Larry Steinbachek

"We have a Yamaha RX11 drum machine but I'm a bit disappointed with that. For a start the memory is a bit limited, and because a drum machine is used like a sketchpad, it's very frustrating if you can't get enough bars into it. We use a LinnDrum with standard chips - our producer has some alternative sound chips too - and a Roland TR707 and 727 which are really good. They're amazing for the money, and we've just got an Octapad (Roland's MIDI drum pad set) which allows you to record drum patterns through MIDI onto the QX1."

"We have a Yamaha RX11 drum machine but I'm a bit disappointed with that. For a start the memory is a bit limited, and because a drum machine is used like a sketchpad, it's very frustrating if you can't get enough bars into it. We use a LinnDrum with standard chips - our producer has some alternative sound chips too - and a Roland TR707 and 727 which are really good. They're amazing for the money, and we've just got an Octapad (Roland's MIDI drum pad set) which allows you to record drum patterns through MIDI onto the QX1."

"The QX1 has been very useful because we can connect up a DX7, take turns putting down ideas, then take the results into the studio, listen to what we've got and change the structure around. On the last few songs, for instance, we've spent a day on each one working out the structure, what key is best for Jon to sing in, and refining the bits that weren't played very well before we put it onto tape."

"Usually we just use the Yamaha TX816 rack for basic writing, but I think if you did a whole track with DX sounds it would be a bit thin. So we MIDI it up to a MemoryMoog, a PPG, our producer's Emulator II, in fact, whatever's lying around, depending on the sound we're after. We MIDI together as much as we can really, and we can also tie in our analogue synths, a Sequential Pro One, an OSCar and a MiniMoog."

"Usually we just use the Yamaha TX816 rack for basic writing, but I think if you did a whole track with DX sounds it would be a bit thin. So we MIDI it up to a MemoryMoog, a PPG, our producer's Emulator II, in fact, whatever's lying around, depending on the sound we're after. We MIDI together as much as we can really, and we can also tie in our analogue synths, a Sequential Pro One, an OSCar and a MiniMoog."

"Usually we just use the Yamaha TX816 rack for basic writing, but I think if you did a whole track with DX sounds it would be a bit thin. So we MIDI it up to a MemoryMoog, a PPG, our producer's Emulator II, in fact, whatever's lying around, depending on the sound we're after. We MIDI together as much as we can really, and we can also tie in our analogue synths, a Sequential Pro One, an OSCar and a MiniMoog."

"Usually we just use the Yamaha TX816 rack for basic writing, but I think if you did a whole track with DX sounds it would be a bit thin. So we MIDI it up to a MemoryMoog, a PPG, our producer's Emulator II, in fact, whatever's lying around, depending on the sound we're after. We MIDI together as much as we can really, and we can also tie in our analogue synths, a Sequential Pro One, an OSCar and a MiniMoog."

"Usually we just use the Yamaha TX816 rack for basic writing, but I think if you did a whole track with DX sounds it would be a bit thin. So we MIDI it up to a MemoryMoog, a PPG, our producer's Emulator II, in fact, whatever's lying around, depending on the sound we're after. We MIDI together as much as we can really, and we can also tie in our analogue synths, a Sequential Pro One, an OSCar and a MiniMoog."

"I've always been interested in electronic instruments. The first synth I got was a Wasp, and I've always liked experimenting with tapes and multitracking, so for me the direction of our recording has always been electronic multitracking rather than guitar-based things."

In the second photo, he is holding a Casio CZ-101.

"We use our producer's Emulator II for long vocal samples and flying in choruses, although on Perfect Beat we felt that the quality wasn't quite good enough so we sampled some chorus and repeat vocals into an MDB Window Recorder and a Publison. Then we triggered them off the QX1, so you get some really neat triple repeats and things."

"The Yamaha QX1 and the TX816 live right by the mixing desk because they're the brains that everything else triggers off. The MemoryMoog and DX7 are the most used instruments for immediate sounds when working out an idea, particularly for Steve Bronski who likes to get to a sound quickly. I tend to have the analogue synths like the Pro One and the OSCar together, and the drum machines are littered about wherever we're working."

"We have a Yamaha RX11 drum machine but I'm a bit disappointed with that. For a start the memory is a bit limited, and because a drum machine is used like a sketchpad, it's very frustrating if you can't get enough bars into it. We use a LinnDrum with standard chips - our producer has some alternative sound chips too - and a Roland TR707 and 727 which are really good. They're amazing for the money, and we've just got an Octapad (Roland's MIDI drum pad set) which allows you to record drum patterns through MIDI onto the QX1."

"We have a Yamaha RX11 drum machine but I'm a bit disappointed with that. For a start the memory is a bit limited, and because a drum machine is used like a sketchpad, it's very frustrating if you can't get enough bars into it. We use a LinnDrum with standard chips - our producer has some alternative sound chips too - and a Roland TR707 and 727 which are really good. They're amazing for the money, and we've just got an Octapad (Roland's MIDI drum pad set) which allows you to record drum patterns through MIDI onto the QX1."

"We have a Yamaha RX11 drum machine but I'm a bit disappointed with that. For a start the memory is a bit limited, and because a drum machine is used like a sketchpad, it's very frustrating if you can't get enough bars into it. We use a LinnDrum with standard chips - our producer has some alternative sound chips too - and a Roland TR707 and 727 which are really good. They're amazing for the money, and we've just got an Octapad (Roland's MIDI drum pad set) which allows you to record drum patterns through MIDI onto the QX1."

"The all-important Drawmer gates and compressor-limiters, which we use for sequencing sounds by keying the gate from a 16th beat tape pulse. They're not really used for keeping the synths quiet - we don't find the DX7s excessively noisy, and the Dolby C noise reduction keeps the Fostex B16 very quiet. Most of the DX parts end up on the TX816 rack anyway, and that's even quieter, probably because the power supply is more stable."

"We both have remote keyboards, a Yamaha KX5 and a Roland Axis, but I just feel a bit of a twit using them. I find the keys on the KX5 are too small, although Steve likes it, and the Axis is very good from the MIDI point of view with a lot of programmable functions, but I'm not sure that it looks good on stage because it's so big."

"Well, we had started out trying to do a cover of Pretty Vacant, so you could say that, yes... (laughs). We'd put a simple octaving sequence into an MC202, but then slowed it down a bit... the melody began to change slightly... and it turned into Small Town Boy! All our cover versions come out like that..."

"The Synclavier is owned by our producer, Mike Thorne, who's been using it since it was a university research machine, so he's very familiar with it. We used it for some straightforward samples — we spent one great afternoon smashing milk bottles — but I think the most interesting use we put it to was as a storage and retrieval device for arrangement purposes. We used it to move whole choruses around in a song, do harmonies to Jimi's voice, stuff like that. The 12-inch of Why has a lot of that on. That use of this kind of technology is much more advanced in America than it is here."

"Live, we've been using the Roland SDE-3000 delay... you can program it at home, then take it out on the road, and have a different setting for every song without having to explain it to some engineer you've never seen before — just set it up, and away you go. Great!"

In this interview he talks about using the Sony PCM-F1.

"We both have remote keyboards, a Yamaha KX5 and a Roland Axis, but I just feel a bit of a twit using them. I find the keys on the KX5 are too small, although Steve likes it, and the Axis is very good from the MIDI point of view with a lot of programmable functions, but I'm not sure that it looks good on stage because it's so big."

"I've used the Axis on TV shows to jump around with, but I'm not sure whether I'll get into it live yet. It's a bit gimmicky because you're so used to playing an upright keyboard, and I think guitar synthesizers will make the crossover between string and keyboard instruments much more effectively. You don't feel so bad if you have something to strum, and although we haven't got around to using a guitar synth yet, I know Steve's very interested."