Whether you love or hate synthesizers and drum machines in your choice of music, you can’t help but be impressed by this very novel – and fairly dangerous – reinvention of the term “electronic music.”
ArcAttack are a band who play music through the hums of Tesla coils. The sound comes from their musical instruments, which are rigged up to control the current and the frequencies of electrical current through the coils, resulting in sparks which can cause vibrations through the air at predetermined frequencies.
Tesla coils were invented by geek hero Nikola Tesla around 1891. Nowadays, they’re mainly used for their entertainment value, but Tesla developed them for the purpose of wireless power transmission.
The band performed on Saturday April 23, at Smithsonian magazine's "The Future Is Here" festival in Washington D.C., Live Science reports. The performance featured the bassist wearing a Faraday cage suit getting “zapped” by the two Tesla coils either side of him. These suits are used by powerline technicians to prevent electric current from flowing through the body, leaving you nice and unfried.
You can check out one of their electric performances of Europe's "Final Countdown" below.
[H/T Live Science]
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