Zoë Blade's notebook

Devil Fish

In the context of synthesisers, the Devil Fish is a popular series of modifications to the TB-303, provided by Real World Interfaces (Robin Whittle).

It extends the ranges of some of the knobs, adds new functionality such as filter FM, and adds more inputs and outputs, including MIDI.

I especially like the filter tracking. With more sensible synthesisers, routing an attenuated copy of the pitch's CV to the filter can add realism to a patch. In the TB-303's case, it instead adds some extra flavour to its stylised sounds.

The extensions can all be set to match an unmodded TB-303, so as with any good mod, the Devil Fish offers a superset of the original sounds and interfacing. In other words, it doesn't remove anything, it only adds to its abilities.

Much like an unmodded TB-303, it can still only do one thing well, namely playing acidlines. But those acidlines just got a lot more versatile.

Quotes

I've got a new 303 now called Devil Fish. There's only 13 or 14 of them around at the moment. It came from a guy from Melbourne named Robin Whittle. The input in the back is now a frequency input, CV and gate inputs, and you can change your slide time by about four times the length. It's got an attack, distortion overload, extended range filter. It's like a modified 303 still in the same box. On the new album, there's some times when it doesn't sound like a 303, more like a Moog or an Oberheim or something. There's one on there which sounds like a didgeridoo!

Richie Hawtin, 1994[1]

Notable users

References

  1. "Kracked Plastik" Roger Brown, The Mix, Dec 1994, pp. 110—114
  2. "Emotional Impact" Richard Buskin, Sound On Sound, Dec 2001

Downloads

Documentation

Modifications: Devil Fish