THE DREADED GEAR THREAD

[MiseryEngine]

Alright somebody had to do it. Let’s talk gear and process. What are you using and how do you like to use it? Any creative uses for things beyond their intended purposes, etc.
knowledge is power.

[Crimesofthecrown777]

I love all things eurorack. However, I got a Strega recently and so using that as a filter/interacting with my eurorack has been incredible. Gonna be tapping into my black box for rhythms soon and checking out a Korg Volca Drum to boot.

I've said it before and I'll say it til I die. The Nebulae V2 is incredible for sound design/deconstruction/reconstruction of anything but with drums it becomes instant IDM. You can also make hard ass industrial hits with it. All in how you shape the samples you put on it.

[Remi]

For noise, I've used the same 5 tape loops for a few years now, always recording over and over on them. They break, I put them back together and ruin them some more.
Also modular synths (10% euro, 90% Serge now) , but mostly as processing tools, hardly ever as sound-making devices, and one nice delay pedal I hardly ever use as a delay but more as a way to turn mono sources into stereo ones. And a broken mixer at times.

[thedemonfeedback666]

I’m extremely boring. Contact mic’d scrap and blades through eq and distortion pedals.

Lately, though, I’ve been doing this PE thing with a Wasp, a microphone through on of those old RadioShack reverbs, and a tape full of fucked up true crime and movie samples, all happening through an old Tascam.

I’m nothing if not unoriginal.

[New Forces]

My gear process this past weekend was punching a damaged cassette deck until the belt starts rotating. Sounded good when it worked.

[theworldisawarfilm]

Amphetamine salts; 40 mg administered orally.

[Scream & Writhe]

My gear process this past weekend was punching a damaged cassette deck until the belt starts rotating. Sounded good when it worked.

Mad props.

Recent setup was a couple contact mics going into a shitty Behringer practice amp then fed into a chain of a couple overdrive pedals and a graphic equalizer. The amp added an electrical-shock type of buzz by default, and I left the amp cables half unplugged at times while vigorously shaking the amp. Things sounded like they were on the verge of white hot burnout.

[Bloomer]

My recent noise efforts have involved recording multiple passes on a cassette deck with the erase head disabled. It leaves a ghost of the previous pass when you record over it. This particular deck has a left and right input adjustment so you can do some panning effects using this technique. Abusing the pause button also produces interesting artifacts.

Lately I've started down the modular road. See where that takes me. I'm really enjoying the flexibility and unpredictable results inherent in modular.

[MiseryEngine]

Ok this one’s gonna be long so please bear with me as I begin to punish.
My sound is all over the place from noisy/old school PE and harsh noise to more traditional industrial and dark ambient stuff all the way to the unspeakable “beat shit”.
My favorite setup for pure PE (the Grunt worshipping noisy kind) is just an SP404 a few pedals, a couple contact mic instruments, and samples I rip from those or my phone to feed the 404. I kind of see the 404 as an infinite tape loop machine. It can be used in similar ways and it’s just so flexible that I think I could say in all honestly if I had to get rid of absolutely everything else, I could survive with just the aforementioned setup.
If you’ve seen any of the videos I post online, you’ll see I’ve used a bunch of eurorack stuff, a multitude of samplers, etc.
I sold my eurorack gear and went fully into the elektron stuff and I will say it’s been a revelation. That style of machine is so flexible that if you have an imagination you can do pretty much anything with them.
That being said, I still think I have the most fun making loops of an SM57 inside of a garbage can with a broken China cymbal that I’m hitting with a softball bat.

[violentgrief]

I got a lot of my early gear advice from Matt (MiseryEngine) and have spent a lot of time working with the Novation Bass Station II and Roland SP-404A over the past year. More recently I've been using a Korg MS-20 mini and literally, as in a couple of hours ago, just got a Korg SQ-1 to go with it.

[htp_systems]

I used to do more cut-up style noise with multiple tape players as sources. But lately I've been recording a lot with minimal set-ups of 2 or 3 pedals using a contact mic or shaker box from Verdant Weapons or a contact mic box by Abrasive Industries and layering recordings to 4 track. Nothing fancy, just feels really satisfying to record with such sensitive gear. I've also been doing a lot with crude tape processing especially with old or botched recordings. Sometimes running old tape recordings through effects, messing with the playback speed, or just cranking the volume and adding EQ. I somewhat recently bought a 4 oscillator box from Electro Lobotomy that can act as a signal processor so I've been having a lot of fun with that as well.

[Haare]

The only things that I pretty much always use are a Ibanez digital delay and a Dod FX-52 fuzz. Everything else changes. All editing and post-production on an ancient version of Sound Forge and Vegas. Synthwise, I have an Elmyra, Dronething and a Microkorg, plus some synth apps (Moog model D and some others.)

[connive]

started with software exclusively in 2013, since 2019 using much more analog gear/tape players in combination.

Software (mac os): daw= Reason 10 w lots of vst's (izotope suite, etc), audacity, photosounder, serato dj, loopback, ozone 6
Hardware: Korg MS20mini w sq64 (sequencer), Elektron digitakt (also as vst in daw), Mackie CR1604 (mixer), Tascam portastudio 424 (tape), Yamaha CMX100 (tape), Toshiba PC-X60 (tape), Stanton STR8-80/Numark TT-100 (turntables), Zoom h4n, Alesis q49, akai mpd218, Realistic 32-1200c (mixer), Scarlett 4i4/ART usb phono plus (interface), proco rat disto (pedal), electrolobotomy wave disto (pedal), cold gold audio stereo contact mics, Pioneer DDJSR2 (digi turntables), sony walkman (tape)

dont plan to acquire much else any time soon if i can help it, maybe few boss pedals for sends off the cr1604. cant say enough about the digitakt, wonderful, flexible machine for samplers especially with the latest 1.30 os update (added external mixer, new filter and lfo, custom resample channel select)

[JuntaCadre]

Here’s all the most commonly used stuff. Korg Minilogue and the SP-404 have probably been the most invaluable over the years. As far as pedals, probably the Digi death metal, and the Genthalz CUNT.

[Helvitis]

This is the piece of equipment I use the most. Then I have some pedals (digitech death metal, boss metal zone, fuzz factory and some loop, delay etc pedals). I have a microbrute as well that I don´t use too much but like to throw in the mix once in a while.

[Zalhietzli]

It's nice to see so many people using (and fucking around) with tapes and tape players. There are so many techniques you can dive into : tape loops, cut up, modifying the cassette shells, fucking around with tape heads...
Aside from that, I mostly less around with hardware : pedals, piezo junk instruments, diy synths, circuit bending... And some digital stuff like granular effects. I recommended Cecilia5 by the way, pretty confusing at first but a lot of possibilities for sound design

[MiseryEngine]

Here’s all the most commonly used stuff. Korg Minilogue and the SP-404 have probably been the most invaluable over the years. As far as pedals, probably the Digi death metal, and the Genthalz CUNT.

I have always loved your setup. You get such a massive and dread inducing sound out of your gear and the photos are always nice.
I always ask people what they’re going for when they want gear advice and I inevitably end up saying the most bang for the buck is a 404, a mid level analog synth, and a couple of pedals. Nothing really does it like that. I plan to go back to using my Bass Station 2 and 404 exclusively for a couple of releases this year.

[violentgrief]

I'd love to hear how people are creating their music. Like, do you record live performances or layer tracks for example? Personally I do about equal amounts of both.

[Kenny]

Like Weeds- Trogotronic boxes and a Vermona Kick Lancet. mainly recorded live.
Our Wrongs - Gen Thalz drum synth and a SP 404 sampler added to Adam Jennings tape loops.

I now like having specific equipment for different projects, keeping them separate, also love working within constraints.

[housepig]

I'd love to hear how people are creating their music. Like, do you record live performances or layer tracks for example? Personally I do about equal amounts of both.

Most Juhyo stuff starts with live recordings as a base, we'll record a stereo track from each of our setups (lately into a Zoom H6), then import it into a DAW (lately Tracktion/Waveform), listen back to it, identify sections or parts that we like, then we start editing, sometimes rerecording parts, and layering on whatever else the track needs.

Shadow On Glass stuff is almost always based on prepared loops or samples, with layers of synth & effects tweaking, either while recording or in the overdubbing / mixing stage.

[Vast Field Magnetism]

I almost exclusively use barely functional analog non-gear.
Sticks, wire brushes, hand"made" anti-records, mics salvaged from old headphones, and most importantly: tapes.
Lots of 'em. Stretched, looped, disassembled, heat/substance treated, etc., recorded and played back with all manner of shit quality decks, dictaphones, boomboxes, and so on.

[thedemonfeedback666]

For Ballerina In Blood, I record live. When when I start off a track with a sample, I do that in real time with the sample on a tape, then I cut the channel and raise the “noise channel”.
The noise channel usually consists of 4 sound sources (usually radio, synthesizer, and 2 contact mic’d sources or a contact mic and a vocal mic).
Those go into a mini mixer, which is then run through a chain. 10 band eq first, always. Death Metal at the end, always. Usually fuzzes and shit in between. Some reverb from the main mixer. That’s it.

[leuksi]

I'd love to hear how people are creating their music. Like, do you record live performances or layer tracks for example? Personally I do about equal amounts of both.

I tend to go simple when recording, just a single SM57 in front of my guitar amp, sometimes I might use a second mic (usually some Superlux that has a shitty-in-a-good-way sound). Post-production in Reaper is needed to make it sound a bit more full, duplicating tracks to phase and layer, some compression and EQ with a touch of reverb usually. Nothing too fancy for now.

[Sisto]

As most above I use tapes, contact mics, various homebuilt electronics and effects. I love my Philips D6920 mkII tape recorder. its what I started with when I had no idea how to make noise. It has a sound on sound function that lets you record over and over tracks without having to disable the erase head manually. I love how Ryan described it as a ghost. I also fuck around with modular. mainly homebuilt but also purchased modules. during sleepless nights I fire on vcv rack and patch on into oblivion. honestly a good way to get into modular if you have no idea where to start and dont want to throw out a ton of money before buying a system that fits your needs.

[leuksi]

Prolly the best gear purchase I've ever done was a feedback looper pedal I got last month. Even tho my board is already quite versatile sound wise, that box actually makes it fucking live.