In 2010 Modified Toy Orchestra release there 2nd album “Plastic Planet” 5 years in the making Plastic Planet continues the philosophy began with there debut album “Toygopop” of performing everything live with a collection of repurposed children’s toys.., converting abandoned playthings into exotic new musical instruments, and then exploring the latent potential and surplus value inherent in these liberated circuits. Guided by this hidden world they seek to make a form of music devoid of personal narrative or autobiography, instead they ask bigger questions about our relationship with “the next new gadget” the desire for the constant upgrade, and the possibilities for problem solutions hidden from our gaze by perceptual habit.
1 Black star
2 Electric rapture because of you
3 Qwerty
4 Funfair for the common man
5 Freeno & Olaf
6 Great kings fall
7 Earth one
8 It's raining
9 Up above the world so high
10 Planet of rock
TOYGOPOP
It's rare to hear an electronic album that has no midi, no sampling, no synthesisers, no laptops, in fact no conventional instruments of any kind, yet Toygopop is just that.
Toygopop was been five years in the making - two years building the toy instruments and learning to play them and three years discovering and collaging combinations of sounds and musical phrases (Brain Duffy creator of the Modified Toy Orchestra calls this process "collaborating with the third mind of the machine") to create a strange yet accessible album that is unlike anything you are likely to hear - sometimes funny, sometimes moving, sometimes dark and disturbing.
1 A grand occasion
2 Had a farm
3 Fantastic little blue world
4 Monkey hands
5 Clanger Tibet
6 Caramel accident
7 Where is my sock?
8 This is the monkey
9 I am hula Barbie, hear me roar!
10 Sometimes you dont
11 Purple friend
12 A lovely parade
Warmcircuit Records
///////////////////////////
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
POCKET CALCULATOR (7")
A split release with ZX Spectrum Orchestra. Pocket Calculator is a cover of Kraftwerk.
///////////////////////////
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
THIS IS THE MONKEY (7")
This Is The Monkey is the first single from “TOYGO POP” and is a major change in direction from the more abstract “Toy.Riff.I.C” recorded for Static Caravan.
It's difficult to imagine such a wealth of strange sounds coming from just modified electronic toys. Yet this ode to the primate in all of us is played entirely on a range of toys that have been scavenged from car boot sales and then circuit bent into new and strange instruments by toy conductor Brian Duffy. Its rare to hear an electronic record that has no traditional instruments, no sampler and no midi. The result is impossible to categorise. File under fun, funky and Frightening.
///////////////////////////
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
NEW SOUNDS FROM OLD CIRCUITS (7")
Vinyl released on Static Caravan.
1 - Toy.Riff.i.c
2 - Synthesizer Youth Day
3 - Xylo