Readers of Allston Pudding may remember Owen Liza Winter from their work in experimental band Birthing Hips, or their solo project Liza. Since leaving Boston this Summer for Gainesville, Florida, they’ve taken a step back from touring life and explored another passion—modifying (or “modding”) Game Boy and Game Boy Advance hardware. We spoke on the phone about their modding brand Aspiration Mods.
[You can follow Aspiration Mods on Instagram and Etsy]
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Allston Pudding: I was reading your Etsy bio, and it was talking about stepping away from touring life. Was there any overlap with modifying Nintendo hardware—were you playing Game Boys and stuff on the road and like, hmm, I should mod this?
Owen: Yeah, definitely. The last tour that Birthing Hips went on I actually had a modified Game Boy with me when I was on tour and I had been thinking about, y’know, this would be a cool thing to try and do more of. But I just didn’t have the time, because I was working full time and touring pretty regularly, and band practice. So I just didn’t have the time to do it, but I wanted to, definitely.
AP: You launched your Instagram for Aspiration Mods last November [2017]. Would you consider that the formal start of Aspiration Mods?
Owen: Yeah. I think that when I decided that I wanted to start doing this and being a part of the Instagram modding scene, that was really when that began, that whole concept. I did a tape label for a little while, a cassette label called Aspiration Tapes, so I figured I could just build up a franchise through Aspiration Mods. [laughs].
AP: Do you remember where the inspiration for the name “Aspiration” came from?
Owen: It was a long time ago, probably when I first moved to Boston, I wanted to have a little tape label that just released some free improvised stuff, and I was talking with Wendy from Birthing Hips about what I should call it. I don’t remember exactly how it came up, but that was sort of a joint name that we came up with I guess.
AP: Were Game Boys your first modding experience ever or had you, prior to Aspiration Mods, dabbled in modding hardware in the past?
Owen: I have since a very young age loved taking things apart just to see what was inside them because I just loved looking at the inside of electronics. I think it’s really cool, I like the way that motherboards look, but I had no clue what any of it did, and most of the time I wouldn’t put it back together. Then when I wanted to get into modding Game Boys, that was the first time that I was like, ok, I’m gonna open this up and do something to it and put it back together and it’s still gonna work. So yeah, probably last November or right around that time was the first time that I really… because I actually ordered a modded Game Boy from someone else, and when I got it I was like, Wow, this is really great. I bet I can do this. And that was really my motivation to start looking into how I could do that.
AP: How did you settle on modding Game Boys in particular… Was that it, like you had a modded Game Boy and you were like, this is the thing I want to mod, or were there other things you were looking at like Playstations or…
Owen: I think for me, I grew up playing Game Boys. When the Game Boy Color came out, I got that and Pokemon Gold, and that was it for me, I was hooked on Game Boys after that. So this is something that I’ve always had a lot of nostalgia about. But also I think they’re great little super iconic looking machines and the electronics that are in them are relatively simple and they’re not super complicated. As soon as you get past a Game Boy Advance, all the parts get way smaller, and way more complex, and I don’t like to mess with that stuff.
I’ve always had a connection to Game Boys and I don’t have any connections to Playstations or any other consoles. And I’ve seen other people mod that stuff and it looks great, but… I wanted to do handheld I think was really the thing. That’s always something I’ve had a connection to.
AP: What’s the typical process like, in terms of materials and tools that you use and all that?
Owen: Typically I like to use original manufactured parts from Nintendo, so I’ll order off of Ebay like an old, beat up Gameboy that doesn’t work anymore sometimes, or it’s just gross and dirty. I’ll get that, and I’ll open it up just with screwdrivers, take all the electronics out, and just get down to the plastic shell, and then I’ll wash that. And usually it’s disgusting inside. Really kind of disturbing sometimes the shit I find inside Game Boys. [laughs]. I’ll wash it all out and then I order some after-market parts… depending on what kind of mod that I’m doing, I’ll order parts from a few different spots that I typically order things from. And when those come in I’ll install all that stuff, solder some stuff onto the motherboard and put it all together and then assemble it and test it.
My basic tools are screwdriver, soldering irons, and some plastic cutters. It’s really not too many tools. I mean, for my custom painting that I do for some Game Boys, that’s a little more involved. That involves obviously paint, primer, and lots of masking tape.
AP: Masking tape?
Owen: Yeah I think for a lot of the paint jobs it’s 90% prep work and painting is only a little part of it.
AP: Like you cover the spots that aren’t painted and blast it…
Owen: Yeah, depending on what I’m doing… I do a lot of the reverse painted Game Boys, so you paint the inside of a clear shell, and I have to completely mask off the whole front of the shell so that no paint gets on that. So that’s a process.
AP: How long does that usually take?
Owen: Painting or the whole modding process in general?
AP: I guess both.
Owen: It also depends on the mod that I’m doing. But if it’s something simple like putting a backlight into an original Game Boy—a DMG—that’ll take like a day, maybe three hours. I’ll open the Game Boy, clean it out, install the backlight and then put it all back together.
It really doesn’t take super long and I could do two or three of those in a day. But for painting a thing, that’s gonna take four or five days because I have to take it all apart, get it all prepped—that can take up to a day just to do all that—and then I’ll spray it with a primer and then that has to dry and get tacky, then I’ll spray the first layer on. That has to dry for a full day before I’ll do another layer of paint.
Sometimes I’ll do up to three layers of paint. And then I have to put a finish on top, like a top coat to seal it and make sure that it doesn’t chip off when you’re using it. So yeah it can take five days, three to five days for painting.
AP: How’s the process changed since you first started. Have you learned new ways that you can modify Game Boys?
Owen: Yeah, definitely. I’m learning new things all the time. I have fucked up so many Game Boys, it’s so sad. I have a graveyard of Game Boys that I’ve destroyed, but that’s the best way to learn. Before I would ever do something new for a customer—like I’ve had people ask me to do new things and I was like yeah I could do that, but before I would ever do something for a customer I would try it out on a different Game Boy for myself so I can learn how to do it first before I try and pawn it off to somebody. Really if you’re gonna do this kind of thing, it really is a bit of trial and error. Sometimes I do things right the first time around and it’s like, holy shit this is great, but then the next three times I try and do it I can’t figure it out for some reason. It can be really frustrating sometimes, but y’know, you figure it out eventually, and I definitely have gotten a few things down to where I really know it well because I’ve done it enough times now that it’s no problem, I don’t even have to think about it, I can just do it.
AP: You mentioned Instagram is essential to Aspiration mods and I noticed you’ve grown a substantial following over the last few months… How did that all come together, connecting with other modders and appreciators of modding?
Owen: A big part of the motivation for me to start doing it on Instagram was just seeing all this great content that all these people were making and I was totally nerding out and loving the stuff that I was seeing. And I was like, you know what, I think I could offer my own special brand of queer modding to this that I think people would be into. So I started doing what I thought I would like to see, the content that I would like to see on the internet. And I’ve met some really great people in the modding community by doing this, one of which I actually met up with in New York, and we hung out, and he’s a really nice guy, and we swapped some Game Boys and stuff, we did like a trade. So it’s cool, I’ve done so many trades, like people are really into doing that. I just finished a Game Boy for a guy in Sweden, and he’s sending me a Playstation Vita, which I’ve never had before. I’m excited about that.
The general reaction to the stuff I make is people seem to really like it. They really like a lot of the painting that I do, and the color choices that I pick out, the aesthetic that I try to go with for a lot of my Game Boys. Obviously there’s some bad apples out there… It seems like people love everything that I do until the second that I get political, and then they get all upset about it. And it’s like, we can all be nerds, but let’s be informed nerds.
AP: Are there any other non-binary or queer artists doing this work that you’ve connected with?
Owen: There’s definitely queer folks out there doing the same thing. I’ve met a few through Instagram—well not met, but I’ve become aware of a few through Instagram. And there’s a lot of non-binary folks that aren’t necessarily Game Boy modding but they’re doing their own nerdy making, they’re making their own stuff that isn’t necessarily Game Boy stuff.
But as far as specifically what I have been doing… these kinds of Game Boys and having the sort of queer eye for the Game Boy [laughs], I haven’t really found anybody else that is exactly doing that kind of thing and it’s been really nice to have all these people because for every bad apple there’s a hundred other people that reach out to me and are very sweet and very nice and they love the work that I do. And that’s really why I enjoy doing it because I like… I mean, making content is hard… It’s difficult to make content and it’s really nice when people appreciate it, and there is a great community of people who are also just making great content that I really enjoy. And there’s definitely a solid 10 or 12 Instagram people that I’ve gotten to know pretty well just through doing this and chatting with them, getting advice.
Everybody’s very open to sharing how best to do things with you, and there’s not really a competitive nature too much on there, which is really cool. Because I think everybody realizes that it’s a pretty niche thing to be into and there’s a lot of room for individuality within that area, and everybody’s open to it and encourages it, so it’s nice.
AP: When you sell your mods, do you usually have… like it’s Game Boys that you’ve made and posted and people will offer to buy them, or people will mostly make custom requests?
Owen: It’s a bit of both. Sometimes I’ll just make something that I want to make and then post it, and people will buy it, or sometimes someone contacts me and they say, ‘Hey I want this thing.’ And I’ll make that for them. But then sometimes people contact me and say, ‘Hey, I want you to make me one thing that—’ and they’ll specify, ‘I want it to have this mod but then I want you to paint it however you want it.’ And so I get to choose however I want to paint the thing. So that’s something that I’ve done for a few people. So yeah, it’s a bit of everything.
AP: What’s next? Do you have your eye on other things that you want to pursue as far as modding, or is this where all your attention is at the moment?
Owen: I’m always trying to learn how to do new things. I see people making amazing stuff on Instagram all the time and I’m like, that’s something I maybe want to try some time.
I’ve never painted an original Game Boy. I’d like to do that at some point. I haven’t successfully modded a Game Boy Pocket yet… That’s something I want to try to achieve.
I’m always trying to figure out new paint processes. I want to get—I used to have an airbrush setup. I want to get another airbrush setup because that means I could do a lot more intricate painting with that. And yeah, I’m always trying to figure out new and better ways to do the things I’m doing.
AP: Is there anything I maybe haven’t asked you about that you want to share?
Owen: I am trying to figure out a way to blend my love for nerdy Game Boy stuff with music too. And not just chip tunes. Like figuring out a way to blend the two together. So that’s something that I’m trying to work on. Just because I do Game Boys now doesn’t mean I’m not still a nerd about music also.