{"id":3278,"date":"2026-07-25T19:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.actutech.app\/synth-historian-oli-freke-will-spend-big-on-a-good-bicycle\/"},"modified":"2026-07-25T19:15:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:15:00","slug":"synth-historian-oli-freke-will-spend-big-on-a-good-bicycle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/synth-historian-oli-freke-will-spend-big-on-a-good-bicycle\/","title":{"rendered":"Synth historian Oli Freke will spend big on a good bicycle"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" data-caption=\"\" data-portal-copyright=\"\" data-has-syndication-rights=\"1\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.theverge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/07\/Oli-Freke-photo.jpeg?quality=90&amp;strip=all&amp;crop=0,0,100,100\" \/><figcaption>\n\t\t<\/figcaption><\/p><\/figure>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Oli Freke is a musician and journalist whose works have appeared in <em>Sound on Sound<\/em>, <em>The Quietus<\/em>, and <em>Mixmag<\/em>. This has included using math to explore the <a href=\"https:\/\/plus.maths.org\/how-many-melodies-are-there\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">melodic potential<\/a> of the Western 12-tone scale and deep dives on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.soundonsound.com\/techniques\/ableton-live-12-granulator-iii\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">effects plug-ins<\/a>. He&rsquo;s even written a book tracing the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.olifreke.co.uk\/books\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">evolution of the synthesizer<\/a> from 1963 through 1995, charting the change from analog to digital and back. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">His new project is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/entertainment\/944102\/beat-gems-is-a-big-beautiful-book-of-drum-machines\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Beat Gems<\/em><\/a>, a coffee-table visual history of drum machines from publisher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kickstarter.com\/projects\/bjooks\/beat-gems-drum-machines-in-modern-music\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Bjooks<\/a>. Like other Bjooks titles, <em>Beat Gems<\/em> is loaded with gorgeous photos, fascinating historical tidbits, and practical advice for making the most of your gear, whether it&rsquo;s  \u2026<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/entertainment\/971013\/oli-freke-bjooks-beat-gems-drum-machine-book-interview\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read the full story at The Verge.<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oli Freke is a musician and journalist whose works have appeared in Sound on Sound, The Quietus, and Mixmag. This [&hellip;]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-classe"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.actutech.app\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}