I admit it. I'm a complete technophile, and get all excited when I buy myself a new gadget. In this case, I recently imported a Rocktron Banshee talkbox from Thomann.de, and I've spent over a week learning how to use it properly.

If you don't know, a talkbox is a musical effect close to that of a vocoder. It takes the sound from an instrument, such as guitar/keyboard, and then sends the sound down a tube. You hold the opposite end of the tube in between your molars (I'm expecting jokes because of this), and shape your mouth which modifies the sound and makes it sound like the instrument is talking. It is THE effect used by Daft Punk in Harder Better Faster Stronger, Around the World, and most of their album Human After All. It's also used by Bon Jovi and Peter Frampton to throw in some other names.

Now, I can not tell you how odd it is to be using this effect. It's like the suction tube you get when you're getting fillings from your dentist, except it doesn't remove you saliva. Unfortunately, saliva ducts are right next to my molars, and so there's the tendency to drool like a bulldog. Next, there's the challenge of learning to shape your mouth properly to get the instrument to talk. H and S sounds are particularly hard as the whole point is not to produce sound from your voicebox when using it, and these sounds require it.

But due to the nature of the talkbox, it also doubles as a wah pedal and a phaser, except with much more control. So it's effectively a three-in-one product, and can be used for hours of fun. Unfortunately, it's picky with what sounds it wants to use from my synth. I need a Saw/Sine wave in order to make it understandable.

Currently, I'm using it to learn how to play HBFS, so once that's done, I might upload to Youtube or even here on NG. I'm also planning on buying a Digitech synth wah pedal soon, so if I do, you'll be reading all about it shortly.

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