Buchla 300 - The Electric Music Box (1980)

Rick who is an expert in restoring old analogue synths, and who has worked on all the old Buchla instruments gives us another insight into the amazing history of the instruments Don Buchla has created over the last dacades.

from muff's:

found this photo from 2007 in a folder on my drive.. was the patch i used to record this piece: soundcloud.com/ava76/buchla-296-buchla-donald

note: configuration has been changed slightly since this photo, now one of 2 original 288s occupies the space to the left of the System Interface.

...its hard to see in this pic but its a hybrid system consisting of 28! Oscillators, Freq Shifter/Bal modulator, 2 Spectral Processors, 16 Lopass Gates, 8 Envelopes, Source of Uncertainty, Voltage Processors, Mixer/preamp, Triple Envelope Follower, System Interface, Time Domain Processor and touchplate. the 300 cpu handles all the sequencing and further voltage processing, multistage complex envelopes.

Q: whats the module left to the system interface?

...its the 298 Silicon cello/sax.. a recreation of the circuit stuffed in the silicon cello... a few were made in 2002 (by me) at the same time as the original run of barberpole modules.

 

More GIF!!!

♥♥♥ Farwell VM-1 ♥♥♥

♥♥♥ Think of  all good times we have wasted, having good times  ♥♥♥

Jason R. Butcher's new module module

A new module module From Jason R. Butcher. Seems like a quad CV mixer. Looks very nice like all his modules.

From his Flickr: Nearing the end of this run limited to 8 units. All are spoken for.

My first GIF.

I made my first gif tonight. Nothing special but I love 8 bit and psychedelic art.

The End of Walnut Grove

Friends of mine have released their sixth Ölfilm a few weeks ago. A dark, apocalyptic dystopian road movie that takes you too a world without light. Because instead of light there is darkness and the sound of a generator that gives just enough electricity that Joe Maguro can see his shopping trolley in which he carries around the last remaining belongings of his life over an endless, cold as hell ice desert. This low buget sience fiction movie has achieved what many new movies are trying to create. Something new, something fresh and exciting. If you can find the movie anywhere go and watch it. You will not regret it.

From their homepage:

The End of Walnut Grove
Das sechste Meisterwerk.
Inhalt:

Es ist Nacht, für immer. Und niemand weiß warum. Menschen verstecken sich in Höhlen und Gruben, Schmutz und Dunkelheit sind ihre Begleiter, und sie hören nur den Wind, der durch die einsame Eiswüste heult.

Joe Maguro hört den Wind nicht. Er hört nur das ohrenbetäubende Knattern seines Generators, den er im Einkaufswagerl über den gefrorenen Sand schiebt, und der ihm Licht und Leben spendet. Joe braucht keine Angst zu haben, vor den Monstern der Nacht.

Also hat er Zeit nach der Lösung zu suchen, vom Rätsel um die ewige Finsternis. INTEC hat etwas damit zu tun, soviel weiß er schon. Und auch den Rest wird er noch herausfinden, unterstützt vom Lippenleser im Pinguinkostüm und einer blonde Falle aus Heldenmut und Pappmachee. Viel Zeit bleibt ihnen nicht. Denn ein bevorstehender Sonnenaufgang löst nicht Rätsel und Probleme, sondern spendet Tod, und Untergang.

There is no trailer but I just made this for the contest they are currently having. I hope this will win me the bottle of Vodka.

Buchla 200 - 101 Buchla 200 - 101 keyboard test

Buchla 200-101 system that Rick from "The Electric Music Box" was repairing. Or that is what he said. I think it sounds great nonetheless.

The Puck style Rogan knobs are back!!!

via xpander on muff's : "in my relentless effort to bring all of the Buchla style knobs back into existence, a group buy will finally be happening for Rogan "puck" style knobs thanks to the generous assistance of two fine wigglers. look for that to begin at the end of the week"

Can't wait for those and will definitely order some. Those where mostly used on the 259's in the Buchla 300 series, but some people prefer them to the skirted ones you normally see. 

UPDATE: the group buy has begun over at muff's. Don't miss out!!!!!!

 

GIF Art

I amlately fascinated by intenet art. Just love those gif's. Go to gifart.org for more.

The Music Easel has returned!!!

So now that the dust has settled I post some of the information that has surfaced here that is concerning the new Buchla Music Easel that BEMI will release in about 6 months.

Ever since I have first read about the Music Easel it was a dream of mine (and probably every Buchla enthusiast) to play one, just for a few minutes at least. But with only 20 or so produced the chances of this ever happening where very little. As I am located in Europe it is even harder to get your hands on one. But even though Don is the guy that never looks back, B&A has been bought and the new owners follow a different philosophy and have announced that they will release a functionally identical Music Easel in the next months. Everything will be the same as the original one. They even left the Programming Card the way it was. So you just take some resistors and solder your own presets for it.
The slot for the Programming Card can also be used for an additional card that lets you hook up the Music Easel to your I Pad or other devices and also lets you save presets.

I have not ordered on yet, but I will when the unit is ready and available in Europe. Can't wait for it. At first I was considering selling my 200e modules but I have since decided against this as I could not live without the 259e or the 267e and all the other wonderful modules.

BEMI's statment on muffs:

Pricing Structure
The Music Easel is BEMI’s first foray into selling Buchla gear through dealers, and while we are keeping the number of dealers purposely small, we are following a traditional dealer pricing model. This means that while BEMI will sell the unit at the MSRP of $3999.99, dealers can advertise it for $3,699.99. No matter whether you choose to purchase directly from BEMI or go through a BEMI dealer, orders will be shipped in the order in which BEMI receives them.
   
Orders / Email Address Confusion
Due to a combination of circumstances, some Easel inquiries sent to our sales@buchla.com address were not received. Our sincere apologies to those of you who were frustrated by our lack of response. We have recovered the mails, and we are contacting everyone who was not previously contacted and/or who did not subsequently place their order through either purchasing@buchla.com or  info@buchla.com.

Features
We’re listening! In addition to the many thoughtful comments we received at NAMM from the Buchla community, we’re closely following the “vintage accuracy versus modern functionality” debate in this forum, and doing our best to find the optimum blend of the two. We’ll continue to refine and implement changes in accordance with your input. Our goal is to put the best possible instrument in your hands.

The preset card is a good example. We think it’s really important to remain true to the original Easel’s preset card architecture (apparently some of you can’t get enough solder fumes). But we also understand the modern workflow and the need for immediate access to multiple presets---hence the design of our optional preset manager/ iPad interface card. Speaking of which, the interface’s spec calls for saving/loading presets, remote programming of the Easel via iPad, and wireless operation. MSRP 
TBA.

We’ll post the full feature list and specs on our new Web site as soon as it’s launched. (We’re busy translating the Latin pages now….)

Aesthetics
The debate over original vs. new aesthetics is raging nearly as fiercely as the one over features. Again, we’re doing our best to find the sweet spot. A couple of things you can be sure of: The case lid will be removable and we’re taking a long hard look at all of the graphic elements, from fonts and colors to knobs….

Don Buchla’s Involvement
If you were BEMI, would you reissue the Music Easel without Don’s involvement? Get real!

The Manual
It’s our intention to include an appropriately updated version of the original Allen Strange manual along with new documentation to help users unfamiliar with the Easel unlock its sonic potential.

European Service / Distribution
Yes to both! We’ll be announcing dealers, distributors, and service centers on our Web site as they come on line.

 

 

1984

"I betrayed you," she said baldly.
"I betrayed you," he said.
She gave him another quick look of dislike.
"Sometimes," she said, "they threaten you with something – something you can't stand up to, can't even think about. And then you say, 'Don't do it to me, do it to somebody else, do it to so-and-so.' And perhaps you might pretend, afterwards, that it was only a trick and that you just said it to make them stop and didn't really mean it. But that isn't true. At the time when it happens you do mean it. You think there's no other way of saving yourself and you're quite ready to save yourself that way. You want it to happen to the other person. You don't give a damn what they suffer. All you care about is yourself."
"All you care about is yourself," he echoed.
"And after that, you don't feel the same toward the other person any longer."
"No," he said, "you don't feel the same."

Throughout, a song recurs in Winston's mind:

Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me—

New Stuff arrived!!!

So a some new stuff arrived in the last couple of weeks.Some panels, some knobs, the simple yet amazing flop sequenzer Djangosfire build. So I took a picture with all the new Buchla stuff.Have to build some modules and need to finally get a bigger case as it is quite sad that I can't use my 267 at the moment.

 

259e and 267e are taking a trip to outer space

Just posted two small demo pieces I just recorded on my soundcloud channel. Both feature just the 259e, the 267e and my beloved El Capistan pedal from Strymon.

I am still amazed about the different sounds one can come up with, using just two Buchla modules be it the 281e in combination with the 259e or now with the 267e. I must say I also had a lot of fun with the 258v.

Buchla 100 system for sale at Muff's Modules

There is a super nice Buchla 100 system for sale at muff's that acording to Rick the man behind the electric music box website includes the following modules:

Fully restored 1970s Era Buchla 100 Modular System in 101 Cabinet:

101 2 piece 25 Panel Unit Cabinet
115 Power supply
110 Dual Gate (2 VCAs)
160 Dual Noise Source
175 Dual Equalizer (2 Filters)
194 Comb Filter (Filter)
190 Dual Reverberator
171 Dual Instrument Preamplifier
111 Dual Ring Modulator
106 Six Channel Mixer
196 Phase Shifter
192 Dual Lopass Filter (2 Filters - SUPER RARE MODULE)
158 Dual Sine/Saw Generator (2 Oscillators)
158 Dual Sine/Saw Generator (2 Oscillators)
156 Dual Control Voltage Processor
107 Voltage Controlled Mixer (10 VCAs!)
140 Timing Pulse Generator
123 Sequential Voltage Source (8 Stage Sequencer X 3)
180 Dual Attack Generator (2 Envelopes)
170 Dual Microphone Preamplifier (transformers!)
130 Dual Envelope Detector
114 Touchplate

all modules cleaned/recapped and tested, power supply refurbished.. wood cabinet restored. this system has 4 VCOS, 12 VCAs, several filter varieties including the rare 192 Lopass Filter which was one of the first Buchla module with Optos!, 8 stage sequencer, tons of processors and excellent stereo reverb.

Pics/more details soon

price is $35,000 plus shipping - pics soon.. here is a crappy one for now:

 

 All modules are cleaned and checked out by a Buchla instrument specialist

The 267e has arrived!!!

Just got my 267e right before Christmas. Wonderful module. Very very well build and one of the deepest Buchla modules I have seen. Took me a while to put it into my 2 panel powerd Box until everything worked fine. Only spend a couple of hours with it so far but I will post some audio soon.