The Little Jammer meets Kenwood
Over the years quite a few people asked if I’d ever feature the Little Jammer. Quite a few more will have absolutely no idea what a Little Jammer is. This video should be an answer to both.
The Little Jammer is something I’ve always been in two minds about - it’s a product that intrigued me since I first learned about it, circa 2004/2005, but the prices have always put me off. Well it’s almost twenty years later and good examples are getting increasingly rare and more expensive. I finally decided that if I was ever going to get a chance to take a look at it, now was the time.
I’ve only just managed to get this first draft edit of the video out on Patreon before the weekend was over. There’s a fair chance this video could, given more time, generate a composition match for some of the audio snippets. I’ll therefore be keeping a very close eye on things before it goes live. The editing could likely do with another pass to tighten things up anyway.
In other news this video has been delayed a day or two while I waited for the delivery of a replacement computer monitor after my ultra-wide failed. I don’t think it enjoyed being repeatedly rotated and folded away on its arm. I did manage to do quite a bit of the editing with a screen that had intermittent missing lines and was totally dead across the last few inches on the right. Needs must.
Hope you’re all doing well. Take care and have a good week.
Comments (83)
Little Jammer meets AI - there are deep-learning applications capable of converting audio mp3 files into MIDI. Not a big leap to have it jamming to ambient audio
Its great to be and supporting your channel again! Now if my memory serve me correct the higher end version with the singer was featured in the Squid Games.
Drummer must come from Frankfurt….
This reminds me of the old coin-op "monkey band" machines at arcades in the old days (a vintage arcade near where I grew up had a few things from that era when I was young). It played Spanish Flea among a few other things. I guess they were called "Bimbo Box". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOqJ3HVKZuk
I’m living in Japan, so if there’s ever anything I can help out with as far as sourcing parts or shipping or whatever I’d be happy to help.
God-tier YouTube channel. Very happy to contribute a small bit to it.
I'm a bit late to the game on this one, Matt, but those cartridges are absolutely repurposed Bandai Wonderswan game carts. The Wonder swan stopped production around the time this came out.
If money was plentiful, I would get these. I liked this a lot.
This video deserves more views; I don't get why it hasn't. On another topic, I hope you haven't been impacted by recent flooding conditions in your locale.
I think the days of getting decent view counts are long gone. After ten or so hours live it was running at 50% down on my typical video view count - hence the rename and thumbnail re-jig. It’s now only about 20% down - but then again my average view counts themselves are probably half what they used to be a few years ago. Ho-hum. As for flooding - luckily we’re half way down the side of a valley so it never floods here - we do sometimes have difficulty with access roads though, nothing major but they can become impassable at times.
(continued) I wonder if it would be possible to program one's own cartridge and create music!
Thanks for this video, I love this so much! The musicians are cute, they have a personality, the fact sound is localized is a great idea.
ohhh I love weird stuff like this...never saw that before.....I was not aware of its existence...thanks Mat, for the funny 22 min escape from the crazy world out there...
Thanks so much for making this video! What a neat "toy." This is the content I'm here for.
Well, now I'm really curious about the female singer. Ah Mat, she's just $1000+! Do it for us! 🤣 It is very Japanese weird to me. And I do love the Amiga sound it has ..
Don't do it! 😮 She must be thoroughly vetted before she is 'hired.' Are there any AI voices that sing?
On the subject of Christmas decorations I just saw a TV advert for The Ideal Home Christmas Show. It implied that Olympia will be full companies selling the type of novelties you showed. I reckon Kenwood could have had a hit product in the USA if they had done a Christmas version of this.
People complaining about your peels clearly have no sense of humour
There’s a lot of that around nowadays.
That's crazy, Mat. As you might guess I'd never heard of these. I hope the Pro version is sufficiently different to make your latest purchase worthwhile. Looking forward to watching the video about that. The things you find! :-) S.
Not sure why, but this is one of my favourite videos I’ve seen from you… and you’ve done some amazing videos!! Definitely the child in me coming out!! Reminds me of the fairground organ set ups, which I loved as a kid. Cheers Matt Lee
Thanks for saying this - it always feels to me like each new video isn't as good as some of my older ones, so I'm glad you enjoyed this one.
Was this licensed by the audio manufacturer Kenwood? I don't see their logo on it.
Kenwood worked on it https://www.kenwood.com/jp/en/news/2006/20060302.html
Never seen anything like this before! Figured it'd be quite gimmicky but is actually quite adorable!
I just love midi music, the attention to detail on this is just so charming.
It's kind of cute, I like the idea! But I'm not so impressed with the sound quality, even in the early 2000s good quality GM/GS/XG sound modules were already a commodity... I like the idea of the Peanuts set, of course, they should play the Peanuts album from the Vince Guaraldi Trio ;-)
This sounds more like Amiga MOD files than MIDI files. You can really hear it in the piano, the way that it's the same sample played at different pitches. It even uses 8-bit audio, just like MOD files did.
I still remember when I first saw Little Jammer Pro as a young boy. Thought it was so extremely cool. And it still is.
I wondered (and I was hoping you would show) what happens if you plug the players in the wrong sockets.
And on piano, Gomez Addams!
Damn, now I'm a fan, too. What a great video. I would definitely build a small stage with lights etc. - great concept. I'm quite sure there would be a market for this nowadays again. Maybe with a ready built stage that would fit in a nice display. Looking forward to the pro-version video.
Just Another Excellent video. Had never seen or heard of this before now, and it does look like something you can easily get attached to....
This was nice! Cute set indeed. I was a bit surprised to see a lan connector but I presume they kinda reuse to have "channels". I wonder how it is coded, like the guitar track notes are matched in the control box with a position made of x different commands for each moving part
I would suspect a separate wire for each solenoid.
If you need proof that man evolved from a common ancestor of the apes, I submit to you: Little Jammer! I could envision a rich, bored husband ordering this and saying to the wife, "I got you a neat little alarm clock that looks like a vintage jazz group." He sets it up by her bedside and gets out his phone to record the first time it wakes her up. She uses the video in the divorce proceedings. Now, if it could only play Cuba Baion...
I'm intensely interested in figuring out how the songs are stored, maybe the cartridge similarity to those for the wonder-swan might be the in.
What an amazing little novelty! I looked up the Pro version and it does have better sound quality - much better. I somehow prefer the version you reviewed - seems to have more personality. Especially the piano player!
What a nice little setup! Reminds me of the title screen of the old videogame Chuck Rock, where the characters played along to the title music on instruments.
I always want to be in the meetings where someone suggests products like this and people think it is a great idea.
Unfortunately I think they stopped having those meetings. Now they’re just about what shade of grey a new smartphone should be.
I like that you matched your shirt with the video. Nice.
I’ve got a very small selection of shirts and this one is well past its best, but it seemed the most appropriate.
Not gonna go through all the comments but the carts appear to be identical to wonderswan carts. Would be curious to see what happened if you inserted one into a WS system
I suspect the answer is that ‘something expensive would break’. Things were a lot safer in the 1980s, when a Spectrum cassette of Back to Skool just did nothing when played into a C64. But yes I think these are your two possible outcomes, 1) damage or 2) nothing.
Oh no. We're seeing the start of a money sink collection hobby. One time I was talking to one of my stock clerks at a store and he asked me if he could keep the bubble wrap. I said technically no but I didn't really care and asked him why. He sells model train parts on eBay on the side. I asked if he had a set and he did and showed me pictures. This guy built a model of our store with working loading dock and trucks running on magnetic lines in model roads delivering product from a freight depot where his train would run from a port. He showed me a POV video from the train going through his whole set, which was over 10 minutes long. I asked him how big it was. He said about 60 feet by 12 feet. His whole basement. He's spent over 50 grand on the train and dropped down to part time at the store to buy and sell and build more parts and models. I felt the urge. Everything he said sounded cool as hell. By the time he was done talking to me about it I wanted my own GE diesel electric something or other and I had to stop myself from looking into it. I know what would happen. I know me.
Check out Rod Stewart's model railway. Of course he didn't have budget constraints.
I think your comparison of this to a tabletop Christmas Village or model train layout is on-point. It feels like something meant to inspire years of future expansions and upgrades. Buy the starter set as a lark, then five years later you've gradually expanded it into a whole stage complete with lighting cues and a line of Irish step dancers...
UGH my weird-ass brain keeps grinding on the question "Why is the keyboard player wearing a watch?" and is also wondering why he's a lefty. As you said, this thing's designers invested more attention to detail than was absolutely necessary (such as giving the keyboard player a mic) so I'm needlessly trying to work out why they thought he should have a wristwatch, as well.
I was wondering if it was a homage to a famous jazz pianist. But barring a couple of images and videos of Count Basie with a watch on his right wrist - I couldn’t see any others. Basie was a stretch that even a contortionist wouldn’t be happy with though, as most of the time his watch is shown on the left wrist. Perhaps he only wore it on the right when doing some 007 style horological product placement.
Toys for adults! Whatever next!... Quickly hides lightsaber, Phaser and Sonic Screwdriver behind model TARDIS... such nonsense!
This looks like something begging to be hacked for modern times. I would love to have a look at decoding the connections to the players to have them play to some better sounding music. Certainly, there is something to work with.
This is some of the worst tat I have ever seen.
Stay tuned.
Attention to detail, a far out idea, fun and well put together, and expensive - Only In Japan. I love it.
Thank you Matt. 10/10 for sheer whimsy. Not at all what I was expecting. I had never heard of this before, but in my mind, I thought it might be a unit where you plug in a guitar/mic/synthesizer/piano and play along yourself with a professional backing track maybe…
It’d make sense. If you search for ‘Little Jammers’ (plural) erroneously, things take a turn down that route.
When you see them all by the curtain backdrop it gives a strange look as if you'd asked an AI program to design a band! I really like this. Maybe the data socket was for some MIDI device, I dunno.
Your comment prompted me to run a screen grab through Photoleap: https://ibb.co/kmxP2Z7 Typical AI messed up faces, but kind of neat.
Too complex for bluetooth, you reckon? Do away with all that licorice.
Very charming! With The Beatles back on the charts (#1 download both sides of the Atlantic) I can imagine a Fab-4 edition, a mop-top set and a Sgt. Peppers. Not that Paul and the lads would ever be so crass as to merch themselves!
I think I saw this set in Squid game (the Netflix giant succes) maybe that is the reason the prices are so high?
Some of the YouTube Little Jammer video pro demonstration titles mention Squid Game - presumably in the hope of getting some residual clicks - I didn’t watch past the second episode so I didn’t get to see this appear in the show.
Interesting. Was wondering re the name presume nothing to do with kenwood brand well known in UK. Wonder if any "fans" have made their own cartridges with modern music
It's the US/Japanese Kenwood audio company - not to be confused with the UK kitchen appliance company started by Kenneth Wood.
What an utterly fascinating, quirky and utterly charming bit of tech
As a (sorry) drummer I have to say I also really appreciate the attention to detail, I just expected some figurines that react to sound and move around randomly--but on the drums it looks like the hi-hat/snare/kick are all modeled separately and the figure moves appropriately. It's good to see that sort of effort go into an (admittedly silly) product like this...
A neat little device. Novelty or not, I can totally see why people would go for it. Reminds me a bit of those coin operated dioramas that you sometimes find at fairs or amusement parks. The fact that it uses ROM cartridges as its "music format" kind of adds to its charm, although I wonder if this choice was made purely for practical reasons (to reduce cost and complexity) or for more mundane reasons like licensing and copy protection. That "Data" socket makes me curious. Possibly an alternative way to control the animatronics, for use with any add-on devices? Sounds like the device is MIDI-based (or some other kind of sequencer). The people who created these songs most likely had to program the servos of the figurines as well. I can't rule out that they used an algorithm for that, but given the "personality" of the players, it was probably tediously hand-tuned. A really nice video. Perfect to end the weekend with.
This thing gives me major EARTHBOUND vibes and in the best possible way.
It reminds me of fairground organs which often had a conductor and sometimes things like real animated violins.
I like your red velvet drapes backdrop and I also really like your Christmas stuff :-)
Unfortunately I don't own any of the Christmas village featured - but that doesn't mean you can't - I borrowed some pictures from here https://www.lemaxcollection.com
Sorry while I gush about the 'adorableness' of these little musicians. You know I love miniatures. The drummer with his flopping fedora has to be my favorite; the piano player leader is another you look-alike. I'm a big child-adult at heart, I sometimes still play with Legos and dolls 😋. I've never heard of The Little Jammer but this did remind me of other videos I've watched of full-size animatronic musicians (Rock Afire Explosion). These have sadly been abandoned in an amusement park. Why they left such valuable equipment to rot boggles my mind: https://youtu.be/izcgDciI2d8&t=39m49s Here's another video with working figures: https://youtu.be/MyEbr6HvWy0 I enjoyed this video very much - your monitor red velvet curtain backdrop really sets them off well. I look forward to seeing what the Pro model has upgraded. Take care 🤍
When Mat started talking about toys for adults I immediately thought of some of the latest Lego sets. I know one of his Patreons is an enthusiast. I can't criticise having just bought myself a Lego Lamborghini Countach. I'm still debating whether to open it. Some of my late Fathers best investments were Lego sets.
Can you imagine them making it now? All the sounds would come out of the central box with “surround sound” from one speaker, the figures would be rattling away randomly and so light they would fall over and of course there would be Wi-Fi and an app :-) as you said, better than they needed to be…
That is brilliant, put a smile on my face too
On first glance at this set-up I was prepared to be underwhelmed, but it really did turn out to be a charming "music visualizer." I don't see me ever wanting to buy one, but it's cool that Mat's got this one with another set on the way.
Good bit of fun. Like it.
Those cartridges look very similar to those of the Wonderswan handheld. Also a Bandai product.
I wasn't sold on this until I saw the drummer's hat jump up, then it had me. I wonder if anyone has worked out how to create custom songs for this or the Pro.
First thing I thought of was the game Syberia with its mechanical music playing animatronics.
is that the worst version of 'In the mood' I've ever heard? Yes, yes I think that it is....
It kind of takes one out of the mood.