the defunct tech orchestras assembled by youtube user bd594 play rock classics

old-school computer equipment bands together to perform the rock classics of ‘the house of the rising sun’ by the animals and ‘bohemian rhapsody’ by queen in the performative videos created by canadian youtube user bd594.

‘the house of the rising sun’, bd594’s most recent composition, features as its lead singer an HP scanjet 3P powered by ubuntu v.9.10 operating system with adaptec SCSI card. an atari 800XL with an eico oscilloscope serves as the organ, with a texas instrument early home computer and tektronix oscilloscope on guitar. a hard drive powered by a microcontroller functions as bass drum and cymbal. each ‘instrument’ was recorded separately with a stereo mic and then mixed, with no sampling or post-production audio effects.

featuring some of the same members, the defunct tech band that bd594 assembled for ‘bohemian rhapsody’ cost about 93 dollars, a mix primarily of found objects and ebay and craigslist bargains.

‘house of the rising sun’ by the animals

queen’s ‘bohemian rhapsody’

computer orchestra covers house of the rising sun the ‘house of the rising sun’ orchestra

computer orchestra covers house of the rising sun tektronix oscilloscope, which combined with a TI calculator performs the guitar part of ‘the house of the rising sun’

via cnet