Drum Machine Pants

The sound of people doing drum rolls on their knees all of a sudden got even more annoying. Tyler Freeman, aka odbol, is the creator of DrumPants – a pair of pants that enable the wearer to produce drum sounds by hitting various parts of the pants with his hands.

In order to make a pair of DrumPants, you need:

• A MIDI Trigger Converter, such as the Roland TMC-6, to convert audio to MIDI
• A General MIDI instrument and amplifier and speakers (I gutted my cheap Yamaha PSR-200 keyboard).
• Piezo transducers as contact mic triggers, wired to 1/4 plugs for the Roland.
• Pants (I used some HUGE Dickies shorts to facilitate easy-access drumming.)

Here are two more demonstration videos of the DrumPants:

Tyler Freeman demos his interactive DrumPants at Maker Faire 2007.

A performance with the DrumPants combined with a LoopStation, for the Two Heads Are Better Than One competition. All of this was played live, showing how the DrumPants can be used to make a beat, but also used for melodic elements to create a complete piece of music.

More information about the DrumPants on odbol’s webiste.

(Fresh Creation via GadgetVenue)