Cats

Weekend Cat Blogging and Photo Hunt: Cuddly

This weekend we once again combine Weekend Cat Blogging and the Photo Hunt, taking advantage of the rather easy them of cuddly.

Of course, Luna is very cuddly, and we have hundreds of photos in the CatSynth archives to prove it. But she also seeks this quality from her environment and the objects around her. Readers may recall the blue fish that Luna received as a holiday gift. She took to it right away, and is still quite fond of it. A few weeks ago I found her carrying it around and lying down with it in the studio, much as child would treat a favorite stuffed animal.

I even found her using it as a pillow:

I think that clearly qualifies as “cuddly.”

Coincidentally, I composed a jazz piece almost 20 (!) years ago called “The Blue Fish.” It might be fun to dust it of and try playing it again one of these days…

Weekend Cat Blogging #246 is being hosted by Billy Sweetfeets. He is also celebrating his Gotcha Day.

Photo Hunt #201 is hosted as always by tnchick. This week’s theme is “cuddly.”

Carnival of the Cats #310 will be up this Sunday at When Cats Attack.

And of course the Friday Ark #283 is at the modulator.

CatSynth pics: Pulsewidthmod

Some more photos from pulsewidthmod on flickr:

Not “cat and synthesizer” pics per se, but they do include equipment that is often overlooked but still vital to making music. The mound of tangled cables puts our messy cables at CatSynth HQ to shame. They also reminded me a bit of Christina Mazza’s drawings from the SF Recology Artists in Residence opening that I saw a few weeks ago.

Weekend Cat Blogging: Luna and Monome

This weekend we present a photo of Luna posing with the monome interface:

I like the desaturated grayscale version, but also the original color photo as well:

Notice that there is very little difference in the monome itself between the two photos. It is the new grayscale edition, with a silver front panel, white LED buttons and a black case. The monomes interface all have a very elegant minimalist design, but this edition is particularly well suited for our aesthetics.

I am hoping to use it tonight in a performance I am doing at a Lunar New Year party here in San Francisco.

Monome is a very small operation in the New York’s Catskills region. They design the interfaces and produce limited runs of each edition. We were fortunate to get one when they went on sale at the beginning of January. I thought this photo from their website, showing the team hard at work filling the orders, is quite appropriate:

Weekend Cat Blogging is hosted by breadchick and LB at The Sour Dough.

Carnival of the Cats will be hosted by Nikita Cat on his blog Meowings of an Opinionated Pussycat.

And of course the Friday Ark is at the modulator.

CatSynth videos: Wicks Looper

From potterpaint2000 on YouTube, via matrixsynth:

“an improv featuring a KP3 processed Wicks Looper from Australia, a wonderful cacaphonous little device. Thanks Brian!…also a Nord Lead and a Stylophone Drumbeat”

I am not familiar with the Wicks Looper, but I did find some more info here, and another video:

CatSynth pic: Octave Electronics CAT SRM fact sheet, 1978

Retro Synth Ads posted this fact sheet for the Octave CAT yesterday:

[click to enlarge]

I believe we have seen seen this picture with the actual cat before. Additionally, the spec sheet contains the blank patch diagram that I have occasionally used for the Octave CAT.

You can see full-size images as well as additional analysis at Retro Synth Ads.