PS I just updated that page with schematics and perfboard layout, in case you have a lonely SP0256-AL2 waiting for a chance to jabber.

The vocal synth will debut at SXSW Interactive on 3/13 when Bodytronix plays Dorkbot at Brush Square Park.  We’re playing a bunch more gigs coming up so maybe we will see you.

• Sat. 3/13 6PM - Dorkbot 23 at SXSW Interactive (RSVP event)… located in Brush Square Park right outside the Austin convention center.
• Tues 3/16 8:30 PM - AWTHUMFETHT 2010 at the Independent (located in 501 Studios)
• Tues 3/16 11:00 PM - Club 1808 (1808 E. 12th St, Austin) w/ Reverse X-Rays, MANY MORE!!
• Sat 3/20 3:00 PM - Handmade Music Austin #6 at Salvage Vanguard Theatre
• April 22-24th (TBA) - Bent Festival ‘10 (The Tank NYC)

I’m working on a new DIY project for folks to build at Handmade Music Austin 6.  Tune In Tokyo started out as an experiment with the 74HC594 chip, and it turned out sounding crazy.  YES, I’m aware of the of nipple reference. XD XD XD

Tune In Tokyo

And finally . . .

Sailormouth, another Texas circuit maestro, interviewed me recently and you can read it here on GetLoFi.com.  Sailormouth’s work covers a good combination of circuit bending, original circuitry, mods, and microcontrollers.  Thanks for the interview my friend.

EDRUPT - My Speakers

The story of EDRUPT is an esoteric mystery of NASA’s Apollo moon missions.  Did you know that the Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) was the first computer built with integrated circuits a.k.a. chips?  Containing 4,100 chips strung together by hand with wire wrap and solidified inside clear epoxy, the AGC was used in all of NASA’s manned moon missions.  Details of its operation have been disclosed, but one of the computer’s designers included a strange and poorly documented machine instruction called EDRUPT.  It was used only once in the mission, during the phase when the Lunar Module made its descent toward the moon’s surface under digital control.  Retro computing enthusiasts can simulate the AGC’s Luminary 131 software on desktop machines but its found that the system breaks unless EDRUPT is removed from the code.  One understanding of EDRUPT is that it instructed the computer to send data to an unknown destination elsewhere in the spacecraft.  But why is EDRUPT a missing piece of the puzzle?  What was contained in the data it sent?  And… what or who was the intended recipient?

When we played Club 1808 we stripped down the setup to the essentials.  I played BBoT, ABoT, mini space rockers, andromeda Mk-3, modified ibanez DM-1000 looper.  erich played x0xb0x, TX606, clap-raca, casio rapman.

thx for jammin with us: owen, ethan, shane, sweet DJG, lisa, gene, no mas bodas, weird weeds, reverse x rays, club 1808

heres to a very analog 2010.

Handmade Music Austin #3

Sunday, December 20 ‘09

4PM – 5:30 – Beginner’s Workshop
6PM – 8 -Upper Division instrument building class
8:30 – ? Jam and featured performance

Salvage Vanguard Theatre
2803 Manor Road
Austin, Texas 78722

Snare is synthesized with Andromeda Mk-1 damped sine wave + Mk-2 filtered noise burst. The damped sine waves simulate the top head of the snare, and the Mk-2 simulates the bottom drum head and snare wires. The sharp percussion sound is from an experimental all-transistor circuit, on the left. Its triggered by a prototype 2-button loop sequencer using PIC 16F684, code by Wooster Audio.

Its a cluster of four interactive electronic music stations where you can play with Andromeda Space Rockers, the Autonomous Bassline Generator, and MIDI-IR. Each station has 4 space rockers, a mixer, four flexible LEDs from our friends at Bleep Labs, and MIDI-IR to keep everybody in sync.

Here’s video from Handmade Music Austin #2. It was awesome meeting everybody who participated.

HMA3 is coming soon. This time we’ll be building mini space rockers (intro) and Andromeda Mk-4 analog bass drums (advanced).

Big ups to Einstein the Parrot, who is the source of the ’shake your bootie’ and ‘oh my gosh’ vocal samples!!  (We used to have a sample of Einstein’s “who let the dogs out” but it got misplaced.)

Props to video producer/editor Will Patterson, radio host Kelsey Innis, engineer Kayla Croft,  and all of the student radio and television volunteers at UT Austin!

12 x ASR mini analog drum machines

In other related news, Nathan Wooster designed a PCB for his MIDI-to-IR sync converter, which lets a computer or MIDI sequencer be the master clock for all of these things.

The 4MS Autonomous Bassline Generator is now available as a kit from 4ms Pedals.  We’ll be teaching 20 people how to build them at the Handmade Music Austin workshop #2 on Nov. 15th.

In December, we’ll introduce the Nebulophone synth kit from Bleep Labs.

electronic music from Eric Archer on Vimeo.

thanks to iloveanalogue.blogspot.com for this video interview!

Prototype 4ch powered pocket mixer blowin out analog beats thru a bare 12″ speaker.

This jam is crying for Gakken SX-150.

Pocket mixer: 2.8W service into 4 ohms w/ soft clip. 4 C-cell batteries. Connects to any external speaker with binding post terminals.