I recently purchased a Buddha Machine online. My apartment is right on Broadway, and I am looking for new ways to combat the street noise, so I thought this white-noise-machine/soundbox, would be an interesting idea. For a simple background explaination, check out this review.

The device plays 9 pre-programmed loops. Each loops lasts anywhere from 2 to 12 seconds. They are all rather serene and never grating. You change loops by clicking a button, the loop number is never displayed anywhere, so there’s no way to know which loop you are on (other than listening). The lack of a visual display means you can easily get lost in the machine. I think this simplicity in the interface is part of the point. You’re not supposed to “manage” your Buddha Machine… you’re supposed to just forget about it and let ramble on in the corner of the room.

The sound quality is hissy, crackly, and poppy, which really adds to the effect. It adds some variety to the loops. If the sounds was perfectly identical in every loop, I think it would get boring faster. It feels like listening to an old record.

I think the real power of this machine would be unlocked if I had 2 or 3 more of these I could place on different loops, so that they all created a drifting ebb and flow of intermingling loops. At $25 dollars (incl. shipping) they’re pretty cheap, so I’ll probably pickup a few more. Brian Eno bought 8.

If you like ambient music, you might want to check out the Buddha Machine. The easiest place to purchase one is eBay. If you’re not sure this is for you, you can download all the loops here (from the official site) in uncompressed .wav format. They are in a zip file, so you can’t stream this link, sorry!