V20260107A
Program runtime: 17min 2sec
Written, performed and produced December, 2025.
©2026 Ernie Gray. All rights reserved.
The ongoing Vacations In Color project started in the late 2000s, centering on hypnagogic pop, R&B and influences from around the world. The music is inspired by the sense memory of pop music from childhood, analog recording aesthetics ca. 1977-82, and the sound of a circuit designed in 1975 by David Cockerell at Electro Harmonix called the Electric Mistress, which imparts a kaleidoscopic, prismatic color onto sources. There is not Vacations In Color without the Electric Mistress. You can learn more about this device from Ralph Metzger’s classic page.
My earliest memories of sounds on the radio in the 70s & early 80s were of emerging and widely used modulation technologies. In 1991, I acquired a used DigiTech RDS-900 rack mounted unit that offered extensive control of a (low fidelity) 8bit modulated digital delay line. Combining a signal with an LFO modulated delayed copy is the recipe behind chorus, flange and doubling. While there are many possible variations, Cockerell’s implementation using a bucket brigade of capacitors to retain voltage state and a color feedback to the output remains distinctive and superlative. Hardware clones and DSP emulations are now widely available, including a noteworthy Open Source VST inspired by the Small Stone and Electric Mistress.
