Aria & Synth

 

 This is one of those models with a complicated background. Simply put, I first built the figure on the right (Synth) and wondered if it was interesting enough; it needed something. I decided what it needed was a mate, and thus I built the figure on the left (Aria). And noticed that there was this Party contest on Lego Ideas with two categories: Dressed to Impress, very fitting for me, but maybe not for this model; Perfect Gifts, a bit less interesting category honestly; and general party category, with an example of a snapshot from the dance floor, perfect for this MOC -

[At this point the author reads the category description a second time, and bit more closely. It's called Home of the Ultimate Celebration and they clearly want you to build a building, a venue, or at least some kind of location; I have a feeling that a chair, table and microphone stand are not quite enough. Back to the building table then; I'll post my Primordial Giant Quagsire before this but will be back the next week as there are 10 days left in the LEGO Ideas/House contest.] 

 Oh yes here I am again. Here's the link for the Ideas contest page. I had this wall thing with three tall windows and four joints and some nice creeper vines with pretty flowers; I had built it for another use (where it was slightly medicore) and had not published it in any way, so it worked well enough. It was the right scale, too. I then made a floor - dark bley was one of the colours that I had enough. I mixed some log bricks in to create a slightly unkept feel of a worn concrete floor. The neutral hue of the grey was good, as it did not reflect any colour to the white walls or compete for attention with the characters. The floor also helped me to make the model a bit sturdier, as I was able to fix the table on its place and connect the microphone stand while keeping the dynamic posing. 

But of course, the figures - sorry for an extremely jumpy text here. Synth. This model is recycled from a WIP that ended up being Supersonic Soaring Suit some 1.5 years ago.  The initial model included a red jacket with those Ace of Spades stickered wedge slopes. I alway though they were from some Harley Quinn set, but they're from a forgotten 2008 Racers set appropriately named 8493 Red Ace. I had acquired two from bulk parts bins. The hanging lightning ornaments are from that WIP, too, as are most of the sleeves. The rest was redesigned to meet the 2026 standards instead of the 2022 ones. I furnished the rest of the figure with certain underground culture vibes: black chocker, slightly torn stockings, swept short turquoise hair and badges. Initially, the composition culminated in Titanic Liverpool curved slope over the sand green shirt (from PaB), but I had to censor it off as LEGO Ideas staff told me that it was licenced. I was aware that the entries should not refer to licensed material, but I was fully unaware that a 122 old boat would be under copyright or someone's intellectual propertly. Well, the published entry uses only regular black slope.

(Originally, the laptop had "Boy, do I hate being right all the time - Ian Malcolm" tile, but I realised soon enough that it would cause issues.) 

And so, I decided that Synth needed a mate so I built Aria, who was to have a totally different look - simple, elegant, a bit fantasy-esque: fittin for summer and inspired by the bright green recolours from the Botanicals tulip bouquet, combined with the magenta axe heads from another flower set. I had reviewed Creator Beautiful Horse some months ago fro New Elementary, and medium nougat boat stud had appeared in January and made its way into PaB; therefore, I could finally build good, sturdy medium nougat legs. The arms are not as sturdy (note the stud-only connection above the elbow) but look decent. And I had got some cheap white macaroni tiles from BL to the hair. These made up Aria and she was a very straightforward to build. 

 At that point, I knew they were heading for the party and were perforning musicians. The set-up was inspired by a discussion with a friends who noted that the most boring set-up in electronic music is a dude with a laptop. I took that as a starting point but had zero inspiration to build a table; it would have hidden the lower part of the figure, killing the dynamicity of the model. I took a break with some other projects and suddenly came up with this idea of a transparent acrylic furniture. Its certain retro-futuristic air fitted the idea of Aria & Synth very well, and, importantly, the transparent table would not obscure the figures. The final table is 5-shaped and made of big panels from 1993 Dacta set 9701 - with the age of 33 years they are retro enough. Later, I supplemented the table with a matching chair that uses Toa Inika weapon prisms as its legs...

Having completed the table, I returned to the instuments. I added a black analog synthetiser and a very small yellow drum machine to give Synth some knobs to adjust. Aria was fine with a microphone. The set-up is, of course, inspired by the current, wonderful live assembly of Rättö & Lehtisalo. They have a mostly acoustic drummer, but otherwise the show is a combination of vocals (Rättö) and electronic laser sounds (Lehtisalo). And a lot of dance. I recommend it.

Next up, I do not know what. I though there would be fan voting but apparently there's sort of review board, too. They might remove my MOC as it's too difficult to display without me assembling it (though it's not that difficult really), I don't know. But next up here, I have another Ideas contest model, and then we're back to Bio-Cup, Summer Joust and who knows what. Cheers!

-Eero. 

Here are the original photos! Please note that these pictures are strictly NON-CANON as they include the Titanic curved slope that is licenced and can't (and won't) appear in the model in case it ends up in the LEGO House.