Enjoy Monty Python’s Argument Sketch on two vintage speech synthesizers

A DECtalk Express stands in for Monty Python actor Michael Palin, with an Intex Talker (Votrax SC-01A) voicing the role of John Cleese. Retro speech synthesis just sounds better. Not more intelligible, necessarily, but absolutely better. And it’s hilarious. Eat your heart out, Transmediale / Ars Electronica / etc.: If all of this sounds familiar, […]

Oldest recorded voices, haunted dolls, and more from Tempest Instruments

New sound technologies? Sure, okay, I guess. But haunted dolls of the 1890s as made by Thomas Edison? Oh, now you’ve got my attention. So in case you haven’t discovered this before, Tempest Instruments, a “small team” led by TV/film and video game composer Alex Davis, has been collected strange sound ephemera of the 19th […]

Peter Kirn - September 22, 2026

Nuclear test equipment inspired this new Eurorack module

Boxcar averagers, used in vintage nuclear test equipment, inspired the latest creation from AI Synthesis. What you get is the AI250 BXR: it’s an oscillator, a voltage generator, and an audio mangler all in one. And it’s a pathway into DIY modules, even on tight budgets.

Peter Kirn - September 2, 2026

Vintage Max patches revived: free downloads, Leafcutter John and Suren

Peter Kirn - July 31, 2026

From Éliane Radigue to West Coast, Homework is a patchable wonder

Peter Kirn - May 4, 2026

Breaking: cave-like reflections in Robert Henke’s free Lanzarote Verb

Peter Kirn - February 16, 2026

Get Universal Audio’s 610 tube channel strips for free — DSP or native

Peter Kirn - January 13, 2026

Waldorf’s Protein: soul of Microwave in an 8-voice wavetable synth, €329

Peter Kirn - November 27, 2025

A poetic, open-source video made on 1979’s Apple II+ and BASIC

Peter Kirn - September 16, 2025