This summer saw the first official live performance by Insectoid Intelligence since leaving my home state of Minnesota, a significant milestone to be sure and something I plan on celebrating by... you guessed it! Performing at Art Wauk again this Saturday! I'd like to extend my deep and sincere gratitude to everyone who makes this extraordinary monthly event possible, and of course to all who managed to brave the scorching summer heat and stop by Post Marketplace to catch a snippet or two of my, erm, adventures in sound! Yes, there was the obligatory feedback squeal before reverting to my usual "no microphones" policy (and for this I have Wendy Carlos and her excellent "Secrets of Synthesis" cassette to thank); yes, it was too hot and the poor Prophet 2000 promptly started glitching out as the board connector harness expanded*; yes, some of my monosynth solos could have been described as slightly meandering. But the spirit was there (well, at least for the June gig, before fatefully getting thrown off by a totally predictable Korg MIDI driver bug the following month), and in the end I got a wonderful chance to do something like The Orb Meets Edgar Froese Meets The Paul Bley Synthesizer Show in Downtown Waukegan in front of an audience of... roughly seven. It was epic. We'll see if I can spare a moment to break open my box of self-produced, hand-made cassettes this time, instead of leaving it unopened on the table next to a pair of giant gold scissors like some kind of bizarro David Lynch pisstake (yes, that's what actually happened last time). Come on down! Show starts at 5 pm! Don't miss it!!!
SPECIAL NOTE: My performance will NOT be taking place at Post Marketplace as in the past. Also, it will be raining. Dress appropriately (costumes highly encouraged!). Watch out for me making some positively spooky synth noises underneath a tarp or overhang somewhere in the vicinity of the Genesee Theater.
So what else is happening with this old bag of bones (exoskeletons?) these days?
* This turns out to be the only identifiable issue behind the odd aforementioned Prophet glitch problem: it only occurs if the machine is operating at a sufficiently high enough temperature. Otherwise it's fine. With the benefit of proper AC and / or convective cooling, I have never experienced any performance issues! There are a couple of potential scenarios that might explain this. One is the ordinary thermal expansion of solder joints I already mentioned, probably in the area of the wiring harness I replaced several years ago. One or more could be loose, or occasionally shorts out with its neighbor as the metal expands. On the other hand, I seem to recall this instrument has always suffered from occasional sample playback errors, even before any repair (something reported frequently enough by other users), and it may simply be that the overall stability of my Prophet was never all that stellar to begin with. Its low serial number, despite all the upgrades and mods described in the technical manual having performed by some service tech at some point in the past, may be partially or entirely repsonsible. After all, low serial Prophet 5s had a number of stability issues as well if memory serves!
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