![]() I've lost a week of my life into creating beautiful, useless music with it, but haven't cracked it yet, made it feel like an instrument. They are both totally awesome but I haven't found a use for either of them just yet. Mutable Instruments - I have a Shruthi and an Ambika. Todd Terje says that the Cwejman S1 is just as good, better in other ways, and less expensive and that he's been using that these days instead of his ARP. I wish I was at home playing with this synth right now. There is no MIDI, but I use a lightpipe-to-CV converter the added control of the Silent Way plug-ins is miraculous. There is no HPF so you have to figure that out if you want to make hi-hats. ![]() I am sending mine in to a synth spa in Savannah to get the ring modulator repaired and the connections tricked out. The spring is noisy but is fun to route sound through it and then back into other things. Sometimes if I have a houseguest I make a seagull + seashore patch and put it in their room. The envelopes are enormously flexible, the CV modulation is amazing, you can build anything and get absolutely lost in creating self-generating patches. Any time I need to do a shitty film score real quick I turn it on and the score is done.ĪRP 2600 - my favourite synth ever, and the only one I use on recordings that I want to be proud of. My Nord Modular is my DX-7 and my drum machine, what a great synth. I have a Memorymoog clone on mine that is so precise in its emulation that it's uncanny. I am a thief, not a programmer, I download other people's architectures and tweak them. Super steep learning curve and, like other Nords, sounds terrible 99% of the time, but it worth it for that 1%. Like, you drag and drop your modules on to an environment and connect them with patch cords. This is a DSP-run synth where you built a virtual modular on your PC and upload it into the hardware. You have to wrestle hard with these synths to make them sound good but the lightness, durability and usability makes it work it. All that said, I travel with and play a Nord Wave because it's light, it samples, the FM synths sound good, it's got built-in delay and reverb. Nord synths are slightly better but still bad-sounding. Their pianos and organs sound "realistic" without sounding good, and they never sound good in a band. There is something in that frequency spectrum that drives me crazy. I don't know what to do with it, it's kind of like having a convertible in the garage. Mine is out on semi-permanent loan to a friend's studio until I get my own space for it, which will probably never happen. It does sound otherworldly, like The Best Synth Ever! But its arpeggiator sucks, it can't be controlled without MIDIfying it (and the kits are poorly reviewed so I haven't done it), it's not particularly routable, and it's too heavy and expensive to really be useful in any home studio. The Jupiter was the one exception, he loved the Jupiter. I was working on a film where the director hated synthesizers, and he came by the house and kept asking for any noodles to be removed, he just wanted lame-ass indie piano/ukelele plunky-plunks. The envelopes are too mushy to be really useful for percussion but they are good for bass and pads. It is heavy (a two-person lift, really) and runs hot. It's hella expensive, I bought it with a film score budget for a sci-fi movie. This is a great synth and I'd own one except that I own a Jupiter 8. The "ensemble" function is famous and it sounds good, I never felt comfortable using it because any time I turn it on it's like "oh, that sound". It also has CV-out so you can double it up with an ARP or a Minimoog. It receives clock in so you can send it pulses from Logic using beat mapper to live drum takes and have the arpeggiation stay in time. I have never owned one but I use them a tonne. Any time I want to do something arpeggiated I borrow one of these guys. ![]() Juno-60 - I think it's this one that has the miracle arpeggiator. It's good if you're somebody who needs to travel light. This takes a little effort to program properly but it's easier than a DX-7. I bought a PG-300 (the programmer) from a guy who was looking at me like I was a sucker and then I sold it to somebody and understood what a sucker looks like. There is a cool fifth- and sixth-stage on the envelopes, it's like an ADADSR, so you can make stuttery sounds. Juno-Alpha - teeny tiny, the B is velocity sensitive, super light, super durable, mine got the shit kicked out of it and it still works. Only issue is that the oscillators like to burn out, and replacing them involves ordering chips and soldering. Start here and end here if you plan to own house or children. One day I'll type out my synth adventures but not today.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |