[Music]
I think it's a confusion with sometimes
when people look at my artwork is that
it's very high-tech but really it's
extremely low tech that's very basic
it's very primal its physical the reason
I can make like music that drags in a
way that doesn't sound like it's being
played off the computers because I'm
doing it in Paul Mann
[Music]
I'm gonna go that's too bad I think I
decided to make my own instruments
initially because I was having trouble
making heavier music with electronic
instruments that were available I'm also
a mechanical engineer in microfluidics
and microscopy I did some bands while I
was in engineering school metal bands
playing bass and guitar and just equally
as passionate about the music as I was
about engineering I kind of got
frustrated by the band member thing so
at some point I was like I'm in a
program drum machine music and played my
guitar along with it but playing along
with the sequence with the guitar it
kind of gets away from you it sounds
great in the studio but it needed to be
more alive I was like oh okay I'm gonna
make a something that I slide it just
took off from there this was the first
ones that I made so these are basically
just controllers for synthesizers USB
output to your computer or to any sin
that you want no idea what this was that
the faster you go the higher the pitch
so this is a new setup tentatively
calling it like a gridiron
the stylus right here that basically
follows the grooves you can create the
beats like that
this one's called Rails this is the one
I played the most toward the most with
there's eight buttons here so you can
basically do different combinations two
buttons at different positions to
trigger different sounds they don't make
their own sound it's an interface I'm
basically taking a really nice physical
thing a small machine that I've built
and then you basically just attach
encoders or potentiometers to them so
that you can send that to a little
computer and read out all that
information this one is basically I
wanted to have a big chunk of steel
that's spun and slid something you just
could really this one was difficult
because you got to measure this spinning
with an encoder and the sliding
thing about it having weight the device
happening weight even here the weight
it's using the quality of the materials
to pack as your instrument this is the
National Center for microscopy and
imaging research I work with physicists
and biologists to come up with new ways
to image cell biology this device allows
you take a block a one millimeter of one
millimeter cube of mouse brain or
whatever sample and you slice it and an
image each slice I don't know what this
sample is it's probably some brains
these devices are basically small robots
and we need to modify them and make them
work better so that's my job and
mechanical engineer I work with 3d
modeling software and then modify them
get a machine to the shop bring them
back in so when I'm building a lot of
the instruments that I'm designing I use
the same software in some ways the
partnership between the two things keeps
me fresh I mean a lot of what I do is
based on hardware and automation
equipment in gears and bearings and
things that slide so there's something
about like being in that environment
with this really I mean these may like
these microscopes are 10 million dollars
no one's spending that kind of money on
making a musical instrument but I'm
trying to like apply those same design
strategies
[Music]
when I was first building it was like I
had a sound in mind and I really wanted
to find a way to appropriately like play
that sound but now I think it's more
what my body is like able to do live as
one person right now I'm working on an
album for relapse that comes out so I'm
having the fall and this one is special
for me because it I've built new
instruments so the first time since like
2010 these new instruments it's a
totally new idea if I may have a partner
or two to develop these into something
like a boutique controller company here
is from my company because I don't see
that many tactile physical industrial
controllers and I feel like it's a shame
because there's so many gnarly musicians
out there and those guys should have
gnarly stuff
[Music]
[Applause]