Guitar designer and builder Jimmy DiResta has turned an AK-47 assault rifle into a completely functional guitar for rapper Wyclef Jean.
(via AK-47 Assault Rifle Turned Into a Functional Golden Guitar)
![We’ve covered lots of repurposing and reuse projects involving speakers, but agree that “Hamburg’s Soundpauli company has [its] own quirky aesthetic.”
More here: More Repurposed Speakers: Soundpauli - Core77](http://24.media.tumblr.com/ca3fee11debb570a129a7aca0239f772/tumblr_mm701v4jnA1qzv12bo1_400.jpg)
We’ve covered lots of repurposing and reuse projects involving speakers, but agree that “Hamburg’s Soundpauli company has [its] own quirky aesthetic.”
Due to our rapid advancement, seemingly new equipment, like fax machines, printers, an Apple IIe, [have been] rendered irrelevant, only a couple of years after their initial release.
Brother, the company responsible for some of this “innovation,” has found a creative use for this tech detritus by putting some of their old printers to work in “The Printer Orchestra” a cool video that shows old equipment performing Dylan’s classic anthem. Now, here’s hoping they disposed of the equipment responsibly after the “orchestra” performed.
Bob Dylan’s ‘The Times They Are a-Changing’ Performed by Old Computers | Technology on GOOD
Pity the poor cassette tape, once the supreme format for listening to music, and now it’s relegated to a nostalgic curiosity. But all is not lost because it seems to have found a second life as an artistic material. Previously, we’ve seen it used to recreate classic album covers, and now graphic designer Benoit Jammes has used some old tapes he found lying around to make colorful artworks, some of which are based on film posters.
Jammes distills the poster or image into its elemental basics so the pictures become minimalist representations, full of bold colors and simple shapes for maximum visual impact. So if if you find some old tapes lying around in your parent’s basement gathering dust and looking forlorn, you now know what to do with them.
(via Cassette Tapes Get New Lease Of Life As Colorful Artworks | The Creators Project)
The image above, I eventually figured out, references Kill Bill advertising. Maybe you knew that?
![It isn’t often that the worlds of recycling and techno music come together.
But thanks to Heavenly Recordings, the European Recycling Platform and Radio 1 DJ Benji B, they have.
Make Noise is a top techno club night and it’s being held around the [U.K.] as part of the Electronic Recycling Tour.
And what’s more, it’s free to enter. Instead of cash, you just need to hand over a knackered electronic item. It can be anything from an old phone to a broken radio to a dead battery.
…
The next Make Noise is in … Glasgow on November 22nd, ending with a huge night in London on the 27th. For all the details, click here.
(via Do The Green Thing: Make noise for e-waste recycling)](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdqko0BAgy1qzv12bo1_400.jpg)
It isn’t often that the worlds of recycling and techno music come together.
But thanks to Heavenly Recordings, the European Recycling Platform and Radio 1 DJ Benji B, they have.
Make Noise is a top techno club night and it’s being held around the [U.K.] as part of the Electronic Recycling Tour.
And what’s more, it’s free to enter. Instead of cash, you just need to hand over a knackered electronic item. It can be anything from an old phone to a broken radio to a dead battery.
…
The next Make Noise is in … Glasgow on November 22nd, ending with a huge night in London on the 27th. For all the details, click here.
Artist Pedro Reyes, who turned 1,527 weapons into 1,527 shovels to plant 1,527 trees — a project covered on Unconsumption here in 2010 — continues to convert Mexican drug-war weapons into art:
As part of his latest project Imagine, Mexico City based artist Pedro Reyes acquired some 6,700 weapons that were scheduled to be buried (as is customary in mass weapon disposals) and instead collaborated with six musicians to create 50 working instruments as part of a statement regarding increased gun violence in Mexico. The numerous firearms were cut down, welded and formed into a variety of string, wind, and percussion instruments over a period of two weeks … .
(spotted on Colossal here)
More on Reyes’ blog here.
Handmade one-of-a-kind bracelets crafted from used guitar strings and sterling silver. Eco friendly, fashion forward and rocktastic!
(via Wear Your Music - Rock Recycled Strings)
Thx: Marc!
“Tom Kipgen makes radios using vintage parts and hand-wound coils. Absolutely stunning stuff.”
Happy Halloween and Day of the Dead!
Pictured: “Dead Media,” an installation that repurposes 497 VHS tapes. Created by friend of Unconsumption Noah Scalin (mentioned previously several times here), of the Skull-A-Day project. (photo via SkullADay here)
See also: Other videotape-related repurposing examples in earlier posts here.
Beyond the viral-ready novelty, listen to the serenades of defunct hard drives, flatbed scanners, and garage sale-rescue computers and you might just hear a sense of urgency. As the discs whir, the chips bleet, and the solenoids ping percussion, this chorus of obsolete electronics seems to plea, save us from landfill doom.
The latest breakout hit from repurposed retro machines is Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used to Know.” Here, it’s covered by a set of glockenspiel-playing solenoids and an HP ScanJet as the angst-ridden whine of the now-infamous vocals. An Amiga rounds out the band. Even the robotics can be counted as chip music, of sorts – a PIC16F84A (a simple microprocessor) acts as the brains. (Kids, ask your parents. Before Arduino, there was PIC programming.)
(via Gotye to Queen to Radiohead, The Songs of Hard Drives, Robotics, and Retro Gear)
The Bonds Made From One Thousand Tones is a music project that will have 1,000 musicians play on one of two violins made from driftwood resulting from the Japanese tsunami.
Numerous musicians from around the world have applied for the opportunity to play the instruments, which were crafted by Muneyuki Nakazawa, a well-known Japanese violin craftsman and restorer.
Amidst an onslaught of disposable, impossible-to-repair electronics and waste, the best weapon to fight back can be know-how.
That’s the message in a beautiful short film that paints a portrait of sound artist and designer Yuri Suzuki, a resident of London’s Design Museum. (Via our friends at Engadget DE)
In this case, Yuri navigates the maze of an electronics PCB quite literally, mapping out a functioning radio on the schematic of the London Underground. But he also speaks poetically about why understanding the inner function of electronics is so important.
(Source: createdigitalmusic.com)
