These sounds were painstakingly collected by IUPUI's newest music technology ensemble, the DISEnsemble (Destructive and Inventive Systems Ensemble), which focuses on making beautiful sounds out of ugly, outdated or broken devices.
The sounds are grouped by instrument, featuring three of the sound systems we developed in the Spring 2018 semester:
1. Hacked Speak 'N Spell: hacked and developed by Chris Turley. (Chris found a non functioning Speak 'N Spell on Ebay, nursed it back to health and then installed a number of pots to control the speed of the playback, meanwhile discovering a hidden "wordvomit" feature that spits out random words and letters in a torrent of digital madness)
2. The Apocalypse Piano: hacked and developed by Alex Hauptmann, Duane Weddle, Chris Turley, Michael Lamb and Charles Cheesman. (After a lesson on speaker twitching, which is basically just making a speaker pop in and out by attaching a 9-volt battery to the leads, Alex discovered that you could get some really interesting timbres by interrupting the current with a piano string, which effectively amplified the sound of the string while also adding a lower octave (under-tone?...we're still investigating) and a heap of twitchy distortion...it sounded like the piano of the Apocalypse, hence the name)
3. Scan-Melodion: hacked and developed by Charles Cheesman, Justin Comer and Alex Hauptman.
4. Extras / other sounds...including some vocal work by the ensemble and a recording of the noisiest projector screen of all time. (A theremin-like device accomplished by attaching an AM radio to a document scanner with halogen bulbs...played by the hands, without touching either device)
Recordings performed by Chris Turley and Duane Weddle, recorded by Dr. Palamara in a noisy room with bad equipment.
Enjoy!
D.I.S.E. Download from Box.com: