Nick Collins is the author of The Art of Hardware Hacking and a Professor from the Department of Sound at the School of the Art Institute.  He recently released the second version of his book and was speaking/performing/signing at Quimby’s Books in Wicker Park, Chicago.  He graciously signed my “Rare first edition” and I got to chat about some of his new oscillator/sequencer projects he documents in the book.

The Chicago Symphacking Orchestra (CSO) was also on hand to perform and a nice blend of hackers/noobs in the audience sharing ideas.  A fine atmosphere.

Thanks Nick, Good stuff in here.

freakin 8° outside.

Tonight I attended the “Video Band” Portion of the Motion Graphics Festival.  It was held at the Chicago Cultural Center and the fact that anyone showed up in this brutal cold is amazing.  It was basically a showcase of digital musicians who perform with live VJ’s.  There were several performers, but the one that stood out to me was the duo of Michael Una and Glen Stephani. It was unique to the evening because it seemed to have a truly organic feel. This feeling was carried throughout both video and music aspects of the performance.  Rather then just having a dude sitting behind his laptop launching clips there was a live spontaneous element to it.  Basically live looping of analog and circuit bent instrument paired with perfectly synced, complementing visuals. The style of music was more to my taste with it’s ambient minimal vibe.  I’ll post a short video clip soon.