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Modified Toy Orchestra

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Record label
  
Warm Circuit

Albums
  
Toygopop, Earth One

Modified Toy Orchestra Modified Toy Orchestra Town Hall Birmingham Colour Burst

Similar
  
Plone, Pram, Tunng, Justin Broadrick, Uwe Schmidt

Profiles

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Tedxaldeburgh modified toy orchestra surplus value what makes an audience tick


The Modified Toy Orchestra is an experimental music group from Birmingham, England. Brian Duffy, the main member and creator of the orchestra makes the group's instruments by circuit bending sound making devices, such as toy keyboards, and educational spelling toys.

Contents

Modified Toy Orchestra Our Daily Bread 011 Monolith Cocktail Blog

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History

Modified Toy Orchestra Modified Toy Orchestra Micronormous Town Hall 8th September

The band was founded by Brian Duffy as a one-man project. He originally began by sampling sounds from toys to use in his electronic music, but after disassembling a Texas Instruments Speak & Spell he realised he could modify them to produce new sounds, turning the toys themselves into instruments. He began looking in car boot sales and skips for more electronic toys to modify and use in performances.

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Duffy describes the intent behind his music as “an interest in the surplus value and hidden potential of seemingly redundant technology.”

Members

  • Brian Duffy
  • Darren Joyce
  • Laurence Hunt
  • Sean Tighe
  • Chris Plant
  • Graeme Rose

    • Past members

    Modified Toy Orchestra TEDxAldeburgh Modified Toy Orchestra Surplus Value What Makes

  • Mike Johnston (His last performance with Modified Toy Orchestra was on 15 October 2007 at the Birmingham Town Hall. He sang a cover version of Kraftwerk's Pocket Calculator as his last song with the band.)

    • Live

    In 2006, the Modified Toy Orchestra was expanded from a one-man project by Brian Duffy to a full six-piece band, to have more possibilities when playing live.

    New live members are: Laurence Hunt (Pram), Darren Joyce (Dreams of Tall Buildings), Mike Johnston (Plone, Mike in Mono), Michael Valentine West (Twiggy and the K-Mesons), and visual projection artist Chris Plant (Colour Burst). Together they have performed at the 2006 Sónar festival in Barcelona and Supersonic festival in the United Kingdom. Previous performances have included the Royal Institute, and supporting bands Heaven 17 and Melt Banana. Live sets have also been transmitted on Resonance FM and BBC Radio 1.

    Discography

  • Plastic Planet (LP, Warm Circuit Records, 2010)
  • Pocket Calculator / TVOD (Limited Edition 7" vinyl, Warm Circuit Records, 2006)
  • Toygopop (LP, Warm Circuit Records, 2006)
  • This is the Monkey (7" vinyl, Warm Circuit Records, 2004)

    • Songs

    Great Kings FallEarth One · 2009
    This Is the MonkeyToygopop · 2006
    It's RainingEarth One · 2009

    References

    Modified Toy Orchestra Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA