I've Got Tone!

Jerry Cantrell almost brought it back in the early 90's with man in the box, that song was pretty popular. It was probably the first time i realized i was hearing one, but i agree they've had there day.

Atavachron wrote: Jeff Beck had a talkie phase in the 70s--  oh yeah and Joe Walsh too

. That's right! I always liked Joe Walsh. Delighted still more when I found out we were both born in the same town. I can't think of any others who've used it.

Atavachron wrote: They are fun, I just can't stop hearing Frampton doing 'Show Me the Way' when I think of one

Indeed, and it's hard to do much different sounding than that, but then again, I haven't tried in quite awhile. David Gilmour used it somewhere on Animals, I recall. I think that's what made me go find one. I don't remember which song. I haven't listened to that in quite awhile. I wonder hypothetically what a talk box & vocoder duet would sound like ...hmm. Either really good or really bad, I imagine.

Atavachron wrote: Talkboxes are so stuck in their time--  do they still make 'em?

They do indeed. There's one from MXR and two different kinds from Rocktron. They're not a complicated mechanism. A horn driver is the main element. Kind of fun to use. They lead one off into using microphones and such that are not in the typical guitar signal path.

Talkboxes are so stuck in their time--  do they still make 'em?

I have a bunch of schematics off the internet that should be well worth putting together. I've bought most or all of the materials too in some cases. There's a lot of DIY how-to instruction on the internet too. I don't have a good work area where I currently live, though, so I'm biding my time a little. I mainly have other people's DIY stuff I've gotten over the years. I've used ring modulators to get latency-free synth sounds for years now. I split and buffer the signal, then use one or more harmonizers to add in harmonics. The commercial ring mods are dead set on supplying an oscillator with them, so I've had to find people over time who make their own DIY ring mods with two inputs and no oscillator. I have a few of them now, and one or two kits to make them when I get around to it. It's a really simple circuit. Even I can say that.

There's a really cool mod for the Boss OC-2 Octave Divider on the net (YouTube). One of these days I'll try to do the mod myself, but I was able to commission someone else to do one for me, and it's become one of my pride and joys. It's latency-free also (because there's no PV conversion). Basically what happens if you bypass the part of the circuit that filters the sound, you get an Atari Punk square wave sound out of it. There's another schematic out there too called a Synth Box, which is based on one of the other octave dividers. I think it was a Rocktron or something. The upshot is I suspect this might be a property of octave dividers generally, which means we could have had monophonic square wave synth sounds from guitars back as early as the 60s! Who knows what could've happened from there. Once you have an acceptable square wave, there are ample harmonics present so that you can filter out some of those harmonics and get other types of wave forms (schematics currently available on the net).

Edited by HackettFan - August 26 2015 at 16:38

I love homemade music stuff.   Tinkering, toiling, experimenting like a mad scientist, it's the best way to learn about not just sounds but electrical too.

^ What I meant was that I've never seen anything like this before. I thought if you made it, you'd know how the breadboard works. What chips does it come with (if at all)?

Edited by Dayvenkirq - August 26 2015 at 10:15

^ I suppose only you know what happens if you fiddle around with the breadboard ... and how to fiddle with it.

Ah, the Great One.