The venerable Commodore 64 is well known among the electronic music community as a synthesizer modder’s dream machine thanks to its robust SID audio chipset. But most of the mods I’ve seen end up looking just like an old C64 and all the cool stuff is going on under the hood…

If you thought that the 312-key Chromatone synthesizer had a few more keys than your everyday piano, just wait ’til you get a load of the Tonal Plexus and its even more plentiful keyboard design…

This unconventional design tool provides a unique way to create new typefaces. Working somewhat like an analog music synthesizer, knobs and button pushes influence the shape of your font characters…

One of the most popular computers from the 1980s, the Commodore 64, is having a minor renaissance as an electronic musical instrument. The C64’s audio chip is famous for producing an array of warm, familiar 8-bit beats and blips…

If that 312-key keyboard I told you about recently was a little too complex for you to wrap your head around, here’s another electronic musical instrument that I came across, and this one only has 114 buttons…

Everyone remembers Atari for their famous video game consoles, arcade games and even home computers. Being a child of 1970s and 80s technology, I’m surprised that I don’t ever remember seeing this oddity…

Here’s an interesting tidbit of recent history for any electronic musicians out there. A couple of years back, a strange little company called Chromatone thought it was time for an overhaul of the traditional 88 keys on pianos (or less on many synthesizers.)

The Chromatone CT-312 keyboard has literally hundreds of individual, unlabeled keys…

Electronic musician Alex Mauer composes music from the electronic beats and blips of the original sound chips found in classic video game systems.

So it’s only appropriate that he’d release an album that plays on the classic Nintendo NES gaming system. His album, entitled VEGAVOX ships on a cartridge the plugs into the console…

Without a doubt, the theramin is one of the oddest musical instruments ever invented. Usually heard cranking out spaceship sounds in 1950’s B-movies, it’s otherworldy sounds are unmistakeable and truly quirky.

So it is with much glee that I bring you the Wii-mote powered theramin, playing the inimitable Theme from Star Trek…

These miniature electronic instruments let you kick out the jams wherever you go. The BlueBox MiJam Mini series let you carry entire band in your backpack.

First up, there’s the Mini Drumpad, which features a bunch of percussion sounds as well as rhythm an tempo settings to keep the sounds on beat…

Dig that retro “Speak & Spell” sound? This sound module out of Germany produces an array of interesting eighties-esque bleeps, blips and fuzz that can incorporate little bits of speech and other sound effects…

While researching the topic of innovative musical devices, I came across the guys at Bleep Labs and their totally wacky Thingamagoop custom synthesizer series.
These portable sythesizers generate electronica using a unique control interface: as you move a colorful LED over a photosensor, the sound’s waveform changes…

Australia’s Mungo Enterprises has engineered the “Infinite Horizon“, a concept device capable of programatically generating modern dance/trance music with, literally, the push of a button. Just press the BIG RED BUTTON, and out comes a track…