Double Gate Drone Synth (Cat Eyes Edition)

[mattoverse]

Just a fun little drone synth I put together.  This first video is with the drone synth run through an 9volt operation head amp into 2 drum-shell speaker cabs and recorded with a doll head binaural microphone I built.  The second video is a direct recording.
Features:
4 oscillators set up as two independent pairs
The output of the first pair of oscillators can be fed into the second pair for interesting poly-rhythms
Power Drain Fun ButtonLED indicator lights for the rate oscillators (1 & 3)
Volume Control
1/4" Mono Output
Powered by 9volt Battery

[Granny Gremlin]

Cool; sounds like an NES.

[mcknib]

I like it very cool indeed

[hymenoptera]

It sounds great. The freak-out button is a nice touch; it really gives you some unique sounds that the typical osc box doesn't do.

Great recording too, btw. The stereo field is huge for a presumed monophonic source. I guess this is the doll head mic at work? Sounds like I'm right there in the room with you! Way to go!

[mattoverse]

Thanks for checking it out.  The binaural mic is just 2 electret elements installed in the ears of the doll head with a simple preamp circuit that is phantom powered.  They are not super high fidelity or anything, but they definitely provide a sense of space.

[hymenoptera]

Could have fooled me. Sounds cool on my monitors.

WHat exactly is the power drain button doing?

[mattoverse]

There is very simply just a large cap, 470uF in this case between power and ground.  In this instance the latching switch can be utilized as a sudo-momentary push-button.  On other similar builds I have also used a standard toggle on off, but then had that run through a larger size momentary normally closed push-button switch, so that pressing it cuts power, or power is cut until it is released.

Additionally, I think it would be fun to mount the power drain button in a hand-controller that could be connected via a 1/4" or 1/8" cable into a switching jack, but have yet to find the right sized enclosure that I can retro-fit.

[hymenoptera]

1590A is a nice size that fits in your hand. You'd have room for a momentary and a toggle or other latching switch wired in parallel so that you'd have a choice between one shot or hold.

[mattoverse]

Good idea, not sure how I overlooked such an obvious choice.  Will try to get some order and try it out.