Edition 10: Screamo

Designed by Alwin Weber

I met Alwin Weber in 2011 a few weeks before the first D.I.Y. Solderfestival in Dresden, which Alwin had set up with Claudio Matina and Matthias Schmidt. We immediately had a good relationship with each other and shortly afterwards I showed up with seven students of the Art University Linz in the Ostpol where the soldering week took place. Since then, I have driven to Dresden almost every year and from time to time Alwin has also stopped by in Linz, Austria. Of course, always with his soldering iron in his luggage.

1* What was your intention with the distortion Screamo?
 
The idea was to build a self-oscillating distortion that, like the Circuit Bending, has a lot of idiosyncrasies and can produce corresponding unusual sounds. Quasi a synth / -------- distortion to build, which can be used as a "remix tool", Schlager music in, Gabber out.
 
2* What magic trick did you use that made Screamo sound so crazy?
 
There are 2 oscillators which are mixed to the audio signal, a feedback of the audio signal in itself and once it is coupled back into an inverter input. This results in addition to the fat distortion and any amount of natural resonances of the circuit, which mix depending on the setting with the incoming signal or link via gate. The instability of this circuit creates a lot of noise, which can be very useful depending on the taste of the artist.
 
3* What's the use of Screamo in your set?
 
In most cases, I use the Screamo for the beats, or the bass drum. You can send for example a bassy kick drum through the Screamo and work with different feedback signals and create a variety of modulations. To use the bandwidth better, I recommend Screamo on the auxiliary out of the mixing desk, because then you can distort all sorts of signals such as guitar, synths or tuner proportionally, which then leads to interesting cross modulations.
But also for remixing "boring" music Screamo is very well suited.

4 * You are one of the organizers of Circuit Control. Would you like to introduce this soldering festival?
 
Circuit Control is a festival for the creative use of the soldering iron and takes place annually since 2012 in Dresden. The one-week event brings musicians, artists, programmers, and engineers together to create collaborative projects.
The focus is on music electronics and art related projects, but also conventional projects are allowed. At the end of the week there will be a final concert with the participants and international guest musicians. The participants come together from all over Europe.

Links:
Circuit Circle: http://www.circuitcircle.de
Circuit Control Festival: https://www.circuit-control.de/
Screamo demonstration video: https://youtu.be/vLrttixyiNg
SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/st-renfried
Circuit Control 2018 at Electronic Cottage:
​https://www.electroniccottage.org/wolfgang-dorninger/edition-4-circuit-control-2018

Alwin Weber
CircuitCircle aka. SchrägeRunde
The SchrägeRunde is a workshop project, which has dealt since 2009 with "Circuit Bending" and "D.I.Y.-Electronic" (Do It Yourself). So on the one hand the modification of electronic children's toys, on the other hand the construction of electronic circuits with the simplest means. In these practice-oriented workshops, the participants are introduced to electronics playfully and learn the art of "creative short circuit".

Some noise bombs by Alwin for SchrägeRunde: