The Royal College of Art in London recently hosted its annual graduate summer show, where postgrad students exhibit some of their artistic and musical projects. Among those featured this year were several vinyl record and turntable mods by [Yuri Suzuki].

One of his projects is called the Finger Player: it is a record player needle worn on the finger somewhat like a thimble, making the act of playing records into a tactile experience.

Another project is the Prepared Turntable, which is a player with five tone arms that have independent faders and volume controls. We feel this project has a great deal of potential in genuine music production, not just as a novelty.

[Suzuki]’s most compelling work is completely off the turntable. Dubbed the Sound Chaser, it is some thing like a toy train running on a small track, except this train has a record needle and the tracks are made from records that have been cut into train track-like segments. The sounds played by the Sound Chaser can be modified by swapping segments of the vinyl track out, mixing and matching for an endless variety of possible songs. We’ll be keeping our eye on [Suzuki]; his ideas seem so basic yet so fresh. If you’ll be in London before July 5, be sure to check out his work at the RCA.

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