Silly Scope Music

In 1989 I had a VHS camera, an old 1960’s tube Oscilloscope and a song to play through it to watch the squiggly green lines jump around. This is the result:

The title bit is at the end, and is built from the intro to “Krazy Kitty Overdrive“, a 1990 VHS video letter I made for a friend, updated to serve as the outro to this random bit of lo-rez Silly Scope Music Video. Deal with it. :D

Song Lyrics and a better MP3 of the song (not that a 4-Track cassette tape really gets all that much better)

Digging up this bit of video flotsam got me curious about the state of “Silly Scope Music” in 2018. Turns out it’s alive and well, and has gotten a bit more refined than just making green lines jump about randomly. There’s this fellow (band maybe?) called “Jerobeam Fenderson” that’s doing some very, very interesting things with the concept. Try these on for size:

Jerobeam Fenderson – Planets:

Jerobeam Fenderson – How to draw a mushroom:

Jerobeam Fenderson – Reconstruct:

Updated: April 1, 2018 — 10:53 pm

4 Comments

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  1. These are all really entertaining. I’d enjoy seeing more of your videos from back in the day!

    I guess some of what Jerobeam is doing turns sound into images, and part of it turns images into sound. I get the feeling that if I watched enough of this stuff, it would actually alter the relationship between the visual and auditory parts of my brain!

    1. Yeah, I find it rather fascinating, the relationship between sound and visual representation. The math behind it all is weirdly wonderful and thought-provoking. Just another way the universe tells us that basically *everything* is music. (if you really want your mind blown, look up “single electron theory” sometime) :D

  2. The Outer Limits. Some of the neat stuff that can be done with an oscilloscope X & Y channels. I wonder if any were done on an on Tektronix true dual beam scope?
    When I was in HS I never had the money for a real scope so I built one out of an old TV.

  3. I find any analog, pre-YouTube video fascinating.

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