This Window

The Roland SH-101 is an analogue synthesiser made by Roland between 1982 and 1986. It became widely used in the 1990s, especially in electronic and house music. The SH-101 is monophonic, meaning it plays one note at a time. It features a single oscillator, sub‑oscillator, low‑pass filter, mixer for blending waveforms, noise generator, arpeggiator, and sequencer. An ADSR envelope controls the filter and VCA, while an LFO can modulate the filter, VCA, pitch, and pulse width. Its sound is often described as “snappy and razor‑sharp” bass, “squelchy and expressive” leads, and a “piercing yet smooth” filter. The SH-101 appears on many Finish The Story songs and is frequently used on This Window tracks. At launch, it cost $495 in the US and £249 in the UK, making it relatively affordable compared to other analogue synthesisers of the time. Their Gods – Limited Free Mix – Homage to the SH-101 Pre-release mix · 5 minutes · Instrumental version Their Gods appear...

Fostex 1/4" reel‑to‑reel 8‑track recorders changed home recording by bringing musicians much closer to a genuine studio experience. With eight independent tracks, artists could record drums, bass, guitars, vocals, and additional layers separately, then shape the mix with far more control than earlier 2‑ or 4‑track setups allowed. This opened the door to real experimentation at home—overdubbing, rearranging sections, refining performances, and building songs piece by piece instead of relying on single‑take captures. Recording and mixing were done through a conventional mixing desk, with the final stereo master mixed to cassette or a 1/4" 2‑track reel‑to‑reel machine. For many independent artists, this affordable recording technology was the first time their music felt “properly recorded” rather than simply documented. A Game Changer These machines also raised expectations for sound quality in self‑released music. Analog tape has a distinctive character t...

The Ashtray - a case study At its core, The Ashtray by This Window is built around a ¼" tape loop first created in 1981 —a fragile analogue fragment re‑entered, re‑worked, and expanded in 2026. The result is a piece that carries two timelines at once: the raw, handmade immediacy of the original loop and the colder, more sculpted sensibility of its modern augmentation. It sits somewhere between art project and sci‑fi horror vignette—a lost soundtrack cue found on a degraded VHS, half‑erased by time. The loop’s mechanical churn becomes a pulse; the added layers smear into a synthetic fog. There’s tension, restraint, and a faint sense that the machinery itself is breathing. Loops used to be fragments of accidents—tape cut too short, a sampler mis‑triggering, a machine playing slightly off its own rhythm. Even when you tried to be precise, the gear had its own opinions. It would saturate, smear, drift, and occasionally betray you. That instability wasn’t a flaw; it w...

How 4-Track Tascam 144 Cassette Recorders Changed Our Recording Adventures The Tascam 144 series (the compact 4-track cassette recorders built for straightforward home recording) helped shrink the distance between “having songs” and “having something you could share.” Instead of needing studio time, engineers, and expensive multi-track setups, bands, non-music creators, and songwriters could capture vocals and instruments where they rehearsed—then overdub their way toward fuller arrangements. That mattered culturally as much as technically: a rough demo stopped being something you kept in a drawer and became material you could trade at shows, send to collaborators, shop around with more confidence, and iterate on between practices. Because the recording process was simple, the 144 encouraged experimentation. You could commit to an idea, hear it back quickly, and fix performances—or re-record parts—without waiting for a scheduled studio block. That sped up song w...