modding, electronics, and gear

Playing (Live?) with Ableton

~ Clicky Steve ~ Leave a comment

On Saturday morning I had a Novation Launchpad delivered, and spent a good chunk of the rest of the weekend trying to figure out how to make use of it. I could easily get it to act as a MIDI input device for the Gameboy (which is sweet), but I really wanted to use it as it was primarily intended: to load up a bunch of chip loops and trigger them live as a sequencer.

After much swearing and frustration, I finally managed to get the loops synched up and laid out for one of the most recent tracks I’ve written. I just need to plug the Launchpad in, and I can play the whole song with the pads – triggering different combinations of sequences from about 1 to 4 bars long.

Much like a lot of the stuff I’ve been playing with lately, I wasn’t really sure why I was doing it in the first place; there was no real end game. I just wanted to see if I could do it. Being able to play with and manipulate songs/sounds that you’ve created on a tiny Gameboy screen in a more ‘live’ or dynamic fashion is pretty cool.

Now that I’ve managed to clear the biggest hurdle of getting it to work, it’s gotten me thinking. Theoretically I could now play a lot of my chiptune tracks live without just hitting ‘play’ on LSDJ – but I don’t think that would really be all that big of a draw in Glasgow. However, it does mean that I could set up chains of melodies, stick them into Ableton and then play them live as more of an instrument, as part of some kind of band setup. I’d just need to find some folk willing to play guitar and potentially drums in a weird quasi grunge electronic band.

Could be interesting.

Modding Gameboys Again

~ Clicky Steve ~ 1 Comment

Inevitably, a big part of making chiptune music involves exploring what you can do with different hardware, and how you can get the most out of it.

Whilst dragging out my gear again, I realised that I have a whole bunch of components kicking about from half-finished projects that I never quite got around to completing: Gameboy screens, shells, lights, switches, and other bits and pieces.

I want to modify my Gameboys so that they all have at least a backlight, and try out some other more interesting things like installing oscillators, so I thought I’d have a bash on one of the reliable bricks that I had lying about in pieces, and install a backlight in an otherwise unmodified yellow DMG.

I battered through the first bit easily. The foil that you need to peel off the screen for the backlight to fit came off without any hassle or residue left behind, and I remember thinking how much simpler it was than the last time I did it.

I should have known better though. Despite getting everything wired up fine, the screen wasn’t showing anything at all. Luckily, I have a pile of spare Gameboy guts to test things out on.

After a bit of swapping about, I realised that it was the screen itself that was the problem. No big deal, though the other screen I had to hand with the foil removed had a damage mark right in the middle that meant it wouldn’t be of any use for the final product. I’d need to remove the foil from one of the others.

For reference, here’s what the screen looks with an inverted backlight…

And without the inversion:

I dug into one of the other spare innards, only to find that the screen was warped and wouldn’t work. Damnit. That left just the one spare without cannibalising another body. I prised the foil off with a razor blade and after about half an hour of scraping/soaking in contact cleaner, got the crusty adhesive residue off.

After putting the damn thing together and taking it apart a few times as I discovered other minor issues (the buttons not fully depressing because of the wires to the LEDs etc), and fixed them all. Eventually, we have the finished product:

A working, old-school DMG with a lovely blue LED backlight so that it can be used anywhere. In the future I plan to add a hex inverter chip to make the screen more contrasty, as well as some other bits and pieces – but for now I’ll leave it in peace.

I knew absolutely nothing about physics or electronics before I took apart my first Gameboy, and I’m definitely not an expert, but there’s something pretty satisfying in putting together or modifying the hardware that you then make music on; squaring the circle or something like that. If I can work it out, then surely anybody can.

All in all, it took longer than I expected, but also wasn’t as complex as I remember from back when I was learning the basics. I’m looking forward to seeing what I can pull off in future.