I feel like a crazy mad scientist. I love it!
The build quality is superb!
It’s so simple, that’s why it’s so brilliant.
Hear it in action
A pickup for exploring sound
The Tabletop Humbucker is a pickup made for adventurous musicians, sound designers and pedal people.
Handmade in Sweden from solid walnut, the pickup is suspended in silicone to reduce mechanical coupling, and the hand-held ground wire helps to reduce hum.
It invites you to touch sound.
There are no screens or menus — just the feedback loop between hand and brain.
A microphone hears things the way your ear does.
A pickup hears things differently.
Instead of capturing acoustic sound, Tabletop Humbucker responds to movement in the magnetic field and turns it into an electrical signal.
That gives you access to sounds a normal microphone would hear very differently — or barely hear at all.
Plug it in
The Tabletop Humbucker is completely passive. No batteries, no power supply.
Just plug it into your audio interface or other equipment and start exploring. Oh, and it loves pedals and effects!
Accessories included
Place the metal washer on the wood soundboard or grey felt scratch protection - voilà you've got a pseudo contact microphone!
Ground wire
Hold the ground wire in your hand to reduce hum and noise.
What's in a name?
The name Happy Dinosaur is a celebration and a promise: to keep musical discovery playful. As kids, we were all scientists and explorers.
Who?
Here's me, Tobias. I'm the maker of the Tabletop Humbucker. Happy Dinosaur is my small one-person company in Sweden.
Evolution
The Tabletop Humbucker was developed through trial and experimentation. A key feature is the silicone suspension that greatly reduce handling noise.
All hands on deck
The Tabletop Humbucker is made for hands-on exploration — for sound designers, musicians, Foley artists, synth people, pedal people, and anyone who likes finding strange sounds in ordinary things.
Metal objects can be played directly over the pickup. Materials like wood, paper, plastic, and ceramics can be captured using the included metal washer and wood soundboard.
Red Means Recording.
Red Means Recording took the Happy Dinosaur Tabletop Humbucker to extraordinary creative places in this video.
It’s incredibly inspiring — it gets me deep into the creative zone every time.