Electronic

Getting creative in the lab with a bunch of gorgeous classic 1960s Brüel & Kjær lab gear I have restored and modified over the years for creative use in the recording studio at Hideaway Studio...

I discovered and fell in love with the 1960s Brüel & Kjær lab gear around 10 years ago and ended up accumulating over 70 of these gorgeous beasts and, during my exploration of them, it seems a few of my friends and clients have since caught the obsession too!

All Recordings Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2014 - 2022.

Brüel & Kjær - Le laboratoire Créatif...

A selection of live improvisations and experimental test recordings...

All Compositions & Recordings Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio.

Relaxing With Electrons..

Oh heck do I love old delay boxes!...  tape, BBD, early digital, lo-fi, Tel-Ray "oil-can" - they all have their own mojo, texture, colour & vibe...

One of my long favourites in the cheap but nice bracket has been the DOD R-908 which is 8-bit digital but with VCO based clock generation and NE571 based companding so there is a lot more character and life to this unit some other digital units.  

I recorded this after the 908 was on the bench this week needing some TLC..   it was made by firing an arpeggio from the SE Omega 8 and a pad from the Matrix 1000 sweetened with Boss CE-300 stereo analog chorus into the R-908 and then various sections slowed by 50% and reversed and composited with the original.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2021.

1984 DOD R-908 Delay: Twinkle Stars...

Made with several overdubs of various signal sources fed through a gorgeous 1968 Brüel & Kjær type 2107 all-tube regenerative swept band pass filter during final testing following the resurrection/restoration of yet another of these unique and wonderful units with modifications for creative use in the studio. 

The 2107 pass frequency is hand cranked to reveal harmonic content at up to a 50dB per octave crest.  At this sort of resonance little that comes out of the beast sounds even remotely similar to what goes in so its to fun to catch the harmonics on way whilst cranking the huge tuning dial.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2022.

1968 Brüel & Kjaer type 2107: Down to Band Pass Creek

Oh heck do I love the old Brüel & Kjær 1/3 octave fixed L/C band-pass resonator banks such as the type 2112, 2113 and 1615...

Every time I use these units in the studio I find myself bathing in the hauntingly serene sonic aesthetic their inductive resonators produce especially when thrown into a delay or two of them are used in stereo.

In this case a gorgeous type 1615 "Band Pass Filter Set" stepped 1/3rd Octave band pass filter set is simply being fed with a single sustained cluster chord from a Korg Wavestation A/D producing a series of quite haunting harmonically related resonances as the frequency control is moved between the different settings. Each of the 30 precision inductive/capacitive resonator tanks has around 60dB per octave crests resulting in an almost mesmerising natural movement caused by the filter coming in and out of resonance on the edges of its pass band as it responds to the source material. 

First layered with the source material and then hear it on its own driven hard to the point everything starts to saturate :)

Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2023.

1973 Brüel & Kjaer type 1615 in Action - Clustered Resonance..

Blending a few layers of samples taken from 1938 Hammond Novachord No.346 with some previous live recordings I'd captured from the beast suddenly had me daydreaming of Lulworth Cove and the Jurassic Coast which is one of my favourite places on planet earth.

Obviously the Novachord doesn't sound like this out of the box but it often amazes me how easily just a few carefully chosen layers of material from the beast can quickly end up producing huge ensembles and washes especially when some are played at half speed.  I think this is in part due to the Novachord's six free-running vibratos which produce a very organic sea of wobbly goodness.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio 2023.

Jurassic Daydreams (Layered 1938 Novachord)

Testing out a gorgeous 1964 all tube/valve Brüel & Kjær type 1013 Beat Frequency Oscillator just after being returned to life for the first time in decades at Hideaway Studio.  The Type 1013 is a close relative to the infamous "Wobbulator" at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop put to good effect by Daphne Oram, Delia Derbyshire et al during the 1960s.

Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2018.

1964 Brüel & Kjaer type 1013 Tube BFO "Wobbulator" Test

A pair of gorgeous 1968 Brüel & Kjær type 2107 all tube swept band pass filters originally built for laboratory use in action following restoration and modification for creative studio use by Dani Wilson at Hideaway Studio. Originally designed for frequency analysis, these majestic hand cranked beasts can achieve selective audio filtering up to 50dB/octave in tube regenerative circuits covering the full audio spectrum split over 6 frequency bands with mechanical auto-selection between them.

This test recording was made simply by firing a narrow pulse wave of approx 400Hz to one 2107 and approx 800Hz to the other recording from them as a stereo pair whilst hand cranking the tuning controls with the filters set to over 45dB/oct.  Both units were recorded directly dry with no added effects - just pure vintage tube goodness in action!

Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio.

1968 Brüel & Kjaer type 2107: Pulse Sweepers

Made by firing a slow evolving patch from a Yamaha TX802 into a Brüel & Kjær type 1621 band pass filter set to 3% selectivity mode and several hand cranked filter sweeps recorded and overdubbed.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio.

Brüel & Kjaer type 1621: Spectral Rising

Made by feeding a single sustained chord played from a Studio Electronics Omega 8 into a classic Brüel & Kjaer type 2113 L/C band-pass resonator bank, sampled through 21 different filter settings, and then randomly sequenced live into a 1969 Dolby A301 for some multi-band compressed magic!...

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio

Brüel & Kjaer type 2113: Random Resonations...

An experimental recording by D.A.Wilson made by feeding a single sustained chord from a Roland D-110 into a Hideaway Studio Triple Tube Hybrid Phaser in turn feeding both Watkins Copicat and Ace-Tone EC-10 tape delays and a Fender "oil-can" Echo-Reverb as well as a hand cranked Bruel & Kjaer type 1621 swept band-pass filter and a type 1615 Band Pass Resonator Set via a tube mixer, all mixed/layered in parallel and recorded onto 1/4" tape on a Sony TC-399 1/4" tape machine...

Probably one of the most complex and exotic analog phasers ever devised, the Triple Tube Hybrid Phaser was originally designed for Jean-Michel Jarre by D.A.Wilson at Hideaway Studio and is one of only a very small handful ever built.

On a huge custom pcb it comprises of three 4-stage phaser blocks similar to the Small Stone with tube (ECC83) pre-amp and post amps and tube buffers between each phaser. The OTA based phasers are combined in an unusual series/parallel arrangement with their own regen paths each modulated by one phase of a triple phase LFO generator thus allowing the phase spread to be set between each phaser block from all three on top of one another for a huge plunging effect to being 120 degrees out for a swirly effect. There are variable controls for the LFO offset, depth, rate and spread as well as a variable regeneration level.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio 2019.

Triple Tube Hybrid Phaser: Gaussian Shorelines

Warping time using FM encoded tape... here two intertwining arpeggiated patches from my Blue Zone Kontakt library were recorded at 240bpm using only keys from the top two octaves onto two (out of 7) tracks of a TEAC MR-30 Laboratory Analog Data Recorder at 38cm/sec.  The FM encoded audio was then played back at 9.5cm/sec thus restoring the pitch but time stretching everything around it including reverb, delays and modulation effects.  The result is quite magical – not least because the tape machine itself adds a load of mojo in terms of smearing/limiting/filtering/noise resulting in a sort of crusty sonic Sepia effect.

No additional reverb has been added - its mearly the original reverb and delay tails ending up 4 times longer due to the tape speed reduction.

The MR-30 was originally intended as an Instrumentation Recorder to capture mainly slow DC signals (yes, it will record CV in parallel with audio!) and vibrations from transducers in laboratory experiments but it turns out the unit is capable of recording 7 tracks of audio concurrently well into the audio range (about 10KHz)and can playback and record at 6 different speeds from 1.2 to 38cm/sec.  In max speed a C90 lasts less than 10 minutes!

Here is the recording... warts and all.

Composition & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio 2020.

1983 TEAC MR-30 Slo-Mo: Molécules d'eau (Lo-Fi FM Encoded Tape Experiment)

Recorded in just two takes, Alto Volo is a live improvised duet conceived and performed by D.A.Wilson on string ensemble (Hollow Sun/Hideaway Studio Novachord) and Thomas Grillo on Theremin in 2010.

For more on the 1938 Novachord see www.novachord.co.uk

2016 Digitally Remastered Version Copyright D.A.Wilson & Thomas Grillo.

D.A.Wilson & Thomas Grillo - Alto Volo (Theremin)

100% synthesized water effects made by feeding some randomised FM bell like sounds from an Orla DSE24 and pink noise from a Bruel & Kjaer type 1405 fed hot via a tube mixer into a gorgeous 1965 Bruel & Kjaer type 1612 Band Pass Filter Set.   Around 60 samples were captured with the filter set to each of the 3rd Octave frequency settings and then loaded across the keyboard and auditioned live in various combinations....

The classic Bruel & Kjaer Band Pass Filter Sets such as the type 1615, 1612, 2112 and 2113 are made up of banks of very high quality passive L/C resonators and are extremely selective with very high Q factors and have a sound all of their own!  There are few studio filters that could come close to achieving the same effect.
 
Sound Design & Recording Copyright D.A.Wilson, Hideaway Studio, 2020.

1965 Brüel & Kjaer type 1612: Waterwerks (SFX With Lab Gear)

D.A.Wilson is an Electronic Engineer, Sound Designer & Vintage Synth Specialist with a particular interest in combining vintage tube, classic analog and modern digital technologies working as a synth engineer looking after a very considerable amount of vintage studio equipment for Will Gregory (Goldfrapp / Moog Ensemble) and a number of other internationally celebrated electronic musicians and producers.  Having undertaken several major restorations and produced custom electronic designs for a number of major artists including Jean-Michel Jarre, Dani is also known for fully restoring two out of the world's four remaining 1979 Crumar GDS and partially restoring 1938 Novachord 346 (the only known operational Novachord in the UK) to playable order along with developing and producing the new Elfin family of 8-bit polysynths and the popular MIDI Front Panel Animator (FPA), Filter Defeat Module (FDM) and XD-280 Drive Emulator upgrades for the AKAI S612 sampler.

Demos of the S612 Upgrades in Action: 

https://soundcloud.com/hideaway-studio/sets/hideaway-studios-s612-front


Hideaway Studio Kontakt Sound libraries may be purchased directly from: 
https://www.lootaudio.com/category/kontakt-instruments/hideaway-studios
 

..and a nice introduction by Cory Pelizzari to the Hideaway Studio Kontakt Libraries:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-C7a3ChC9U&feature=emb_title


For more on releases from Hideaway Studio for Kontakt please visit the blog at:  www.hideawaystudio.net