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Midboss's avatar

Plywood.

One of my favorite tracks on anything is YYZ off of Rush's Moving Pictures. Just after the 2:26 mark there is something that I always equated to the sound of a thunder clap. My Uncle told me the sound was actually created by slamming a piece of plywood into a wooden stool and sure enough plywood is listed in the liner notes of the album.

In an interview for the Rush Backstage Club Newsletter, December 1985 Neil Peart is asked Q. How do you play plywood?

A. Well you wear gloves so as not to get splinters, you take a piece of 1/4" plywood, and smack it down hard on the top of a wooden stool. Very demanding, technically? took years of practice.

So my answer is plywood. Or technically plywood & wooden stool, but plywood is the only one that ended up in the liner notes. Justice for wooden stool.

Emilia's avatar

Those little wooden frog percussion things, used to love them as a child. They make such an interesting sound aswell! Please tell me someone knows what I'm referencing because otherwise I sound crazy. I think the concept of these type of percussion instruments stems from Latin America, no idea why its a frog lol but I love it nonetheless.

Horror and Cats's avatar

Just a reply because I can’t find a picture (or even the original source of the story I remember from like 15 years ago), but the piano they recorded the Firefly theme song on I believe was water damaged/warped, which generated a wholly unique sound and cannot be FULLY emulated on any other piano.

L

The Talkbox!

I always found this one weird , a great sound and a little bit disgusting!

It voices over your guitar as you play to give that robotic sound that matches the pace of what you are playing.

I keep thinking about all the spit in the tube... But also its obscure as why does it take a tube! rather than a microphone set up . It looks like some sort of ventilator and that it would be an impingement.

Retro Stu's avatar

I was trying to think of instruments that don't rely on MIDI or triggering things and while this contraption is essentially a bunch of instruments put together I have to share it because what an instrument it is!

It always makes me think of the band OK GO and is called the Wintergatan Marble Machine.

Comprising of a crank which the user must turn it then releases 2000 steel marbles which cycle through the instrument which acts as a bass kick drum, cymbal, vibraphone and other instruments and plays through a 32 bar loop. Not only that, the music itself is stored on two programmable wheels and they use Lego technic parts to trigger the release of the marbles! It's everything I wish I could've made with my Lego and Meccano sets as a kid!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvUU8joBb1Q

Rich's avatar

Brilliant. Absolutely ingenious. Like a steampunk DJ.

Konquest's avatar

Factory Fan Bass By Ei Wada + Teruo Takahashi(from the iron factory) + Nicos Orchest-Lab

They replaced the fan blades with a disk with holes of different shapes and sizes, it converts blinks of lights to electric signals and generates sound from a bass amplifier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omgbhGirTtY

mar1gold 's avatar

wowowo this is super cool!

Konquest's avatar

As a kid i did something similar but it wasn't musical. Singing with your face behind the fan, the voice comes out distorted Hahaha

Rich's avatar

This is awesome. So inventive!

Konquest's avatar

I like how they repurposed an 'everyday' kind of object rather then reinventing something totally new :D

NeoKazuho's avatar

https://youtu.be/Wp1wHZfZz9s?si=ZLYX16KYo_jb9XFT

Pikasso Guitar would be the hardest and craziest to be mastered

D

I can't believe no-one has mentioned the Dion Dublin 'Dube'.

This is my party trick when people are talking about music, and it's something that no-one ever knows about. I advise you to just check it out...

https://www.thedube.com/

Sturmer's avatar

I'm not formally trained in music, beyond the standard classes offered in school, but all my life I've been drawn to creating sounds. I have a collection of various unique and obscure musical instruments at home. One such instrument is a Rainstick, considered a percussion instrument. It's challenging to use solo but works wonderfully as an addition to ambient music. I often use it for meditation, playing it without any particular aim and not recording the sessions, just living in the moment.

https://twitter.com/GurtsF/status/1779835884495331537

Here’s a link to learn more about the Rainstick on Wikipedia, and you can watch Evelyn Glennie demonstrate its use passionately in this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTtJApuHCCI

FirestormGamingTeam's avatar

For me, it's the accordion, the very sound of music this instrument can make is just amazing. One of my foster parents, the father, David was in a Morris band, in the village of Nether Heyford and every year we had this village festival, and he would play this, whilst dancing around, I remember at the time thinking OMG, this is amazing.

Jenna 's avatar

This one is a silly one, the otamatone. I’ve recently came across this odd instrument and I absolutely love it. It so goofy but can honestly produce some great sounds . It works by pressing down on the stem, which creates electronic sounds and you can control the pitch by squeezing the face on it. It was made by Maywa Denki in Japan and first released in 2009.

Here’s a link to the song Hallelujah being played on this instrument.

https://youtu.be/x8hCe3j8CqU?si=n1MeBjbEwP9FlJit

Rich's avatar

Haha this is perfect! Wonder what a whole choir of otamatones would sound like...

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