Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. Bit of a fun one this week. Depending on your personality type, the phrase "I have over 130,000 unread emails" will either place you in one of three or four personality categories: Discomfort over the idea of this (That makes me anxious), Competition (I have more than that!), Disconcern (So What?) or Self-Reflective/Assessing (I only have 20, I'm fine). But it's unlikely any of you will envy a person with such a stockpile.

I can't sell this batch of unread emails as a currency, just the number itself, for example. (Though if this were Google, they would be selling the information gathered, but that's another topic) – Really, the acquisition of such a bounty of unread messages is a descriptor of a kind of personality, nothing more or less. But I decided about twelve years ago, when my daily management of emails had run over to 500 Unread Messages, to just let the faucet continue unabated. If I missed a message, someone would surely message again, and not going through a daily drill of negotiating trashed messages or folder arrangement provided literal hours of rescued time to my work week. So, at 500 unread emails and 3,000 unread work emails (ha), I thought: "Let's see how far we can take this".

After a year of not organizing messages into separate folders, I found I'd developed a very comprehensive habit. I hadn't missed a single important message from or to anyone. There was only one folder: My INBOX, and it was easy to look at 200-300 messages a day visually to determine if I needed to open a message, or if the subject itself was suitable to indicate its contents. I started to receive compliments from co-workers for my dependable communication style, as well. Oddly, the less I cared about structuring and organizing, the more I was perceived as provably structured and organized.

So this week, I celebrate the achievement of 100,000 unread personal emails and 35,000 unread work emails. To make this applicable to the show, I discuss digital resolution, compared to analog signals. In some ways, digital resolution in its lowest bitrate is a collection of poles of data. Each pole could be perceived as a single message, or an email (why not) – and this week's demonstration shows you how to make your own waveform for free, making a very low bitrate waveform using a tool like Audacity: Make a 1/10th second tone (generate tone) and add a 1/5th of a second space of silence (insert silence) – Then follow along in the discussion on how to make a suitable VCO (or DCO, more accurately) for adding to modular synthesis.

Some of these episodes of SWWE discuss expensive gear, but everything made this week is using free software, like Audacity. The mentioned apps are incredibly cheap, as well: PixelWave (one dollar) and Bebot (two dollars).

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #44: "A Group of Over 100,000 Emails Walk Into a Bar…"

Connect with SWWE via Flagged or Unread Email on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and Have a Very Communicative week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the show. This week we get down to the serious question of the day: Do you ever hear bubble wrap in your pockets? Happened to us this week, and it very likely might have been a complete audio hallucination. Fortunately, using specific patented Psychomental Technology, we were able to record the hallucination itself in the audio track. Nice technology that doesn't exist, but great for recording imaginary bubble wrap. This week we also discuss the wonderful GAMESTOP moment. I'm reminded of the cultural Gamestop precursor, Radio Shack, which is a prized part of my youth, which had its own troubles with Hedge Fund assault, see its 2015 battle with hedge fund Standard General.

example:

By delaying actions that might have preserved some of the chain's value, Standard General allegedly sought to take over RadioShack at the lowest price possible.

Hedge Funds are awful! I'd love them to be a hallucination. This week also provides tips on relaxation and "The True Self and The False Self", Part 25 of Charlie Pickle.

The entire thought of audio hallucination has been a fun one for me since I've been regularly using a Quantum Ocean daily. (See episode 22) The Quantum Ocean's wash of static, clicks, and noise produces audible thought hallucinations, not unlike what you might 'hear' while falling asleep at the edge of being awake or not, a kind of drift into dreaming. Fun as hell to be able to do this while fully awake. What sounds do you hallucinate?

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #43: Do You Ever Hear Bubble Wrap In Your Pockets?

Connect with SWWE via Unverifiable Noises on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and regards to GAMESTONK GAMESTOMP, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. Really, a calm and simple one this week. Biden's in office, hooray, and the peace of mind and decompression from that is TANGIBLE, isn't it. So this week, I thought to look at a collection of audio files I've compiled from field recording in Austin and Chicago over a couple of years. There's butterfly wings flapping, a nearly perfect cicada, peacocks, and a parakeet record. All of this is run through hardware samplers, primarily a Korg MicroSampler, and turned into mechanized insect wing machinery. Have a nice week and enjoy the audio.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #42: Hundreds of Butterfly Wings, Run Through Hardware Samplers

Connect with SWWE via Relative Sanity and Peace of Mind on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and good insect regards, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week, it's impossible to not discuss White Nationalism (or my joke for it: "What" Nationalism) – And during this week celebrating MLK Day, I feel inclined to talk about the formative role of the KKK on my mind, growing up as a goth/punk in Denver in the 1990s. The short version of this is "hate has happened before", it will get bad, AND it will go away again. I say this because my parents had their experiences with hate in the 40s and 60s, it went away, then I had my experiences in the 90s and it went away. It's always here, just less represented through position. So it's a less urgent worry about this current strain of the problem. The Feds are clearly on it, too. "What Nationalism" and "What Power" is Fucked.

Contrarians will disagree and say NOPE, this is the worst the White Nationalist threat has ever been. But I'll say that's a narrow view of a longer running problem in the country. I actually was in a race riot in Denver in 1992, and that's what this episode will discuss.

My view is more of a Comic-Con one. We've always had hateful unhappy people who find "what power" through acting up in Nazi Cosplay. But even if this month's insurrection looked awful and horrifying, it compares very little to the Klan's uprising in power in the 1990s, including its own Hitler Youth component of occupying high schools and turning football players and other students into KKK recruiters. I refer to this article as an example. I was a part of the counterculture of Denver in my teens and we all knew many people who were in the KKK, we knew them from home room and we knew girls who dated them. This was the basic state of punk at the time. Skinheads and anti-racists all went to the same dance clubs, music stores, and coffee shops. And so when a riot happened in Denver on January 20 1992, I unsurprisingly recognized a bunch of the KKK supporters on the Capitol Steps as people in the punk community. It was a terribly depressing day, chronicled here, and in video:

Of course, Hate did not win out in time. Other punks fought back against the KKK violently, and Klan connections to Denver's punk and goth community was largely a shameful secret. Most people didn't tolerate hate in any way, but my highschool years, age 14-18, was one when nearly everyone knew at least one KKK member or someone dating a skinhead, or some other dismal bullshit. I guess you could call them Klansboys, more accurately. Or Aryan Doof. And most of them grew out of it. But I don't believe the same can be said now with What Nationalism. The Klan was far more ubiquitous. Perhaps discussing the Klan of the 1990s is a useful way to prevent this current problem from expanding into worse territory, too.

This is not saying punks and KKK are the same thing, it's more complicated. But here's a piece on the problem in the 1990s, presented optimistically about the problem of today. And an excitement about a new Administration in Washington in less than a week. Thank the lord.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTIONICS #41, Remembering the KKK Riot on MLK Day in Denver, 1992

Connect with SWWE via 1990s Recall on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and have a good week – Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the show. This week we're pleased to welcome Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin into the studio. It's their first interview in more than 25 years! Abbie has been in hiding since 1989 and Jerry has gone low profile since 1994, but we meet with them via seance this week. The reason: They want to take credit for the insurrection at DC. Specifically the wikipedia article that didn't exist until January 6, titled: The 2021 storming of the United States Capitol

It can now be told, and explained, that the charismatic smiling quality of the rabid crazed neo-nazis storming into the Capitol building were, in fact, under the spell of YIPPIE MAGIC —  double-crossed into an act of self destruction! This fulfills a 50 year plan, begun in 1970, to crumble the Republican Party. Abbie and Jerry do a better job of explaining this, which is fully described in Side A this week: "YIPPIE SEANCE!" Abbie Hoffman & Jerry Rubin Take Credit for Last Week's Riot.

January 6 will go down in history as the best day ever for the Democratic Party. Not only did we recover the Senate, the entire world saw clear optics of the festering monster that the Republican party has been creating since Goldwater. Since gerrymandering. Since FOX News. Since McCarthy. They can all try and walk this politely into being Trump's fault, but everyone knows this is all the GOP's creation. Future wikipedia articles talk about how January 6 is officially known as the day the GOP died. It will be a felony in the future to be a Republican Senator. Viva!

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #40: "A YIPPIE SEANCE!" — Last Week's DC RIOT Explained

Additionally, 2020 ended with an incredible video upload. MEDIA BURN uploaded a politely titled "CHICAGO CONSPIRACY 8" by RG Davis to VIMEO. This footage, which hasn't been released in 50 years since its one time airing is the most candid conversation with the Chicago 7 during the fourth month of their trial. If you've ever been curious to see ACTUAL footage of the personalities on trial, this is as honest a capsule you'll ever likely see.

Chicago Conspiracy 8 from MediaBurnArchive on Vimeo.

When done with the video, hop aboard for an hour long talk with Yippie Ghosts. This last week was awful to watch but the beginning of America's recovery, trust us.

Connect with SWWE via Yippie Spells and Magic on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone – Welcome back to the show. Bit of a fun one to begin the New Year. This week is about smuggling drugs, or rather the U.S. Govt's history with increasing scrutiny at our borders, with drugs as a justification. Customs used to be more casual, a question about what you might have purchased and what you'll be declaring. But as airports became more militarized in defense of drugs and terrorists, customs itself became more of an inspection process. The record this week is a series of rarely heard Radio Spots that were prepared to let you know about these increased measures, featuring Jack Webb from Dragnet and a beautiful sounding Ricardo Montalbán, speaking in Spanish. You are also introduced to the head of U.S. Customs Vernon D Acree, whose wonderfully uptight voice completes the long-awaited threesome for J. Edgar Hoover and Richard Daley. A lot of wonderful samples here for you to hunt through, too.

"Drugs Dolls and Delays" introduces you to some wild fear-based stories. There's a 13 year old kid junky, you learn he's been on heroin since he was eleven and is up to a $200/day habit! You learn about the danger of importing fruit. College students are implicitly warned about their upcoming trips abroad. And you hear about the saddest story of them all: The cover girl on the LP, a kid's baby doll whose head has been cracked off, only to reveal a body full of white powder. That powder can only mean one thing, and I don't think it's coffee creamer. Cuff 'em!

Connect with SWWE via Doll Head and Cocaine on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and don't put heroin in your kid's Barbie, put it in the R2D2! – EP

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Greetings, fellow residents of 2020! Welcome back to the show. We're days away from kicking this year to the curb, and in a year as mind-breaking as this one, psychedelics might be one of the few things to make clear-eyed sense of it. I don't have any acid this year, but taking LSD on New Year's is often a great way to end a year and begin a new one. You should always take acid in a controlled space (let the acid itself go out of control for you) and a great electronics trick to learn for acid consumption is filling a room with stroboscopic sound, which is automated panning that can make the room feel like it's moving in a circular twirl. You can make this swirl slowly and also change directions. This week I'll demonstrate this method. I use a Moog Unit Q148, but the effect is also very easy to achieve with some simple electronic modules. You can even do it manually with two separate amplifiers (or an analog mixer) and two people working the balance knobs.

Speaking in eurorack terms: You basically need two separate VCAs that will open and close rapidly with control voltage. Send your sound into both VCAs and trigger them both open and closed with different strobes of CV (triangle waves work best) – Send one VCA to a left channel and the other to the right. You'll find the room moving along wildly with the sound. Simple sound sources like radio static work really well. You can slow the panning by slowing the control voltage rate. This is even easier with a CV mixer, if you have a positive and negative CV out, send one one VCA and the other to the other VCA, they will flip in sync. If you have a large room, you can achieve this in quadrophonic terms with a mixer and some experimentation. (The no longer in production Koma Poltergeist is perfect)

In terms of still available off-the-shelf products, Knas makes a beguiling quadrophonic VCA panner that I'd love to keep on the market. This thing has intrigued me for years. (nice write up by Great Synthesizers.) If you have a room to fill with strobing audio panning, it looks tough to beat. The Knas Quad Massager demo describes audio panning well:

For this week's show, we demonstrate how to merge a variety of sounds into transient soundscapes that work great will hallucinogens. Following that, with social distancing still in vogue, our side A track for the week is a blend of various LSD-intended ideas, with "Awake in the Freezer Aisle of the All-Night Grocery, Peaking Happily and Alone."

Side B for this week is part 20 of Charlie Pickle, concluding the Treemont Purchase storyline with "Hurricanes and Displacement".

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #38: Acid Is Best on New Year's Eve

Connect with SWWE via Positive End of 2020 Assessment on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and have a great New Year, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hello, all – Happy Grievances! Welcome back to the show. This week is our holiday episode for December, and we're decorating the pole — with nothing! This year has already had its ornaments of bullshit and insanity, no need for glitter or decorations. I'm having a Zoom party for one over here. It's Festivus! The good holiday that Seinfeld made famous. And in so many ways it is the perfect holiday for this year. In a year like 2020, Festivus is a good natured outlet to just let the grievances out. All holidays have their moments where they become more substantial. Columbus Day wasn't anything until he came back with all those slaves, Thanksgiving was nothing until the genocide of American Natives, and Christmas was nothing but a birthday before Thomas Nast invented our modern Santa Claus.

All these holidays made use of their moment to become a permanent part of our collective experience, and few years set a better stage for Festivus to become a genuine and real event to process the insanity of our current reality. Festivus is officially on December 23, incidentally. But in honor of the most ridiculous "pick your grievance" year, I'm suggesting it go full-bore, with bank closures, no mail delivery, even shut off the Atomic Clock for the day. You have a problem any of that, include it in your grievance list! If we can have Daylight Savings Day, which many people complain about for months, we can certainly have an officially recognized Festivus, where many people would only complain for a night.

To acknowledge the new federally protected day of grievance, this episode is partly a tribute to Jonathon Wolff, who invented the world's cheapest (and perhaps most lucrative) sitcom theme, composing the Seinfeld theme in half of an afternoon. With regard for that slapping fake bass note, learn about envelope following, which turns any signal into control voltage (a pitch envelope and a gate) and hear how something as identifiable as a sitcom theme can be used to control synthesizers and drum patterns in undetectable ways.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #37: Happy GRIEVANCES! We Have Endured THE YEAR of Festivus.

Connect with SWWE via Metal Pole and Bare Floor on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and have a very good holiday, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the show. The lead image here demonstrates that a radio can be a hat, but I'd like to dive even deeper on radio. Radio is more powerful than we give it credit. Its transformative possibilities as ubiquitous electromagnetic waves make it truly wonderful and ghostly. Did you know a common anxiety in the early century was picking up radio reception in your teeth, btw? Any random city has a good number of radio stations constantly broadcasting at the same time. We should be able to hear all of these stations at once, not one station at a time, so this week I'll show you a way to approximate that.

Simply put, in radio reception, the radio tuner is the censor. Instead of hearing all the stations at once, it allows you to only hear one station at a time, on the dial number you've selected. This "single station" concept is awfully boring, however – especially when you consider any city's radio feed might have 15-20 stations playing at the same time on the FM dial.

Removing the tuner from controlling the dial is a lot more fun, however, and this week I'll demonstrate a method, using control voltage, to play a radio tuner in a way where the the stations are notes on a keyboard, along with using modulation to make the entire dial spin back and forth at a strobe-like speed. We'll use an array of control voltage sources (a Pot Action Recorder, Stepped Voltage CV generator, and a few CV sequencers) and an Arradio module.

Prior to that, I remember my dad's wonderful Marantz 2200 series receiver, which he gifted my brother and me, partly, I feel, to not feel terrible about upgrading to something else for himself in the 1980s. (Just give the kids the old one!) I think the Marantz was better than the upgrade, though, and it gave me a lifelong addiction to radio dials and switches, as the Marantz had GREAT switches and dials. You can hear this memory in the lead track, "Basement Living Was Really Good".

Finally, this week's episode concludes with "White Man's Blues", introducing you to Charlie's co-worker Duncan, who is a big Double Trouble fan. Catch up on Charlie Pickle here.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #36: FUN MADNESS with Control Voltage Radio Tuning

Connect with SWWE via Radio Hat and Wideband Receiver on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Want to delight the undelightable? Episode Packs of Spoken Word with Electronics are great holiday gifts, incidentally. They're marked down to $5 a piece through the New Year. That's cheaper than a Radio Hat! Thanks for supporting the show.

Have a very good week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week is a tribute to Mr Rogers. I have one rare tape on Mr Rogers in my library of unusual records, and when I share this with people I present it as "a side of Mr Rogers you may have never heard." Most listeners agree: This is a very incredible album. Specifically, this is Fred Rogers translating the complexity of death and pain into helping parents deal with a huge fear: The death of their kids. He also relates similar comfort to kids themselves. And then you meet the children, who are all wonderful, happy, and seemingly more aware of the moment than many adults three times their age. I'm posting it this week because we need more compassion in the world, presently.

This is what the 1983 cassette "Healing with Love" is all about, and its obscure placement in the Mr Rogers discography only makes it more interesting. This wasn't work for PBS. It was seemingly only intended for the patients and their parents, and copies of the tape were produced in small numbers. There is no way this topic would have made it onto his show (though Bruce Haack on Mr Rogers is a favorite in that category)

This tape celebrates the word of Dr Gerald Jampolsky, who is a kindred spirit of Fred Rogers. You are introduced to Jampolsky, his group of patients, their parents, and then encounter some frightening moments with a parent grieving a dead child. Dr Jampolsky manages a phone hotline for terminally ill children and consoles parents, both those grieving a death or managing stress, and Jampolsky's love and care for everyone is to be admired. Hear the entire tape here.

Of course, we had to make a tribute to all of this, and that can be found in Side A for this week, "Mr Roger's Metaphysical Phone Hotline" including some of the more intense Mr Rogers sentences I've ever heard. Here's one: "Do you consider death an enemy?" – Wild.

Side B for this week continues our serial Charlie Pickle. (Hear all the story up to this point) – This week introduces you to your first day's work at Company Statistics, where both you and Charlie work, and you're given some tips on helping everyone out with the coffee.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #35: Mr Rogers' Rare Words From 1983 on Death and Childhood Illness

Connect with SWWE via Sincere Understanding and Compassion on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google .

Thanks and have a good week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi everyone, welcome back to the show. This week is about loud noises made by computers. Awful sounds like modems, faxes, and my favorite unbearable noise: The firmware update file. Firmware can be updated via an audio file and to demonstrate this, we discuss audio files from Korg's Monotribe, the W-slash sampler from Whimsical Raps, and Nanoloop.

I thought it would be fun to make comforting music from these noises, and you can jump to "The Roomba is Dreaming" to hear the end result. The discussion for this week is a demonstration of using envelope generators to smooth out the harsh tones of a firmware file. In particular, a trapezoid generator based on an EMS Synthi is used to pull out tonal rhythms.

Last week's post on "Booting DOS from vinyl" reminded me of cassette drive loading. We had an Atari 400 and an 800, and both of those used cassettes to load many of their games. I used to love that noise, and I expect Atari filtered the sound of the cassettes themselves, otherwise risk injuring the ears of kids who put the cassettes (intended for a computer) into their walkman (it would still play, after all). So you'll learn about Zaxxon, Frogger, and my favorite Atari cassette-based game: Salmon Run.

All of these sound files work to load data because a lot can be communicated in a tone. If you think about a phone dialer, it is twelve separate pitched notes (0-9, pound and asterix) – These tones are used for any number of aggravating automated systems when you call customer service lines, and they also connect your call. There are a few tones never intended for you to hear, however, including the 2600 hertz tone, which was a tone generated by a payphone when a call was concluded.

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak unofficially began Apple Computers with a phone phreaking device called the Blue Box. It was a device that sent out a 2600 hertz tone to fake (or phake) the sound of a phone getting disconnected. The two callers would remain on the phone, however, allowing a free call without billing. So in our introduction this week I demonstrate the 2600 hertz tone using a wonderful iphone app called Phonal Tonal, which replicates a Blue Box, Green Box, and a Red Box.

2600, the hacker quarterly, is named after this 2600 hertz tone, which is a single tone that can override a payphone's pricing controls with one single command.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #34: Making Music with 2600 Hz Tones and Firmware Audio Update Files

Connect with SWWE via tone generator on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and other podcast services.

NEW: We now offer weekly downloads on Bandcamp. Support the show in that way, if you'd like.

Have a very tonal week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week is our first Thanksgiving Episode, and with most of us opting to stay home and not travel this year, I thought I'd share one of my favorite records in my collection. This is a 40 album set from The Minnesota Department of Public Welfare. Specifically this is a part of the "Talking Books for the Blind" – an endeavor that is still very much alive in public education. I have a friend who has read trigonometry into a recorder for use in math courses at the university level for decades, as an example.

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Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the show. This week is partially about the decompression following months and years of stress over Trump. With the election completed, I found myself more stressed last week than I'd been months before, and this is partly because of how I deal with threats. I am calm when threatened and then unravel a bit after the fact when I'm safer. So for humor sake, as a tangent, this week's show is about the last ten days of my life that appear to be missing from my mind, and a discussion on batteries. I don't like batteries. I can definitely talk about how much I don't like batteries.

Batteries are lousy. Batteries are awful. Batteries are overhyped. Batteries Batteries are wasteful. Batteries are polution. Batteries suck.

(more…)

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the show. This week, a Nanoloop arrived from Germany. I was elated. It showed up with great timing, too, on the afternoon of the day of the Election. Not sure it's possible to describe how stressful that day felt, though I imagine it's relatable. A drum machine synthesizer that is built off of the sounds of classic Nintendo Gameboy circuitry was just what the doctor ordered, so I turned off the news (to the best of my ability, anyway) and recorded Nanoloop beats for a week. You'll find that mood journal here for Side A.

The Nanoloop itself is a legendary component of chiptune music, and other electronic formats, providing instant acid house-esque rhythms. It's really wonderful for sound design, too. It's four concurrent 16-step grids, four voices, and is played like a video game. You'll hear Nanoloop on some recordings you love, from Aphex Twin to Boards of Canada, and elsewhere. A discussion on that is included.

The Nanoloop began as a cartridge for the original Nintendo Gameboy. It was then made for the Nintendo DS, ported to a deliriously fun iphone app, among other history. All of these iterations beg the question: "Why make a dedicated piece of hardware?" The answer is hardware is physical (obviously), electrically more musical (each note is a synapse), and has unpredictability you can't find in software. I've spent a week with the Nanoloop hardware and already find myself more drawn to play it than any of the software versions, cartridge included. This is a great successful achievement for Wittchow, who successfully launched a Kickstarter to realize Nanoloop as hardware in February 2019.

The serendipity of the Nanoloop arriving unexpectedly as it did was all the more nice, as I'd paid for it in March 2019. Kickstarter campaigns can be a little like messages in the bottle in that way, and the arrival of this gear on that stressful day is something I'm very thankful for. The original price of the Nanoloop was $100, which gives you a very capable PCB, buttons and a lucite clear faceplate. I might spend a little to build a custom metal or wood case around it, as I expect to use this for many years to come. (I expect that original price to increase if there's a second run of these made, too, and wouldn't fault them for it.)

Oliver Wittchow, the inventor of the Nanoloop, also makes one of my favorite phone games, the self-described Hungry Ducks, which just involves throwing bread out in the water and watching ducks scurry to eat.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #31: "So Damn Relieved Biden Won."

Connect with SWWE via Chiptune and Sequenced Pulse on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a good terror-free week, Trump is on the way out, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week is a precarious one, as we post the episodes on Monday. The Election happens on Tuesday, however, and that means the world might become a very different creature in the next seven days. So to anticipate GOOD or BAD, this week is all about jokes. For total distraction, I have 45 minutes of jokes that I will read to you this week. You can press play and just forget the world as you meditate on such classics as "Did you Hear About the Invisible Man's Family? His Kids Were Nothing to Look At, Either!" – 45 minutes of that, thank me or pie me later.

The jokes for this episode actually come from my Joke Calendar, which I had at my office at work. I tormented 30-50 people at work so much (true story) that they stole the calendar from me, and placed it in the ice box! I responded to the prank with "The Joke Calendar", which is a track I'm also including in this week's humor pack for Side A. This track is from my album This is the TRUTH, which is on Bandcamp.

But chances are, you're here for part two of all the porn titles of 1984, read by a computer, continued from last week. The L-Z of that massive list is another 45 minute track of distraction, and available here as Side B. This concludes the adult entertainment onslaught from Episode 29, I've included the A-L list in the embedded audio below.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #30: Hundreds of Jokes & Distractions For This Election Week

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One bit of politics here. A very funny Neil Young's Cinnamon Girl, put through the Q Truth Filter, as QAnon Girl, by The Mike Pence Experience. (I didn't make this, I just love it) – It mysteriously arrived on the Internet just this week. November Surprise:

A few thanks in order, if the world explodes before Friday: Some appreciation to The Onion's AV Club for their valued piece on last week's show. Regards to writer Allison Shoemaker, in particular. And a thanks to Dazed & Confused magazine, as well.

Connect with SWWE via Distraction and Humor on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Good cheer, and see you on the other side of the mirror next week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week focuses on an independently produced book from 1984. Title is "Lary King's Encyclopedic Guide to Adult Video Cassette Movies" and it is a wonderful surviving snapshot of adult movies from that era. Incidentally, 1984 is the stated end of The Golden Age of Porn and the titles included, which contain films from 1960-1984, don't disappoint. Porn at its best is very clever. This is from the time adult movies were scripted, filmed (not videotaped), and these movies contained some of the funniest titles imaginable.

So, in 1983, an archivist by the name of Lary King (not Larry King! we hope) endeavored to list every single one of these film titles available on VHS and LaserDisc. There are no pictures in the book, highlighting the value and insane delights of the titles themselves, naked and alone. The surviving rare book shows the variety of content from that era, and also speaks to the manageable amount of films themselves. Back in 1984, you could reasonable see EVERY American adult film in existence. Heck, it all fit in a snug 300 page book.

We're happy to share the first half of film titles with an audiobook component for Side A, where a computer will read you every title, A through L. The second half of titles will post next week, as the computer got pretty exhausted. Side B continues the Charlie Pickle story with part eleven: Morrie Treemont.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #29: "Lary King's 1984 Guide to Adult Video Cassette Movies"

Connect with SWWE via Consenting Adults and Blue-Light Projection on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a good week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Greetings, everyone. Welcome back to the show. This week is our Halloween episode. It's a tribute episode to a familiar childhood pony, named Patch, of the 1960s-1980s. Patch the Pony taught children an easy to remember rule: "Nay, Nay! From Strangers Stay Away!" — I love the story of Patch the Pony.

To keep with the Halloween season, audio from Patch is turned into a Halloween Movie. This is done with a variety of synthesizer beds, spray-can webbing, fake plastic hands, witches broomsticks, rattling skeletons, and vampire teeth. It's also achieved through the soundtrack of Patch the Pony itself, an unusual story of a wandering Pony who watches over children, and the peculiar voice acting for The Stranger who has a ball of candy, and an offer to "climb in" and ride in his new automobile. Nay, Nay, Stay Away!

Patch the Pony is a nice success story of an independent creator, too. While most cartoon mascots were corporate owned, Patch is one of the few guardians of children to be independently created, a heroic creation of a mother from Watertown, Wisconsin — who went on to share the story of Patch with millions of children for decades. Other than Art Clokey's Pokey from Gumby, I can't think of many creator-owned safety horses.

Side B for this week continues our serialized story of The Recovery of Charlie Pickle, with Psychiatric Notes #1.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #28: A Tribute to Patch the Pony

Connect with SWWE via Jack-o-Lantern and Candy Corn on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a "ghoul" week, E

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the show. This week, our close friend Donald Trump phones in for a five minute interview, where we discuss his second term ambitions. This phone call was made earlier last week, and just a day or so after being released from Walter Reed for the Guinness World Record in Hospitalized Covid Recovery. Incredible!

The White House switchboard was muting any moment Trump coughed, but one got past their censor button, so we've isolated the hacking wheeze and cough and have made it available as a free ringtone.

We then take a train down to Hell to hear The Devil's opinion on 'Stupid Covid Masks', and conclude the episode with Part Nine of Charlie Pickle.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #27: A Phone Interview with Donald Trump, 26 Days Before the Election.

Connect with SWWE via Uncontrollable Baby President Hacking on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a good week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone – Welcome back to the show. This week we present a course on Mind Surgery, which is a cassette I found in a thrift store bin in Denver in 1993. The tape itself is a product of Denver, a part of the 'UNIQUE-TECHNIQUE' Program, based in suburban Littleton in 1985. I've enjoyed the lessons on Junk-Proof Filtering, avoiding the NIOPS, and celebrating the MMMS for years. So this episode is a tribute to the Mind Surgeon. You'll find full audio, along with a tribute track.

Mind Surgery is an unusual audio product, especially if you listen to a lot of self-help audio. It's overwhelmingly positive, for one, it doesn't blame you for your problems. It lives in its own self-made psychology, which is delightful, and it doesn't have a manipulative agenda. I'd label it "outsider psyche". There's a benevolent Scientology vibe found within, too, with self-created William Burroughs-esque terms and procedures. And I haven't even mentioned the backup singers. I love this cassette.

Side A is a full-out tribute to Mind Surgery and the Junk Proof-Filter. Side B for this week continues our Charlie Pickle story.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #26: A Self-Help Course on MIND SURGERY and JUNK-PROOF FILTERING (1985)

Connect with SWWE via Mind Movie (and no NIOP!) on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a good week, Ethan

Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds

Hi, everyone – Welcome back to the show. This week is all about Thumb Hypnosis. That might provide more questions than answers. Specifically, "Thumb Hypnosis" is a 1960s recording (I'm presuming, it's undated) that arrived to me with other hypnotism records some years ago. I love self-pressed hypnotism recordings, and "Thumb Hypnosis" is one of the best out there. It answers no questions. It solves all problems. Thumb!

Enjoying THUMB HYPNOSIS, raw audio is provided in track two, with a full reworking of sampling opportunities in track three. Audio is processed through a Radio Music module, 907 Fixed Filter Bank, and an SSL Samplecorder. Also, a quick demo of a Korg MicroSampler is provided, which is one of the nicest and most playable pieces of Korg hardware ever made, sadly pulled from production after less than a year on the market. It's a GREAT sampler, very similar to an E-MU. So this episode covers a lot of sampling hardware, processes, and tips.

SPOKEN WORD WITH ELECTRONICS #25: Do You Believe in THUMB HYPNOSIS?

Connect with SWWE via Audio Persuasion or "digital" thumb puns on Bandcamp, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play.

Thanks and have a good week, Ethan