A Thunder Drum is made with a spring attached to the skin, so when it is shaken the spring moves and creates a continuous resonance through the body of the instrument. This results in a sound very much like thunder. The drums come in various shapes and sizes, and are sometimes known by other names such as Thunder Tube, Spring Drum, or, Thunder Maker.

The Philicorda is a 1960s transistor based organ that has found favour with producers in recent times ; one was used on the album ’19’ by Adele by producer Jim Abiss. This particular Philicorda belongs to producer Liam Howe, and has been used on records by Marina and the Diamonds, Ellie Goulding, and Cocknbullkid.

“Log Drums” or “Slit Drums” are hollow percussion instruments found in many aboriginal cultures around the world, particularly Africa and Southeast Asia. Typically made from wood, the instrument consists of a box or log with slits or tongues carved into it to produce notes when struck. Despite the name, the instrument is in fact an ideophone or “lamellaphone”, since the body of the instrument itself vibrates when struck.

Samulnori is a type of Korean percussion music that has been gaining popularity over the last few decades, both in Korea and abroad. The term “samulnori” ( ????) can be broken into two parts - “samul” meaning “four things”, and “nori” meaning “to play”.

We found our Thunder Drum on an obscure island somewhere in Indonesia, but they are available in many countries around the world. A Thunder Drum is made with a spring attached to the skin, so when it is shaken the spring moves and creates a continuous resonance through the body of the instrument. This results in a sound very much like thunder. The drums come in various shapes and sizes, and are sometimes known by other names such as Thunder Tube, Spring Drum, or, Thunder Maker.

Why did we sample a Broken Wurlitzer 200A electric piano? We were asking around producers we know, to see if anyone had any junky, but cool sounding old keyboards ; Neil Davidge, producer for Massive Attack, said “..erm, I have an old Wurlizer piano with a dodgy distorting speaker that sounds great”. So, we borrowed it, and he was right, it did sound really great.

The 'Crowd-choir' was an idea for a crowd-sourced sampled instrument, partly inspired by the 10cc track 'I'm not in love', which famously featured a vocal pad sound created by painstakingly over-dubbing a single vocal note over and over again.

The instruments of the great composers are museum pieces now ; hundreds of years old and not in playable condition.

Perhaps one of the most enigmatic musical instruments of all time, The Ondes Martenot ( literally ‘Martenot Waves’) was invented by Maurice Martenot in 1928. The original unreliable tube-based design was refined and later models remained in production until 1988.

The ebow ( Energy bow), is a small, hand held device that 'bows' the strings of a guitar using an electromagnetic field. It produces a unique guitar sound, with a very slow attack and infinite sustain. To play the ebow, the guitarist holds it over the string, near the pickup or hole, so that the string sits in a small notch on the underside of the eBow. The eBow's magnets then cause the string to vibrate until it feeds back on itself at its own resonant frequency. This feedback loop is very similar to the well-known amplifier feedback, but a much more controllable version. The player can vary the loudness of the sound by moving closer or further away from the string, as with amplifier feedback. The ebow is switchable from low power mode to high power mode, which gives a strong, harmonically rich sound. The ebow has been used at one time or another by nearly every guitarist under the sun : Radiohead, Tom Petty, Dave Gilmour, Sigur Ros, NIN, Coldplay, Smashing Pumpkins, The Cure, REM, U2, etc etc...

The E.M.S. Synthi AKS is a legendary instrument with an illustrious history. First manufactured in 1972 by E.M.S in Putney, South-West London, The Synthi A was basically a portable version of EMS's famous VCS3 synthesiser, and the KS Keyboard (a playable 30-note touchplate) was added to make the Synthi AKS. It cost 420lb. It was quickly adopted by the likes of Brian Eno and Pink Floyd, and has been used by experimental musicians ever since. The Synthi has a unique patching system that uses a small patchbay grid. Each of the Synthi's components appear as a source and destination on the patchbay, and by placing a pin into that x-y position, you can route the signal from one component to the other. This was a very effective way to make a powerful modular system very compact.

Variable Ambience Drums is a set of acoustic drum kits specifically programmed for Native Instruments’ Battery 2 and Kontakt 2. Utilising over 1300 24-bit samples, 7 velocity layers and up to 5 positions on the snares.

We don’t know much about this particular instrument’s history - a friend of Soniccouture, Tom Heywood ( Discography ), who runs Normal Bias studios in Berlin, found it in one of the city’s many flea markets. It was sold to him by a vendor who specialises in DDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik) era collectibles. It is a child’s toy piano, made of plastic.

LUTHIER DE L'ELECTRONIQUE
Perhaps one of the most enigmatic musical instruments of all time, The Ondes Martenot ( literally ‘Martenot Waves’) was invented by Maurice Martenot in 1928. The original unreliable tube-based design was refined and later models remained in production until 1988.