101–110 of 137 posts
As a Midwestern raver in the 90s that was regularly in Detroit, Chicago, and Minneapolis, I love this little history and philosophy piece. I can't quite explain the feeling of the midwestern rave scene in the 90s, but it was very racially diverse, utopian, punk, looking somehow back and forward in time at the same time enmeshed in psychedelics and psychedelia but somehow also part of both machines and cultures far ol…
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Roland recently reissued many of their classic synths including an updated 303. Now it’s called the TB-03 and it has a “friendly” step programming option in addition to the original crazy style: https://www.roland.com/us/products/tb-03/
Behringer are also bringing out a bunch of clones. I think they may have just released a 303 clone. Can't speak to the quality of it though. Always found Behringer kit to have a high noise floor but that was at least a decade ago so things may have changed.
A lot of people, myself included, still love and create acid. The original 303 itself is pretty absurdly (prohibitively) expensive to acquire, and it's a tiny plastic toy and net anywhere from 2000-4000$. A case study in supply and demand - with a little bit of hype, I suppose. There have been a bunch of pretty good software emulations, most notably: https://www.audiorealism.se/abl3.html and even some much cheaper ph…
Have you considered getting a x0xb0x kit? I built one of those a few years back, and the sound was pretty spot on to the original.
If you are interested in this, Synthmania YouTube channel has pretty detailed reconstruction/deconstruction of beats from those times, mostly using the original gear.
Great article. Where’s the write up on the TR-808?!
For awhile when I was younger I played the game of listen to an album then look up who influenced it, rinse and repeat. Found real gems this way, but along these lines I never found the track in this article. It's really good and it reminds me of E2-E4 [1] [2] by Manuel Göttsching. Which I found because the guy from LCD Soundsystem is quoted in the wikipedia article that when he did 45:33 that he wanted to make somet…
Seems like you really know your house. Not sure if you're musically inclined but if so the OP-1 is a great tool[1][2]. If you ever make it to nyc hit me up, I know James well and I'm sure he'd enjoy your thoughts around E2-E4. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDqThYqldBI [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umatbZ0n4mE
The acid sound is still immensely popular amongst my cohort even after 30 years. And still some great stuff being produced (relatively) recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHIEqdOic9w
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This is like me! ReBirth was pivotal for shifting my computer use from purely gaming to more creative efforts including programming, back in middle school. I’m probably not wrong to say it is has had a huge influence on music software since. I still enjoy using it on the iPad. Your list is also a good one, I would add this, https://youtu.be/rdfEWFYpYNM It was amazing to hear Ten Ragas - especially as someone who grew…
Ten Ragas was actually before all the acid house if I'm not mistaken. The guy did a European (or maybe even World) tour a few years ago and I saw him play in a small bar. He appeared quite unenthusiastic, just replaying the kind of stuff he made way back then and probably had a hard time understanding why people found it so incredible. Apart from several 303s he also had a very expensive Jupiter that he was touring w…
I did hear about the tour and that exact response, clearly this stuff was in the distant past for him.
It makes wonder who else got their hands on a 303 in the early 80s elsewhere in the world. We keep digging out great African and Middle-eastern records, there may be more to the Acid story.
There is indeed something about turning an actual hardware knob (even if it's only to midi-control a software instrument) which can do that. Much less for dragging buttons with a mouse, it seems. The day I got my first synth I spent an entire evening and night like that. Get some sound going, play some notes until satisfied with the melody, then repeat endlessly while lossing yourself in truning each knob available.
I really love how an obscure topic like Acid House can trend on HN and then a whole bunch of people who've been fans of that topic for years just emerge in the comments out of nowhere. It's really testament to the diversity and quality of the HN community.