Turn your Printer into a Synth

You've probably heard of circuit bending, when people shortcircuit audio novalties like speak n spells to get glitch fx. Well this guys on the next level.

listen to this if youre a non-believer

The first iteration of the printer synth included two ways to generate sound: It could play simple sequenced patterns by firing the print head, and also had the tape/walkman mellotron.

The printer mellotron runs off cassette tape. I recorded different notes from a synthesizer onto cassette tape on all four tracks (by recording the tones on both sides of the tape.) Afterwards, I pulled the tape out of the cassette and glued it to the paper roller on the printer, then wrote code for the printer to turn the paper roller at a constant speed.

To "read" the tape on the roller, I use a modified walkman. I removed the play head from the walkman and remounted it on the outside, so pressing the head against the tape on the roller allows you to hear the tones. Placing the head against different pieces of tape allows you to selectively play different notes. This setup introduces a lot of random variance that affects the pitch, tone, and stereo image of the playback, making the sound very complex and interesting.

If you can brave his choice of background read the full article here