Robotic Headgear

It must have been 1995. I was playing in my first real band - “Krusters Kronomid”. I was in my one bedroom appartment in Bellingham getting ready for a show at the Viking Union, when Chris Walla showed up. He seemed concerned that maybe I had been in an accident.

At that time, I was having a lot of fun connecting electronic sounds into my guitar. Rafe Wadleigh (the guitarist/bassist) for Krusters had taken some headgear out of a construction helmet. I wired up a strange voice changing toy and connected it to the headgear.

Chris snapped this picture of me as I was testing it out.

Later that night, I tested it out on stage. The following is a worn-out tape recording of that test.

Rafe starts out playing a bass line causing the robo-headgear to go haywire. Then Jason McGerr (the drummer) comes in with the drums … and Mike Seilo (the singer) just looks on in disbelief.

The robot voice blares out - seemingly with a mind of its own. I was suppose to be in control of it. It had other ideas.

I yell “Wait … wait … quiet down … wait … it’s picking up too much stage noise.”

My favorite part is when Mike says “Let’s cut the side show and play a tune!”

WATCH YOUR EARS AND SPEAKERS! VERY HARSH SOUNDS!

It ended up sounding like a naughty robot throwing a tantrum. It broke the moment I took it off and I never bothered to fix it.