Liam Lacey

Liam Lacey BSc (Hons), 33, Bristol, UK. Currently: Head of Development at Modal Electronics, Freelance maker and creative technologist, Electronica artist as Fatework. Previously: Lead Software Developer at nu desine, Associate Lecturer at The University of the West of England, Bristol, Author at AskAudio Magazine. I'm a music and sound coder, hacker, maker, artist, designer, academic, educator, writer and enthusiast, with a keen interest in interaction design too. Creator of the Vintage Toy Synthesiser. Areas of interest and study include: - C/C++ software development - New interfaces for musical expression - Audio DSP - Music composition, production, and performance - Audio plugin programming - Augmented instruments - Interactive music and media systems - Audio synthesis and sound design - The Teensy/Arduino platform - Algorithmic composition and generative music - Physical computing - New media art - Conceptual music - Max/MSP - New advances in creative technology Click on the links at the top of the page to see more of my work and activities. Contact me at [email protected].

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I’ve recently put out a new Fatework track, leaning more towards the ambient side rather than IDM. Enjoy!

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Modal Electronics are delighted to announce that the CRAFTsynth 2.0 evolution has gone live on Kickstarter! Grab one of the early bird offers at https://www.kickstarter.com/proj…/skulpt/modal-craftsynth-20

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We at Modal Electronics took a CRAFTsynth 2.0 over to Sonic State for Nick Batt to take an early look under the hood at our latest portable synthesiser.

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Modal Electronics are proud to announce the next generation of the successful CRAFTsynth – their Modal CRAFTsynth 2.0 - coming soon on Kickstarter.

A true evolution of the species, Modal CRAFTsynth 2.0 draws on the raw synthesis power of the original CRAFTsynth but adds a huge range of new features and again raises the benchmark on what a compact, portable battery powered synthesiser can do.

See more at http://www.modalelectronics.com/craft/

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Nick Batt from Sonic State took an in depth look at the newest Modal Electronics product - SKULPTsynthesiser - and really enjoyed it. “I’m quite impressed with this! It’s a bit of a hit…” - take a look and see why….

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This is a quick run down of the Modal Electronics SKULPTsynthesiser by musician Matthew Hodson. Here he gives an overview and a run down of the main features while trying out some of the built in presets. 

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Throughout September I undertook possibly my most ambitious DIY MIDI controller project to date, which I'm really happy to say has been awarded one of the top 20 projects in the 2018 Hackaday Prize Musical Instrument Challenge. In a nutshell, the project is a dedicated hardware MIDI controller for controlling the Turnado audio FX software plugin - you can find out more about the project on the Hackaday project page.

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Here's Modal Electronics team member Luke talking with Nick Batt from Sonicstate at SynthFest UK 2018 about SKULPTsynthesiser and it’s new polychaining feature.

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Earlier this month the Modal Electronics SKULPTsynthesiser Kickstarter campaign came to a very successful end, reaching a final funding amount of £148,683 (297% of the funding goal), which was enough for us to unlock the final stretch goal of the black version of the synth. However in case you missed the Kickstarter campaign, we have now opened up pre-orders for SKULPT on Indiegogo InDemand, which has already raised another $7k in funding. 

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Over the past couple of weeks we at Modal Electronics have released a set of 9 sound demo videos of SKULPT synthesiser, showing the kind of sonic variety that can produced with it. Here is a video of all 9 sound demos. The SKULPT Kickstarter campaign only has 4 days to go, with over 260% funded with less than 40% until we unlock the second stretch goal of the black SKULPT.

[liamtmlacey]

I’m so happy to say that the Modal Electronics SKULPT synthesiser Kickstarter campaign is now 200% funded in only 7 days! Not only does this mean we’ve smashed the first stretch goal of including a protective lid/base with every SKULPT, but it also means we can announce the next stretch goal - a mean-looking black version of SKULPT.

[liamtmlacey]

I’m so happy to say that the Modal Electronics SKULPT synthesiser Kickstarter campaign is now live. Incredibly it was fully funded in only 4 and a half hours, and at time of writing it is now at 170% funded with only 30% left until we reach the first stretch goal - a protective cover that doubles as a base. I really can’t wait to see this synth out in the world.

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We at Modal Electronics are proud to announce the latest in its line of innovative Machines For Musicians - the Modal SKULPT synthesiser.

Packing a huge range of synthesis power in a highly portable package, Modal SKULPT is ready to help you take your creativity to the next level wherever and whenever you want.

Modal SKULPT will shortly be available to order on Kickstarter, starting Friday 13th July 2018. For more details, consult www.modalelectronics.com/skulpt.

The full spec is as follows:

4 voice – 32 oscillator virtual analogue synthesiser

8 oscillators per voice with 2 selectable morphable waveforms

Mixer stage for osc levels along with FM, PWM, tuning and Ring Modulation options

Monophonic, Duophonic and Polyphonic modes available

Multi option Unison / spread to detune the 32 oscillators for a huge sound

8 slot modulation matrix with 8 sources and 37 destinations

3 x envelope generators for Filter, Amplitude and Modulation

2 x audio rate LFOs, one global and one polyphonic

Realtime sequencer that will record up to 128 notes and up to 4 parameters.

Fully featured arpeggiator with division, direction, octave, swing and sustain controls.

Resonant filter that can be morphed from low pass, through band pass, to high pass

Delay and distortion (wavehsaping overdrive, not bitcrushing) effects

Optional MIDI clock sync for LFOs and Delay

128 patch and 64 sequence storage locations

16 key touch MIDI keyboard

MIDI DIN In and Out – Analogue clock sync In and Out connections

Class compliant MIDI provided over USB connection to host computer or tablet

Headphone and line output

Power by USB or 6 x AA batteries

Optional software editor available for MacOS, Windows, IOS and Android

Portable and compact design

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I recently wrote an article for Ask.Audio about the different ways you can get into music tech DIY and hacking - everything from graphical programming, creative coding platforms, beginner friendly microcontrollers, DIY audio hardware platforms, hackable musical devices, and music hack events. Read the article here.

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With the availability of the Modal Electronics CRAFTrhythm drum sampler also comes an update to the optional CRAFTapp application to support integration with CRAFTrhythm. See the above video for a quick example of how you can use CRAFTrhythm, CRAFTsynth, and CRAFTapp in conjunction with Ableton Live to building a track.

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Happy to announce that the Modal Electronics CRAFTrhythm drum sampler is now available in Europe at Gear4Music, with rest of the World availability coming very soon!

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One of my favourite new MIDI controllers released over the last couple of years is the ROLI Lightpad BLOCK, partly because it is so easily hackable. Therefore for my latest AskAudio tutorial I’ve written about how you can hack and develop software for the Lightpad, developing an 8-step MIDI sequencer app as an example. Check out the tutorial here.