altLab - DIT Creativity

Hel­lo “intre­nets” people(s)

This post today reflects a lit­tle about  what cir­cuit ben­ding and diy are.

I have many fri­ends and col­le­a­gues  asking me “-So what is cir­cuit ben­ding?”, well here goes the awser and a bit of the his­tory behind cir­cuit bending.

Seems that a guy cal­led Reed Gha­za­la, was making expe­ri­ments with some synthe­si­zers, trying to get some more sounds out of the elec­tro­nic ins­tru­ments, so he deci­ded to open one and poke the guts of the beast .

He soon  finds out that the core of an elec­tro­nic ins­tru­ment its a lot of fun and this could be exci­ting discover.

Now…have you ever heard of the Savant syn­dro­me ?  a per­son who as Savant Syn­dro­me have the abi­lity of mixing emo­ti­ons, like seeing num­bers in a wide vari­ety of colors or the alpha­bet in sha­pes and forms, the cau­se of this, its sim­ply the brain and some short fuses in some are­as, and this its exac­tly what Cir­cuit ben­ding is.

So, when Reed deci­ded to explo­re the pos­si­bi­lity of the short cir­cuit he open a big door for expe­ri­men­tal music and a new form of seeing elec­tro­nic devi­ces, the idea its sim­ply bril­li­ant, lets open some toys, synths, pedals (wha­te­ver) and lets start to take some really cool sounds out of it, and the bril­li­ant part is : you don’t need to know about elec­tro­nics or be a geek who spent all day in the gara­ge (myself inclu­ded), becau­se cir­cuit ben­ding its like a a brain in short fuse.

What you need to cir­cuit ben­ding some stuff ?  This is another ques­ti­on and an impor­tant one. Hummm lets see:

First, you will need some kind of devi­ce that pro­du­ces sound, like a toy, a dis­tor­ti­on pedal, an old synth just to name a few.

Second, this is the impor­tant part DON’T USE ANYTHING THAT CONNECTS DIRECTLY TO THE AC/DC POWER, this means DEATH, ins­te­ad use bat­te­ri­es, all kinds of bat­te­ri­es and even trans­for­mers as long you don’t tou­ch that evil 220 V you are in business .

Third, open your devi­ce and cho­o­se your method of ope­ra­ti­on, this could be done in a vari­ety of ways, you could use your fin­gers with a lit­tle of sali­va (ughhh), or two screw dri­vers con­nec­ted by an alli­ga­tor clip.

Four, explo­re and see if the devi­ce reacts to your tou­ch poking some cir­cuits, i often get some gre­at results poking the chips legs and con­nec­ting them together, fin­ding the cool points its fun so don’t give up if you don’t find something in the first 5 minutes.

Five, ohh the “intre­nets” yes the­re’s a lot in here just sear­ch a bit and you will find your­self in a brand new world, of cour­se the cir­cuit ben­ding com­mu­nity its open min­ded and fri­en­dly, so don’t be shy and ask ques­ti­ons (most of us don’t know what are doing so join the club).

Now you know were Beck, Madon­na, Mike Pat­ton and many others are get­ting they ins­pi­ra­ti­on (yeah that’s right Madon­na), the musi­cal pos­si­bi­lity are immen­se, just think  is you, who  are dis­co­ve­ring your own sounds and making it at the same time (not like a pat­ch in a synthe­si­zer ) something really new and fresh made enti­rely  by you.

So,  what is Cir­cuit Bending ?