Making music with vintage equipment is a glorious exploration of the past which can often come with a high price tag. Luckily, we have independent makers to rekindle the flames of forgotten gems, like the drumBs PCB’s & panel, an analogue percussion module originally available in the April 1983 edition of Electronics & Music Maker magazine.
The drumBs is an analogue percussion synthesizer with a VCO to generate a tone, a white noise source for some texture, a resonant filter to … well, resonate… and an auto roll function for retriggers. The module has controls for decay, pitch bend, pitch, mix, pulse, roll, cutoff, and resonance to sculpt the sound from sharp sparking snares to blippy percussive punches!
The module comes as a set with both the main PCB and a front panel which are available in a range of colours – requiring an external +5V pulse or gate signal to trigger the sound. A schematic has been made available as well as the build guide which has the full bill of materials to complete the unit.
The drumBs is sold by Circuitbenders who are based on the south coast of England – we interviewed them for the Tindie Blog if you’d like to know more about their work!
Check out the videos below to hear the module in action:
