OM-1 Cassette Tape Synthesizer

File this one under utterly uniquely sounding analog synthesizer.

The Onde Magnétique OM-1 is a device with which you control a modified cassette-player. Into the player you put various pre-recorded cassettes (flute, vox etc) and by playing the buttons on the controller you set the speed of the cassette motor. Which in turn produces notes in different pitches. Really cool concept. Like the bastard child of a Mellotron. Check it out!

The OM-1 costs $285 and can be ordered from their web site.

July 20th, 2016|Analog, Synthesizer|

Stranger Things on Netflix is like the 80s all over again

Stranger Things

I just finished watching all the eight episodes of the new Netflix series Stranger Things. I won’t write a lengthy review but I will say this. I loved it!
Not only is the story set in 1983 but the whole production, with just a few exceptions felt very 80s. And I say that in a good way. They somehow managed to stay clear of almost all of the usual 80s clichés. It’s like Steven Spielberg made a six and a half hour feature film based on a book by Stephen King and released it in the mid 80s.

Think movies like The Goonies, Stand by me and a bit of E.T.
Casting was good for the most part, with some surprisingly good acting here and there. I expect we will see more great things from Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven) in the future. Oh and i just loooove the music in the opening credits – with those warm, fat analog Moog sounds, going straight into my soul. Just wonderful.

July 19th, 2016|Blog, Film|

Nanoloop Mono for Gameboy

Over 10 years ago I got this idea that I would make some new chip tunes, so I bought an old Nintendo Gameboy and a cartridge with an early version of Nanoloop.
(Had to look, it’s version 1.2.)

No new chip tunes were actually made but I did manage to use some of its crunchy sounds in a couple of my early dance music releases, like A brand new world. The noisy crunchy loop you hear in the intro was done on a Gameboy with Nanoloop 1.2, with some sampled congas put on top of it.

Anyhow, the latest version of that awesome little sequencer is now 2.7 and apparently there is another type of cartridge on the way called Nanoloop Mono.
It’s a three channel analog synthesizer cart for the original monochrome Gameboy models, and judging by the video it sounds pretty damn good. I might just get one of these and fire up the old beige boy one more time.

Hmm.. I should make a youtube video playing Nanoloop 1.2. There doesn’t seem to be many on the tube.

 

Breathing some life into an old white Apple Macbook

I had an old Intel Macbook from 2006 stashed away in my closet. Apple had more or less dropped all support for it a long time ago, so now it was pretty much useless. I couldn’t even run the latest version of Chrome on it anymore.

A couple of months ago I stumbled upon a video on Youtube with a step by step guide on how to install Windows 10 on these old laptops. I decided to refurbish my old Macbook. It looked pretty easy but I didn’t have the original disks for Snow Leopard and had to buy new ones from Apple. I also got a new 500 GB hard drive as the original was only 60 GB, too small to hold both Windows and OS X. The whole process was fairly straight forward and took about an afternoon and an evening, including installing all the updates for Windows.

Basically it went like this:

  1. Download the 32 bit version of Windows 7 or 8 and put the installation files on a USB stick or DVD-R.
  2. Run the Bootcamp app from the the Snow Leopard system disk
  3. Insert the USB or DVD-R with Windows and run through the installation.
  4. After completion boot in Windows mode and update to Windows 10.
  5. Finish off by running the Bootcamp app in Windows. This will install all the necessary drivers.

Now I had a fully working Windows 10 laptop for surfing the web and playing non-graphics intense games like Braid and FEZ.

Of course I couldn’t stop there. I decided to do something about that ugly top case. Since the laptop was first generation white Macbook, aka the smelly version the sides of the plastic had eroded into in thin long stripes. On top of that, the plastic smelled like old sweat, a heavy BO that got more intense the warmer the computer got. Apple quality my ass.

The inside of a Macbook

Removing all the screws and opening it up.

I surfed the web and found a $30 Hong Kong replacement on AliExpress.com. The description said it was original and 97% new, which I now understand means refurbished. I suspect they took the underside from an old laptop and added newly produced plastic top, keys and pad.

The quality of the top case was surprisingly good, although there is a barely noticeable bump in the plastic to the left of the pad. As if something like a spanner was dropped on it. Never mind.. I’m happy it doesn’t smell at all like the original, it’s in one piece and everything is working. And I now have a Windows 10 computer that looks like a Macbook.

Old top vs new top

New vs old. Notice how the keys are a bit more yellow on the old top case.

July 15th, 2016|Blog, DIY|

One post a day, starting today

Recently I was attending Web Visions in Barcelona – for some inspiration and a heads up with what is happening in web design, UX, tech etc. One of the speakers was Matt Haughey (Slack) who gave some good advice on how to keep up with your side projects. His tip was to keep a regimen and do something once a day. It doesn’t have to take that long and it doesn’t have to be great. So here is my version of that. I will try to breathe some life into my blog again by posting stuff at least once a day, starting today. I will write about my music process, design, tech and other things I think is fun and important. Just short posts and not too advanced. If somebody is interested I might even fire up the comments field again. Had to close it down a while ago since it was only accumulating spam.

The pic was made using Prisma, a fun new app that uses Google DeepDream technology. It’s free (for now) and super easy to use. Check it out!

July 14th, 2016|Blog|
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