The LoFi Magic of a Scottish Tape Drum Machine
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- Опубликовано: 7 сен 2024
- The Bandmaster Powerhouse is a drum machine unlike any other: it uses 8-Track tape recordings of drum and percussion loops to play back "Funky Beat", "Modern Waltz" and "Disco" patterns. Made by GR International in Perth, Scotland in the 1970s, only few survive and the tapes are even rarer. The warble and flutter, especially when pitched down, is horrible from a technical perspective, but it adds layers of texture that are a dream come true for the rare groove enthusiast.
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This is incredible. Any chance you plan to track down the other tapes in the series? Would be amazing to have those samples as well
the only thing better than this thing existing in the first place is the fact that the drums sound EXACTLY like you'd hope they would. Beautiful.
I’m Scottish and never heard of this. Also it sounds like it came straight out of a silent hill game. Trip hop for days.
Glad someone else thought Silent Hill as well!
this would go crazy in lofi breakcore... the busyness of the loops and that warm crunch is so good
What on earth is lofi breakcore
@@FungleFunTimeBreakcore is jungle on steroids. So an even lower fidelity version of that.
@@GuyGamer1 so you mean breakcore.
@@FungleFunTime yea like old doormouse.
@@FungleFunTimeJust because you haven't heard of something doesn't mean it isn't real. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy"
I live in Perth, Scotland and it's crazy to think a drum machine was ever built here, that's amazing, thanks for shining a spotlight on it!!
very cool 8 track someone had lots of time to build this
My family is from Perth, I'm a Murray, originally McMurray century's ago. May the mighty Scots live on.
@@TRIPPLEJAY00There's s reason people left Scotland.
@@LeeGee That's probably my ancestors fault; I'm English.
Ha, I love this thread. I'm English but live near Edinburgh. My wife is Scottish, originally from Ayr and constantly moans about the weather, litter, people etc. She wants to move to Spain, but unfortunately my English compatriots screwed that up voting oot the EU. Cheers for that! I don't think a Scottish drum machine is at all surprising though, Instruo are based in Glasgow and Scots invented plenty of stuff like TV for example. It's not all kilts and sheep farming north of the border 🤣
I love that the video is 8:08 long. That has to be deliberate! Well played.
First export was 8:09 - I just had to edit out a second when I saw that
@@Hainbachthat's dedication ❤
Another instrument that feels like it was specifically invented for you to find it decades later 😅😂😂. Insanely cool tech, and the sounds are great.
Give me more you know about I’m curious 😭 !!!
I _totally_ forgot about that thing! I've got all the loops deep on a drive somewhere.
Great to see and hear you with it.
6:04 “Finding a unicorn that also plays the trumpet very well” 😂 Haha, agree 100%-most unicorns I know suck at playing the trumpet.
I love it that this segment times out to exactly "808" .
A bit like every time I look at my watch and it's 8.08 or 9.09 I hear beats in my head 🤘
Only us drum machine nutters would notice that,, and i also do the same when i “clock” the time
I honestly was not ready for that WHAT-moment, when you started the drums. If someone asked me to describe what I think it could sound like before actually hearing it, I would not say "a loopbased lofi-Boombap-powerhouse".
Oh, I love these drum sounds!
Was not expecting to hear the name of my tiny hometown in a Hainbach video but here we are
If Oor Wullie made a boom bap album, this would be his go to drum machine, just dae it!
I can’t believe as a Scottish person I didn’t know this!!!
It is very very rare as not many survived.
I love it’s sound! The second tape had a real hip hop feel to it. I have a few friends from Perth, I’ll ask if any older relatives know the name of the manufacturer. Thank you for showcasing it!
Wowsers... i'm a connoisseur of strange, unique and interesting music gear but this is the coolest and simplest thing i've ever seen! I almost want to convert one of my old 8 track players into something that can do this. The drum loops are absolutely fantastic too.
All they had to do was wait fifty years for it to be one of the greatest things ever made.
Joined your Patreon based on this. And Yes, I already have 1,000,000,000,000 drum samples and, yes, I need more, LOL
It never ends! :-) Thanks for supporting!
Funny , I’ve just added a cranky old Emu ESI-32 to my jamming synths, I feel much the same about its crunch on beats. Nice work
How cool!
I think 8 track offers some interesting possibilities as a performance tool. Lisa Belladonna said that she used to perform with 8 track players and some tapes that she prepared for the show.
"slow tape face" is awesome.
Pretty cool 👍 thanks for sharing this with us. I remember the old 8 track tapes, I even rocked some 8 tracks in a old Cadillac years ago 😂
I have a lead on a Birotron actually. There is a place called Studio Bell in Calgary, Alberta, Canada that has a massive collection of keyboards. I once got to tour their back warehouse rooms and saw that they had a Birotron, which the tour guide assured me was in playable condition, though I didn't get to hear it played. I get the impression that even the curators there might not know just how rare it is, to be honest. But it's all a bit of a hike from Berlin...
Wow I'm a couple hours away maybe I'll check that place out one day, good info
Oh I have to contact them, thank you!
I wrote them! They also have a Novachord, always wanted to play one. Hopefully a trip to Canade is on order!
@@Hainbach Happy I could help!
@@stewart_foster If you do go on a day when you can do a tour, they hide all the really cool stuff in the back rooms for some reason...
My favourite thing about this machine are the two little 'cupboards/shelves' for storing the cassettes 👌 The lovely crunchy sounds aren't bad either 😊
Drum machine and.. Luxembourg ? Got to vote for that as I've never heard of a drum machine from there! :)
BMI Mini Computer from Benelux Musical Instrument company perhaps? The Riha FR12 was also made by BMI...in the book Drumfax 1.
Good Morning from BC Canada , waking up with coffee and this video put me in a special place . Nice jam !
As a huge fan and user of 8 tracks and drum machines I love this! ❤
A drummer friend used to live in London, and his workshop was next to Rick Wakeman's rehearsal space where they worked on the Birotron. I'd keep quizzing him for information on it as it was fascinating. He's sadly passed now, but it was great to be reminded of it. And really cool drum machine, although it doesn't seem like you've got any control of when the loop starts.
A mini Mellotron for lo-fi beats. Never heard of this bit of kit before. Cool 😎
This is absolutely wild and i love it
Thanks bud!
Hi from Glasgow, loved the spooky dub at the end
Wow what a feat to get all those beats lined up. They are really cool breaks too and slowing them down and phasing between the different beats is really cool. What a fascinating machine! My DNA tells me I'm more Scottish thsn English so I'm calling this a W! Thanks again for sharing such an interesting machine. 😊
Those tapes give me major Portishead vibes at the lower tempos
That track at the end of the video is great for Halloween! Spooky, kiddies!
Oooh I would love to buy this song at the end in a full version ! TripHop style! ❤
Looks like Cerrone on the tape’s sticker 😳
Thanks for that hainbach !
This is one of the most amazingly different yet remarkably simple machines I’ve ever seen. I love the funkiness of the loops and the blend feature is clever. And the tone range you get when you slow it down is gorgeous. Thanks for showing us these forgotten pieces of tech 🙂
Dude, Hainbach both the songs in this video kicked ass!
Luxembourg gets my vote.
The cartridge is very similar to carts used in radio broadcast and players manufactured by Sonifex and others...they were also looping and had 1/4" tape with various lengths. The players were very well made and might be an interesting addition to looping experiments in analog setup.
Don't forget that wicked electro-demagnetizer thingy to zap the carts blank again...
!!!>>>dzzzzzzzzzt
@@spritelysprite And remove your watch before turning on the demagnetizer...
@@timoruohomaki what’s a watch?
(Jk) 🙃
Great vid. Luxembourg sounds intriguing!
The amount of comments from people thinking this is a real instrument is hilarious. This is an amazing way to pitch your sample pack tho!!!!
You drove me into a rabbit hole with the Birotron... it's absolute madness and the guy holding the most complete set of tapes seems to be quite insane himself, so good luck getting your hands into one of these. What I can say is that certainly sounds haunting and mysterious, at least the sounds that are left preserved. Nobody knows how it really sounded on its prime.
It's a remarkably simple device. A standard 8-track player, with a motor speed control and a balance potentiometer across the left and right channel coming from the stereo head added to it. The tapes are manufactured without the metal strip where the ends are spliced together and so you don't even need to disable the track switching mechanism in the player. It should be pretty simple to modify a random old player to the same thing.
amazing they got the tracks to line up on tape like that back then to crossfade back and forth
It reminds me of a tape version of the “Drum Drops” LPs… which I have bunch of, btw!
Ah yea this is nice, I came across this drum machine years ago and managed to get myself some WAV's of some of the numerous cassette's that came free with the machine. They sound excellent sampled into mpc60
The piece you play at the end sounds like Bowie/ Eno from the Low era, superb. Next device? Italy please 😁
This sounds amazing! I'm Scottish and this is the first time I've heard about this machine.
Perth, Scotland - where I was brought up and went to school! Couldn't believe it when you said that's where this was made... although before my time :)
Reminds me of using the DJ Swamp Never Ending Breakbeats vinyls as a drum machine. Which if you haven't done yet, please do. They are not expensive yet and very useful.
Wow! It's the very first rompler/sampler!
Because of course YOU found one, in good working order 😏👍
The thing sounds pretty darn thick!
It does! Though it could use a full restoration, especially the head alignment is off and the tapes need new foam (which is probably a related issue).
Awesome! I want these samples. May finally sign up for the Patreon :)
Nice bit of history! There was a company that did a kontakt library but they re no longer available.
Ooh I LOVE THIS!!! please bless us with some sample loops x
I did! All loops are on patreon.com/hainbach in full length, warped and weird
A guy who worked at the Rca in Rome told me that in the 70s they used tape loops from one inch to 24 tracks where they recorded the drums with a metronome track and then used them in low-cost productions
Fascinating, and fantastically fun! So obscure, too. It really does have a tremendous amount of warm, gritty and real character and feel. It sounds great, and worked beautifully with your piece. Very fun and inspiring. Very nicely done.
Awesome! Thanks for this video. I have two eight tracks cassettes tape echos, the Vorg Echo Pack from Pearl Musical Instruments and an Echo Chamber NE 100. Every one sounds on a spetial way, thanks to the age of this cassettes and every spetial mechanism. I love this analog tapes because they are so inpredictible. :)
There’s an entire label in Germany that is basically built around using this thing lol. It’s called Sued
blown away by how good this sounds! :)
Those Breakbeats are 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Now I just want you to make a psych pop album. Great song.
this unit sounds magical and it's it's neat to learn Mount Kimbie used this
edit: Luxembourg!
As a Scotsman whos into synths and drum machines iv never heard of this
That song was awesome! Would love to listen to album of that sound!
Holy crap, that thing sounds awesome.
Luxembourg please!
The Powerhouse is an amazingly unique and characterful instrument, and well utilised here by your fine self.
sounds like a cross between the drums from only fools and horses, and outkasts version of my favourite things
Thank's for your videos from France 👍
Wow that end track is da bomb 💜
Thank you!
@@Hainbach Is there a longer recording available of the end track? This vibe really hits the sweet spot for me
Beautiful track in the beginning.... 😍😍😍
That yellow t-shirt is awesome!
Just saw your Oregon Energizer in the video, how about doing something with that. Loved it for decades
This is utterly incredible,, and judging by the empty space that holds the cartridges , there has to be 4 others out there
We have come a looooooong way.
I still have two of them and usually the tape head holder breaks. I have 8 tapes each. Nice wonky machine and fun.
That's a truly beautiful sound! 😱😍
Next? Luxemburg!
BTW, excellent video as usual, Viele Danke, Hainbach!
I saw one for sale locally, but they wanted insane amounts of money, and the video they provided showed clearly that either the heads were misaligned, or the tapes were messed up, so that was a fat no. :-D I did figure somebody would sample the tapes at some point. ;-D
I think it's a problem of decaying tapes that cause the heads to go out of alignment. The foam in the cassettes breaks apart and needs to be renewed. But some tapes do sound better, all the latin stuff is very clean compared to the Foxtrots/Waltzes.
@@Hainbach Yeah, that sounds likely, I did see someone (Techmoan?) talk about that 8-track foam problem.
It may be possible to make new recordings of tape loops to fit inside an 8 track cartridge.
The lowest lo-fi I've ever heard. Your work always impresses. BTW, the drummer who recorded those loops was a great drummer. Excellent playing.
Yes! And the percussion on the Latin stuff is fantastic
You should definitely make a drumbreak pack with this beauty ❤
It is on patreon.com/hainbach already :-)
@@Hainbach awesome! ♥️
Holy crap the loops sound AMAZING.
This sounds amazing. I could write some sick bass lines over those beats.
I prefer real drum sound loops over synthetic 808/909 sounds !! great sound, what a machine...
Growing up we had an organ/synth that had an 8 track drum machine it matched the tv, record player, tape deck, and 8track player. Both weighed about 800 lbs (each unit) you should look into some of these wacky American instruments from the 70s
Do you remember the name perchance?
@@Hainbach sadly no, I do not remember.
Sounds like something Boards of Canada would use
Came here to say just this.
@@joedevitt132 they’re Scottish as well
Its a very interesting tape drum machine!
Please make an 8track amen loop, put a wider pot for speed (and possibly speed doubler), and a crossfader instead of knob for A/B!!!!! I always thought "jungle concrete" would be a cool project
AB is already a crossfader, so that is cool. I have to talk to my tech and see what is possible. The rarity of this unit and lack of 8-Track tapes here makes me bit careful.
@@Hainbach As you mentioned, 8-tracks we're much bigger in the States, blank tapes/cartridges (or cheap tapes that could be recorded over) are probably more available there. Lisa Bella Donna talks about her use of 8-track compositions in this video tour of her studio: ruclips.net/video/L8vf99skSCU/видео.htmlsi=HMhaDpTQqiO2uqhM
7:20 This definitely sounds like the cave level in a 90's Final Fantasy game, presumably as you look for some Irn Bru to drink while playing around with the Powerhouse.
Never heard of this before and as everyone is pointing out, it sounds exactly like one would hope it does. Your track at the end was awesome too - what is that bass sound? ... Great video!
Thank you! The bass is from this machine: ruclips.net/video/T9F_My3C7-s/видео.htmlsi=-8EmeJahCk_UPFeH
that is pretty cool Hainbach!
Its like.... an old version of the sp404
"Like finding a unicorn playing the trumpet very well". 🤣I'm going to shoehorn that somewhere in my social media feed today. Being serious, thanks for another interesting and enjoyable video.
Interesting. I kinda want one now. Also, voting for Japan.
The beginning 😍 could be in some noir film in the turning sequence where the protagonist has an unspoken idea while smoking in an allyway while its raining
sounds amazing! 😃
Panzer throat condenser mics were amazing sonically…I would love a an electrolarynx…
nice video, and i vote for Luxembourg
i do wonder if some of these loops made it into early 90s electronica x idm productions at some point. those do sound oddly familiar at times.
It is possible - I tried to track down every usage but the only one I truly heard it was with Mount Kimbie
Looks like a take on a “cart” machine we used to use in radio.