a 100k pot, 1.7uf electrolytic cap & 100nf ceramic cap.
here’s a sound sample (with a little bit of delay)
