Synthesiser Dave - Episode 10 - Gakken SX-150 Mk II

Our very own synth doctor isn’t just a merciful bringer of life and health to unwell kit, his Hippocratic Oath also allows him to get a little bit ‘Six Million Dollar Man’ on their ass and actually improve them. So this month he thought he would show us how to “Mod The Gakken”. The Gakken SX-150 is a synth originally given away in kit form on the cover of a Japanese magazine (published by Gakken). It was so popular that they produced a Mark II and sold it. Dave found it online and bought one for £25 and we bought one too. The limitation of the Gakken SX-150 is that it can only be controlled by the stylus, making it a turbo-charged Stylophone (but with much better sounds and parameter control, so not really like a Stylophone at all). Dave discovered if you open it up, drill a hole and add a couple of inputs, you can hook it up to a sequencer, like the relatively inexpensive Korg SQ-1. Once modded, this little plasticky machine really starts to get interesting. What’s more, you can shout loud