Sunday 30 October 2011

Maths Tour Snaps 2011

What better way to banish the post-tour blues than to go through all the photos I took... Happy days indeed!




































Theres No One Driving

We were lucky enough to have Gazelle Twin supporting us at the first XOYO gig last week, and Elizabeth also did a beautiful remix for us which is on the new Maths album The Shape of Things. A very rubbish video I took is below



She has just done a really cool thing over on The Quietus, its a fascinating insight into her inspirations check it out here. One thing I liked was this rather spooky robot-bus, which actually exists. Its typical isn't it? You wait years for something to happen then two come along at once. I put a new soundtrack on it (from a cool 1980s library album called New Technology V3) which I just downloaded from Dusty Shelf

Some Buchla Percussions

Saturday 29 October 2011

Krell Cover Version

I saw this over on synthtopia, its Ben Burt (who did the Star Wars sound design) demonstrating how Louis and Bebe Barron made the music for Forbidden Planet, the first ever completely electronic film soundtrack in 1956, long before synthesisers were born

X&O @ XOYO




Our 2nd night at XOYO had the truly fantastic Xeno & Oaklander as support. They showed up with all their lovely gear in suitcases and set it up in front of everyone which was fascinating to watch then launched straight into their amazing set which is pretty impressive considering they use no backing tracks its all triggered analog sequences and drum machines and arpeggiators. After the set it all got piled in the dressing room in an equally ad hoc manner and it is this irreverence that infuses their music and its very refreshing to behold

Friday 28 October 2011

DJ Phil



Phil (of Wrangler) was the DJ at the XOYO gigs. Cheers mate! You rule! Here's a little clip I took of him in action. That's our Wrangler 7 he's playing...

The Trip Is Over

We all returned home today after our little tour, slightly earlier than anticipated. John managed to trip over a small table in the pitch dark and smashed his forehead! So our XOYO gig turned into our farewell as far as this tour is concerned. Luckily John is OK but he'll have an impressive scar to show for all his efforts this month. In fact we have all put a lot of work in but I have loved every second of it - up until this morning waiting for John to come back from the hospital! So thanks to John and the team (Sefa, Hannah, Baz, Chris, Chris and Steve) I've had an amazing time. I will put up some pictures in a new post soon

Spheres

The Vemia/Sphere auction is on again, with the usual selection of interesting vintage synths and electronic gear. For example this thing, called a Farfisa Polychrome (no I hadn't heard of it either)


Thursday 27 October 2011

Growing Pains

I drove over to west London last night to pick up a new (old) case for the Buchla from Rash, as well as a 291e triple morphing filter. And he lent me his 259e to try out too. Yum!



UPDATE: here's a drone patch I just made using the new modules:

Wednesday 26 October 2011

Krakow Time

Heres a little gallery of pics from our trip to Krakow, for the Unsound festival...