7 ms·

I built my own analog drum machine (2020)

189 points by danboarder 5y ago

alpineidyll3 5y ago
"Lady's in trouble with the law" is a classic track. I love this guy.
- the_local_host 5y ago
  This dude's stuff is incredible and I never heard of him before today. He should be famous!
smoldesu 5y ago
Thanks to the magic of Eurorack, it's easier than ever (albeit expensive) to build your own synth. Even "from scratch" oscillators aren't too difficult, if you're familiar with breadboarding/soldering.
- danboarder 5y ago
  Thanks for mentioning that, I was not aware of Eurorack and when I looked it up I found the Synth DIY Wiki, which is a treasure trove for this topic, super cool (https://sdiy.info/wiki/Main_Page https://sdiy.info/wiki/Main_Page ). BTW, some friends and I build the Box of Boom, which is an interactive digital + analog drum kit that uses actuators to play real drums with a video game console ( see https://www.boxofboom.com https://www.boxofboom.com ). We're exploring doing a new version that integrates more synth-y sounds and signal modifiers.
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    That's neat! I forgot to mention VCV Rack [1] which is a great way to get started with Eurorack for free. [1] https://vcvrack.com/ https://vcvrack.com/
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      Rack is awesome, and I use it almost every day. But it's not a way to get started with Eurorack. It's a (great) way to get started with modular synthesis. Eurorack is specific term for a particular hardware format (physical dimensions, power supply specifications, electrical standards). In general, most of the modules are analog, though there's no requirement for this to be true. Hardware modular synthesis existed before the emergence of Eurorack (perhaps most famously the Moog modulars, but also Buchla and perhaps 6-12 other companies making modular systems). Eurorack is an industry-wide specification that allows many different module makers to create modules that will all fully interoperate with each other.
      - smoldesu 5y ago
        My distinction is that it's to get you used to the standard, not the hardware. VCV Rack still uses 1V/Octave and CV just like a real Eurorack synth, so calling it "modular" is a bit of a disservice. VCV Rack is an emulation of the hardware, so much so that you can actually mix and match the two if you have the proper interface.
        PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
        The lessons you learn from using Rack are lessons about modular synthesis, not Eurorack. These are valuable lessons, and because Eurorack is also a modular synthesis environment, most of those lessons will carry over to a hardware environment. The same lessons will also help when using an older pre-eurorack hardware modular (e.g. Moog or Buchla) or a different software modular environment (e.g. Reaktor). I don't think that it is accurate to call Rack an emulation of the hardware. Rack itself doesn't emulate anything at all. Some of the modules emulate specific hardware modules. Many do not. There's also no actual voltage in Rack, just a nomenclature consensus on "1V/Octave", despite there being no volts anywhere. ps. I love Rack.
        smoldesu 5y ago
        I'm not accusing you of not loving Rack, I'm not sure why we're coming back around to this point again. In any case, Rack markets itself as a "Eurorack simulator", not a modular synthesizer. The predominant vision has always been to onboard preexisting physical modules to create an experience that is as similarly robust as hardware. There are plenty of software modular synthesizers: Uhe's Zebra is a bit of a classic in that regard. It's a wholly original digital modular synthesizer, and bared very little resemblance to physical Eurorack. > There's also no actual voltage in Rack, just a nomenclature consensus on "1V/Octave", despite there being no volts anywhere. Sure, just like there isn't a cartridge reader in bsnes. That doesn't mean it's not an emulator: it's just arranging the data in a manner that makes it viable to compute. It's not outside the realm of possibility to also simulate those voltages, but what's the point? The same discussion has been had every time the phrase "virtual analog" was used, and nobody ever agrees on it. In any case, VCV Rack is still emulation, even if it's only HLE.
  - munificent 5y ago
    If you search for "eurorack kit", you can find a ton of module kits where you get all the parts and solder them yourself. It's a really enjoyable hobby and a nice way to ease into electronics.
    - squarefoot 5y ago
      Also worth mentioning the fully Open Source and Open Hardware TSynth by ElectroTechnique, which is very cheap and sounds great for what it costs. https://electrotechnique.cc/ https://electrotechnique.cc/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCA2L7CeWSE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCA2L7CeWSE
- fpgaminer 5y ago
  It's even cheaper if you go with an AE Modular. A starter kit is like $500, versus Eurorack where a single module can be $500 :P. I've got one and have had a blast with it so far.
motohagiography 5y ago
The slider interface on the second prototype is very appealing as a UX. His other ones look sold out, and naively I could see custom collector synths from artists become quite a thing. What I love about making music with synths is you're essentially exploring a fractal overlaid on all possible audible frequencies, modulated by time. There is a kind of romanticism to the analog aspect of it that emphasises how it is a tangible event instead of a sampled representation, which is basically a fluffy idea now because physically humans are indifferent to whether it's one or the other, but the way it comes out in music is that on machines like this, the art of it is something discovered and shared moreso than reflected and produced. It doesn't really matter, but if there were an impulse-buy priced one akin to the stuff at teenage.engineering by this artist or another one, I could see a mini-craze for them.
- pushrax 5y ago
  > the art of it is something discovered and shared That’s what microtonal harmonic structures feel like to me, in the present day. Exploration and sharing of a new but familiar frontier. Even when done digitally.
- munificent 5y ago
  > you're essentially exploring a fractal overlaid on all possible audible frequencies, modulated by time. Another way to think of it is that every knob on the synth gives you a new dimension and each patch is a single point in that n-dimensional space. Sound design means exploring that volume by changing coordinates. I look at synth usability (which is very similar to how a lot of game designers talk about fun) as in part a question of how that space is arranged. How much of that volume produces sounds users will like versus ones they won't? How continuous is it? If I like a sound at point X, how likely am I to like sounds near X, or will moving even a small distance radically change the sound? Can I intuit what neighboring regions will sound like based on the current sound? I think a big part of why subtractive synthesis has been so successful is that it works well in that model. Most parameter changes are continuous and intuitive. The space feels like it smoothly changes in useful and predictable ways as you navigate. FM synthesis is really cool, but it feels a lot more like a chaotic universe where there are tiny islands of brilliant sounds separated by empty volumes of noise, or indistinguishable FM bloops.
erikschoster 5y ago
It's nice to see this here -- as Ellen Fullman said, instrument building is composition.
- qrv3w 5y ago
  Is that quote from a particular interview or talk? I'm interested in the context and learning more about Fullman
  - erikschoster 5y ago
    Yes it's actually paraphrasing the title of a nice piece she contributed to the second issue of the Spectres journal published by Shelter Press! The full title is "Instrument design is composition, resonance is harmony." It's an inspiring essay -- the Spectres issue on Resonances has a number of other nice essays from composers, sound artists etc loosely grouped around the subject.
    - qrv3w 5y ago
      Thanks a lot!
- fuzzfactor 5y ago
  Hewlett & Packard started out by building an instrument. Another very impressive thing they did was never stop. I continued with experiments using vacuum tubes more so into this century although I slacked off without a bench in recent years due to serious losses from natural disasters as they have come along. I really had my old vintage gear in shape and some new developments which sounded excessively tubular, and it had been a good reason to break out the old guitar even if just to test the amps numerous times per session as I was auditioning components and circuit possibilities. When I was at the bench I would spend about equal time soldering and playing. I was playing the same old stuff so I could reference the underlying differences in the circuits, I'm not a songwriter to begin with and I definitely was playing worse than ever, but with just a few hours of soldering I could get better tone than I ever had in my life. I needed all the help I could get anyway at that point and I guess I did have nothing to be ashamed of, but it was easy to admit that I was getting more progress out of spending two hours soldering than practicing music. Ended up with the amps as my instruments and the guitar as the equipment, and did some fun gigs with talented musicians for a while there. I never wanted to stop either.
aidos 5y ago
What a great insight! I absolutely loved his first album. Even better when he teamed up with Conan Mockasin (who I’ve always kept an eye on because I went to school with him) to form Soft Hair. Their track, The Lying has to Stop, is a work of beauty.
tessierashpool 5y ago
I built a drum machine last summer. highly recommend it. wasn't analog, but I was building it for different reasons. I had some help, and some disappointments, but building your own hardware is pretty easy with the Arduino ecosystem.
- imagica 5y ago
  How far did you get with it? Did you end up abandoning the project?
  - tessierashpool 5y ago
    No, I built it and got it working, but it was a bit fragile. I used a Teensy for the brain, with USB MIDI, and that made it reliant on the cables. Teensys run on a mini version of USB, so the cables aren’t generally that sturdy. I’m going to rebuild it with a more durable foundation.
jarmitage 5y ago
There's a brilliant set of live performances from the artist, of music made with these machines: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLafsplTntnuaL2ARcXtijZlsIlBnKDZAb https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLafsplTntnuaL2ARcXtij...
- mixmastamyk 5y ago
  Darn it, was secretly hoping I’d dislike it and not have to pick up a copy. Oh well. :-)
doctorhandshake 5y ago
In school I studied computer music, and I participated in a grad seminar for which the final project was a group concert. Alvin Lucier, one of the progenitors of electronic music, led the seminar as guest faculty. For the performance I built a software instrument in Max/MSP with some similar principles around free timing to those in this drum machine, but with a digital granular synth voicing. At the pre-show critique, I performed a piece using this instrument, and explained that the synthesizer had 3 voices because I found that to be a sweet spot between a full-sounding texture and what I could manage live. Alvin asked me if I had considered 5 voices. Confused, I said I had, but, and I repeated, I found it too much to manage. Cryptically, he replied something to the effect of ‘well, ok, but three is three but five is five.’ This was bizarrely hilarious to me but I kept it to myself. Later, the student who designed the show poster elected to call it ‘Three is Three but Five is Five’.
- imagica 5y ago
  Id be curious to see a performance with that instrument. Any link?
  - doctorhandshake 5y ago
    It wasn’t documented! :/ one of the things I learned only after my prolific college years is that despite what Cage says, if you don’t document, it didn’t happen. If it’s at all interesting I’d add that the instrument was multichannel and I performed from a seat in the theater audience, with the outputs of the system variously directed to the quad-channel PA and to the battery-powered car stereo I had sewn into a nylon vest / jacket on my person.
- raptorraver 5y ago
  My first encounter with programming (after childhoolds basic coding) was a Max/MSP course at music school. I remember I built a program which plays a short loop and each iteration modifies the loop a bit. It ended up pretty nice, but unfortunately I've lost the copy long time ago.
annoyingnoob 5y ago
I saw 'analog drum machine' and thought 'drum playing robot'.
- SamBam 5y ago
  I was thinking something like the Wintergatan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q
  - annoyingnoob 5y ago
    Yes, thank you.
- eloeffler 5y ago
  Me too, a purely mechanical even :) Would a metronome count for that?
  - type0 5y ago
    Hehe. What like Compressorhead drummer? Hilarious.
jim-jim-jim 5y ago
Notorious studio perfectionists Steely Dan commissioned a custom drum machine during the recording of Gaucho because none of the session drummers could play to their standards. http://rogernichols.com/wendel http://rogernichols.com/wendel Clocking in at ~$150K, it probably was a bit more expensive than this guy's project.
- big_youth 5y ago
  I love when musicians nerd out on gear. This snare drum commissioned by Aphex Twin may interest you: https://stichtinglogos.org/instrum_gwr/snar2.html https://stichtinglogos.org/instrum_gwr/snar2.html
  - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
    That's sick, thanks. Somebody also posted this a while back: https://warp.net/editorial/richard-d-james-speaks-to-tatsuya-takahashi https://warp.net/editorial/richard-d-james-speaks-to-tatsuya... I think RDJ was involved with other instruments' designs too.
pugworthy 5y ago
And here I thought actual physical beats being driven by servos perhaps.

189 points by danboarder 5y ago

alpineidyll3 5y ago

"Lady's in trouble with the law" is a classic track. I love this guy.

the_local_host 5y ago
This dude's stuff is incredible and I never heard of him before today. He should be famous!

smoldesu 5y ago

Thanks to the magic of Eurorack, it's easier than ever (albeit expensive) to build your own synth. Even "from scratch" oscillators aren't too difficult, if you're familiar with breadboarding/soldering.

danboarder 5y ago
Thanks for mentioning that, I was not aware of Eurorack and when I looked it up I found the Synth DIY Wiki, which is a treasure trove for this topic, super cool (https://sdiy.info/wiki/Main_Page https://sdiy.info/wiki/Main_Page ). BTW, some friends and I build the Box of Boom, which is an interactive digital + analog drum kit that uses actuators to play real drums with a video game console ( see https://www.boxofboom.com https://www.boxofboom.com ). We're exploring doing a new version that integrates more synth-y sounds and signal modifiers.
- smoldesu 5y ago
  That's neat! I forgot to mention VCV Rack [1] which is a great way to get started with Eurorack for free. [1] https://vcvrack.com/ https://vcvrack.com/
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    Rack is awesome, and I use it almost every day. But it's not a way to get started with Eurorack. It's a (great) way to get started with modular synthesis. Eurorack is specific term for a particular hardware format (physical dimensions, power supply specifications, electrical standards). In general, most of the modules are analog, though there's no requirement for this to be true. Hardware modular synthesis existed before the emergence of Eurorack (perhaps most famously the Moog modulars, but also Buchla and perhaps 6-12 other companies making modular systems). Eurorack is an industry-wide specification that allows many different module makers to create modules that will all fully interoperate with each other.
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      My distinction is that it's to get you used to the standard, not the hardware. VCV Rack still uses 1V/Octave and CV just like a real Eurorack synth, so calling it "modular" is a bit of a disservice. VCV Rack is an emulation of the hardware, so much so that you can actually mix and match the two if you have the proper interface.
      - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
        The lessons you learn from using Rack are lessons about modular synthesis, not Eurorack. These are valuable lessons, and because Eurorack is also a modular synthesis environment, most of those lessons will carry over to a hardware environment. The same lessons will also help when using an older pre-eurorack hardware modular (e.g. Moog or Buchla) or a different software modular environment (e.g. Reaktor). I don't think that it is accurate to call Rack an emulation of the hardware. Rack itself doesn't emulate anything at all. Some of the modules emulate specific hardware modules. Many do not. There's also no actual voltage in Rack, just a nomenclature consensus on "1V/Octave", despite there being no volts anywhere. ps. I love Rack.
        smoldesu 5y ago
        I'm not accusing you of not loving Rack, I'm not sure why we're coming back around to this point again. In any case, Rack markets itself as a "Eurorack simulator", not a modular synthesizer. The predominant vision has always been to onboard preexisting physical modules to create an experience that is as similarly robust as hardware. There are plenty of software modular synthesizers: Uhe's Zebra is a bit of a classic in that regard. It's a wholly original digital modular synthesizer, and bared very little resemblance to physical Eurorack. > There's also no actual voltage in Rack, just a nomenclature consensus on "1V/Octave", despite there being no volts anywhere. Sure, just like there isn't a cartridge reader in bsnes. That doesn't mean it's not an emulator: it's just arranging the data in a manner that makes it viable to compute. It's not outside the realm of possibility to also simulate those voltages, but what's the point? The same discussion has been had every time the phrase "virtual analog" was used, and nobody ever agrees on it. In any case, VCV Rack is still emulation, even if it's only HLE.
- munificent 5y ago
  If you search for "eurorack kit", you can find a ton of module kits where you get all the parts and solder them yourself. It's a really enjoyable hobby and a nice way to ease into electronics.
  - squarefoot 5y ago
    Also worth mentioning the fully Open Source and Open Hardware TSynth by ElectroTechnique, which is very cheap and sounds great for what it costs. https://electrotechnique.cc/ https://electrotechnique.cc/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCA2L7CeWSE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCA2L7CeWSE
fpgaminer 5y ago
It's even cheaper if you go with an AE Modular. A starter kit is like $500, versus Eurorack where a single module can be $500 :P. I've got one and have had a blast with it so far.

motohagiography 5y ago

The slider interface on the second prototype is very appealing as a UX. His other ones look sold out, and naively I could see custom collector synths from artists become quite a thing. What I love about making music with synths is you're essentially exploring a fractal overlaid on all possible audible frequencies, modulated by time. There is a kind of romanticism to the analog aspect of it that emphasises how it is a tangible event instead of a sampled representation, which is basically a fluffy idea now because physically humans are indifferent to whether it's one or the other, but the way it comes out in music is that on machines like this, the art of it is something discovered and shared moreso than reflected and produced. It doesn't really matter, but if there were an impulse-buy priced one akin to the stuff at teenage.engineering by this artist or another one, I could see a mini-craze for them.

pushrax 5y ago
> the art of it is something discovered and shared That’s what microtonal harmonic structures feel like to me, in the present day. Exploration and sharing of a new but familiar frontier. Even when done digitally.
munificent 5y ago
> you're essentially exploring a fractal overlaid on all possible audible frequencies, modulated by time. Another way to think of it is that every knob on the synth gives you a new dimension and each patch is a single point in that n-dimensional space. Sound design means exploring that volume by changing coordinates. I look at synth usability (which is very similar to how a lot of game designers talk about fun) as in part a question of how that space is arranged. How much of that volume produces sounds users will like versus ones they won't? How continuous is it? If I like a sound at point X, how likely am I to like sounds near X, or will moving even a small distance radically change the sound? Can I intuit what neighboring regions will sound like based on the current sound? I think a big part of why subtractive synthesis has been so successful is that it works well in that model. Most parameter changes are continuous and intuitive. The space feels like it smoothly changes in useful and predictable ways as you navigate. FM synthesis is really cool, but it feels a lot more like a chaotic universe where there are tiny islands of brilliant sounds separated by empty volumes of noise, or indistinguishable FM bloops.

erikschoster 5y ago

It's nice to see this here -- as Ellen Fullman said, instrument building is composition.

qrv3w 5y ago
Is that quote from a particular interview or talk? I'm interested in the context and learning more about Fullman
- erikschoster 5y ago
  Yes it's actually paraphrasing the title of a nice piece she contributed to the second issue of the Spectres journal published by Shelter Press! The full title is "Instrument design is composition, resonance is harmony." It's an inspiring essay -- the Spectres issue on Resonances has a number of other nice essays from composers, sound artists etc loosely grouped around the subject.
  - qrv3w 5y ago
    Thanks a lot!
fuzzfactor 5y ago
Hewlett & Packard started out by building an instrument. Another very impressive thing they did was never stop. I continued with experiments using vacuum tubes more so into this century although I slacked off without a bench in recent years due to serious losses from natural disasters as they have come along. I really had my old vintage gear in shape and some new developments which sounded excessively tubular, and it had been a good reason to break out the old guitar even if just to test the amps numerous times per session as I was auditioning components and circuit possibilities. When I was at the bench I would spend about equal time soldering and playing. I was playing the same old stuff so I could reference the underlying differences in the circuits, I'm not a songwriter to begin with and I definitely was playing worse than ever, but with just a few hours of soldering I could get better tone than I ever had in my life. I needed all the help I could get anyway at that point and I guess I did have nothing to be ashamed of, but it was easy to admit that I was getting more progress out of spending two hours soldering than practicing music. Ended up with the amps as my instruments and the guitar as the equipment, and did some fun gigs with talented musicians for a while there. I never wanted to stop either.

aidos 5y ago

What a great insight! I absolutely loved his first album. Even better when he teamed up with Conan Mockasin (who I’ve always kept an eye on because I went to school with him) to form Soft Hair. Their track, The Lying has to Stop, is a work of beauty.

tessierashpool 5y ago

I built a drum machine last summer. highly recommend it. wasn't analog, but I was building it for different reasons. I had some help, and some disappointments, but building your own hardware is pretty easy with the Arduino ecosystem.

imagica 5y ago
How far did you get with it? Did you end up abandoning the project?
- tessierashpool 5y ago
  No, I built it and got it working, but it was a bit fragile. I used a Teensy for the brain, with USB MIDI, and that made it reliant on the cables. Teensys run on a mini version of USB, so the cables aren’t generally that sturdy. I’m going to rebuild it with a more durable foundation.

jarmitage 5y ago

There's a brilliant set of live performances from the artist, of music made with these machines: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLafsplTntnuaL2ARcXtijZlsIlBnKDZAb https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLafsplTntnuaL2ARcXtij...

mixmastamyk 5y ago
Darn it, was secretly hoping I’d dislike it and not have to pick up a copy. Oh well. :-)

doctorhandshake 5y ago

In school I studied computer music, and I participated in a grad seminar for which the final project was a group concert. Alvin Lucier, one of the progenitors of electronic music, led the seminar as guest faculty. For the performance I built a software instrument in Max/MSP with some similar principles around free timing to those in this drum machine, but with a digital granular synth voicing. At the pre-show critique, I performed a piece using this instrument, and explained that the synthesizer had 3 voices because I found that to be a sweet spot between a full-sounding texture and what I could manage live. Alvin asked me if I had considered 5 voices. Confused, I said I had, but, and I repeated, I found it too much to manage. Cryptically, he replied something to the effect of ‘well, ok, but three is three but five is five.’ This was bizarrely hilarious to me but I kept it to myself. Later, the student who designed the show poster elected to call it ‘Three is Three but Five is Five’.

imagica 5y ago
Id be curious to see a performance with that instrument. Any link?
- doctorhandshake 5y ago
  It wasn’t documented! :/ one of the things I learned only after my prolific college years is that despite what Cage says, if you don’t document, it didn’t happen. If it’s at all interesting I’d add that the instrument was multichannel and I performed from a seat in the theater audience, with the outputs of the system variously directed to the quad-channel PA and to the battery-powered car stereo I had sewn into a nylon vest / jacket on my person.
raptorraver 5y ago
My first encounter with programming (after childhoolds basic coding) was a Max/MSP course at music school. I remember I built a program which plays a short loop and each iteration modifies the loop a bit. It ended up pretty nice, but unfortunately I've lost the copy long time ago.

annoyingnoob 5y ago

I saw 'analog drum machine' and thought 'drum playing robot'.

SamBam 5y ago
I was thinking something like the Wintergatan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q
- annoyingnoob 5y ago
  Yes, thank you.
eloeffler 5y ago
Me too, a purely mechanical even :) Would a metronome count for that?
- type0 5y ago
  Hehe. What like Compressorhead drummer? Hilarious.

jim-jim-jim 5y ago

Notorious studio perfectionists Steely Dan commissioned a custom drum machine during the recording of Gaucho because none of the session drummers could play to their standards. http://rogernichols.com/wendel http://rogernichols.com/wendel Clocking in at ~$150K, it probably was a bit more expensive than this guy's project.

big_youth 5y ago
I love when musicians nerd out on gear. This snare drum commissioned by Aphex Twin may interest you: https://stichtinglogos.org/instrum_gwr/snar2.html https://stichtinglogos.org/instrum_gwr/snar2.html
- jim-jim-jim 5y ago
  That's sick, thanks. Somebody also posted this a while back: https://warp.net/editorial/richard-d-james-speaks-to-tatsuya-takahashi https://warp.net/editorial/richard-d-james-speaks-to-tatsuya... I think RDJ was involved with other instruments' designs too.

pugworthy 5y ago

And here I thought actual physical beats being driven by servos perhaps.