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Old Synthis for Goa


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i want to open a discussion about fine electronical instruments from last 20,25 years ....

now, is the time of pugins ,BUT some of us stil work with hardware gears ..its less comfortable , but it have own magic .... so i wish to share my impressions about this instruments , short reviews about varius synthis , rythmboxes and ...

im still fascinated with sound from middle 90s , this massive mixiture of sonic impressions ,feelings and euforia .....

so hardware junkies .... lets hear yuo!

(my english is verry bad so , dont be angri ,when im make some syntax :rolleyes: )

my hardware:

Waldorf XT

Viruws C

JUno alfa 1

Oberheim Matrix 6

Roland Jx8p

Doepfer ms 404

Waldorf Pulse+

Roland s 760 Sampler

and tomorrow comes one Emu Orbit

... want to find a Nord Modular ...

www.goasia-project.com

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Guest The Journey Man Project

I've played with a few synths on and off...

 

my fav's:

 

Roland TB-303 with the Dvil Fish enhancement... great for the really acidici sounds...

 

Waldorf Micro-Q just really good fun, lots of interesting sounds... pretty easy to use

 

Novation Supernova... I loved this one, an old friend in england had it, and loved it to make great progressive and dub type sounds...

 

 

I find virus and Nor synths to be pretty shit really... it takes a lot more effort to get great sounds out of, hence why there is little originality in the scene any more, nobody bothers to spend weeks on end tweaking a hardware synth for those few special sounds, the digital world has made the electronic msic scene redundant and lazy.

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Please don't buy a Nord...  :(  Pretty please?  With cherry on top?

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Pardon me (and, ahem, I'm speaking to you too, Journey Man <_< ), but I do believe Goasia said Nord Modular - that's a whole different kettle of fish. I've had a Nord Micro Modular since '99 and a NM G2 Engine for just over a year now - and I love them to death. :)

 

The NM synths are non-fixed architecture - a bit like Reaktor, but more reliable and far more user friendly (although a little more limited in scope in some respects). The ability to build your own synth (sequencers included) offers endless possibilities of soundscapes to explore. As a tool for psytrance creation, I couldn't recommend them highly enough - provided you have the kind of brain required to comprehend modular synthesis. B)

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very nice .. someone, who have Micro and g2 engine ... now i can buy a new G2 engine or old

Modular for almost same price , i try a Reactor 5 but like other plugin sythis , it sound little thinner than hardware synthis , Reactor is a first class instrument ..but i need something stronger and harder ... is Nord Modular or G2 engine ? or simply a Nordlead 1 , cus i have it before few years and i like Nords "in your face" sound ....

have this modulars a same sonic character like nordlead1 ? and for your ears wath sound better Modular 1 (Micro) or a new G2 ?

 

 

:)

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very nice .. someone, who have Micro and g2 engine ... now i can buy a new G2 engine or old

Modular for  almost same price , i try a Reactor 5 but like other plugin sythis , it sound    little thinner than hardware synthis , Reactor is a first class instrument ..but i need something stronger and  harder ... is Nord Modular or G2 engine ? or simply a Nordlead 1 , cus i have it before few years and i like Nords "in your face" sound ....

have this modulars a same sonic character like nordlead1 ? and for your ears wath sound better Modular 1 (Micro) or a new G2 ?

 

 

:)

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Well, a Micro sounds exactly the same as the full size Classic Nord Modular, but it's limited to the one patch on its one DSP instead of the full size machine's four patches on four DSP's. Some in the Nord Modular Community don't like the sound of A/D converters on the G2 range in comparison to the old - I think they say they find the sound a bit too 'bright'. Others say that it's really a matter of preference, and some suggest that the sound of the old range can be more or less replicated within a G2 patch anyway.

 

If you're not intimidated by Reaktor and like the whole concept, but just dislike its sound, then the NM series could well be for you. The NM's don't do everything that Reaktor can do, but they do the classic Modular Synthesis thing, complete with the Editor software 'spaghetti wall', really well; and it's easier and more intuitive to use(well, as easy as modular synthesis can be). But to get it working really well it requires a fair bit of the visual programming involved in constructing patches, so you need to be technically minded.

 

I highly recommend the Electro-Music.com Nord Modular Forums, (the biggest NM forums on the net) for a lot of quality discussion on the NM series. There are a lot of members there that use the synths for experimental electronic music, and there isn't a lot of talk aout psytrance, but it's a great place to learn about Nord Modulars.

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goasia, i love the tracks ive heard from you...

 

first, if you think reaktor is thin, try this synth :)

http://www.vbcam.net/kov/simplePSY.rar

 

The problem with reaktor is no one really programs it much that makes psy so you really have to learn alot to get good sounds from it. That synth is about 5 different good parts of other synths mashed togather. Reaktor can sound "old school phat", what im still trying to figure out is how to make it sound more dirty like older synths.

With such a nice studio though of digital synths i dont think you would get much from reaktor.

 

As fas as the nord modular, ive had 2 micros and have used the g2 software alot. The nord modular 1 sounds just like a nord lead 2 sound quality wise, the g2 sounds like a nord lead 3, clavia changed their algorithms for some reason, i prefer the NM1 sound. I think the g2 has a wider pallet though, almost all patches on the Nm1 have that distinct "nord" sound.

 

If you really want to check out the nord modular 1 sound just listen to old logic bomb and hux flux, that was basically "their" sounds.

 

Personally though with goasia's setup i would forget the nord modular because you could get a korg prophecy and kurzweil k2000 for the same price as the modular.

Those 2 synths were like what the virus and nord lead are today. Old koxbox/psychopod is the sound of the prophecy, almost every memorable hallucinogen synth patch is from the k2000. I even remember people bitching about koxbox using to many prophecy presets on their albums ;)

Also, there is the novation basstation, thats a huge classic.

 

The only old school artist i still cant figure out what the fuck they are using is the pleiadians....

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The only old school artist i still cant figure out what the fuck they are using is the pleiadians....

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I know they used the JD800 a lot for their typical lead sound.

 

I must agreee that reaktor sounds a bit thin. Sure you might be able to make if fat by stacking and processing.

Somehow to me it seems like a good idea to stick with instruments that I like the sound of without too much work.

A synth patch that sounds great without any FX or stacking usually sound amazing with it.

 

But then the nord lead sound thin as well in my ears, at least the versions I tried.

But both that and the virus is so extemly overused in trance so it's the first two hardware synths I would sell if I had them.

The modulars is cool, and although it is a bit sterile you can make nice sounds that is easy to fit in the mix.

 

The pulsar synths and modular is what I rely on when I want dense analogue type sounds. For thinner sounds there is plenty of VST synths that sounds really good.

 

The hardware I really thought been the best before I went digital:

Sequential Circuits Pro-1 (cheap monophonic analouge with great sound and modulation capabilities)

Original Waldorf Microwave with analogue filers (the later ones had a bit weak filters IMO, the original rules)

Korg MS-20 (very electric sounding and great modulation)

Korg MonoPoly (flexible with good modulation)

ARP 2600 (thin sounding but extremly expressive, flexible and a pleasure to work with)

Oberheim 4 voice (deep and clear acid sound)

Roland 100m (neither cheap or easy to get a decent system, but sounds great and easy to work with....for a modular that is)

Studio Electronics ATC-1 and SE-1 (fat sounding proper modern analouge synths)

 

Nice machines that you can get hold of real cheap:

ESQ-1 (buggy and annoying, but sounds good)

Korg DW8000 (that great combination of digital oscillators and analogue filters)

Ensoniq Mirage (early lofi processor, then branded "sampler". 8bit sampling with analogue filters)

 

I haven't actually used any of the modern analogue modulars like doepher.

But that would probably be highest on my shopping list......if I would get some weird impulse and suddenly look forward to suffer with MIDI/CV issues and having to stretch around in the room to reach various control surfaces.

I'm sure glad those days are over :)

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"I know they used the JD800 a lot for their typical lead sound."

 

thank you so much for this information, its a big "AH-HA" for me. I had pretty much given up and assumed they were useing some kind of modular, i always figured their more metalic sounds were some form of fm(ive never got close to getting any of their sounds with FM though) I see how with the JD800 weird waveforms that would give the metalic sound. do you know anything else they used? Would you say the JD800 was their main synth? Ive been looking up info on it all night, it looks like a really cool synth. Roland is one of the synth companies i really know nothing about.

 

"I must agreee that reaktor sounds a bit thin. Sure you might be able to make if fat by stacking and processing.

Somehow to me it seems like a good idea to stick with instruments that I like the sound of without too much work."

 

yea, if i was just getting into synthesis and making goa i wouldnt even bother with reaktor. It often seems people say its the most flexible synth, but that tends to be for sounds that really dont make sense for goa/psytrance. Reaktor doesnt even come close to sounding analog. You can get a bit of the analog "wet" filter sound by stacking 3 or 4 copies of the same filter with slight varitions in cutoff/rez, but its still to clean sounding.

 

"But both that and the virus is so extemly overused in trance so it's the first two hardware synths I would sell if I had them."

 

hehe yea please, everyone needs to stop using these synths, im so sick of hearing them.

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:) nice discussion .....

i was own Prophecy before 2 years and change it for Z1 , Prophecy is nice and fat synthesizer ,very good sounds , almost like analogs , but bad user interface ..and the whole mashine is little bit slow , i think P. have some hardware latency ... after , when im buying a Z1 ,same synthesizer technique , but not so fat like Prophecy ..i think i need one ,again Prophecy....

Rolands ... best digital synthis from Roland are JD 990 and and JD 800 , before few days i was sell my JD 990 . without controll is almost unusable for goatrance .. editing sounds on LCD is naightmare , if i can i like to buy a JD 800 , cus is a powerful synth engine with total control of sound ... btw. is favorite synthesizer of Laurent Garnier :)

i agree with Spindrift ... about this real analogs , but some of then arent cheap , Pro One , Korg Ms20..... realy make wierd noises , deep basses , but you need find it , pay it and have service in your neighbourhood...and im from Serbia :) no Srvices , no Ebay , just a psychedelic athmosphere in last 15 years <_< ... new analogs are very expensive ....

... yesterday i take the Orbit .... for 200 euros , fantastic .. presets needs some changes ,

sampled waves are solid , and i like a typcal strong sound of Emu filters , in my next track Orbit will doe good job :rolleyes:

tanx guys .... and keep continue .....

B)

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" i think P. have some hardware latency ... after , when im buying a Z1 ,same synthesizer technique , but not so fat like Prophecy ..i think i need one ,again Prophecy...."

 

yea that was my experience too. The z1 was the last hardware synth i bought and i sold it after about 3 weeks. I thought it would sound at least as good as the prophecy but the sound was really cheesy, not raw at all.

 

goasia does the JD 990 sound the same as the jd 800? I just dont want to buy it and have the same thing happen as with the z1. After posting last night i found info on the JD 990, im really thinking of getting one now since they are pretty cheap on ebay. I dont mind programming rack synths with a software editor.

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First came out a JD 800 , then i think two years after a jd 990 , jd800 have less samples

and in someway poorer synth engine , but is minor thing ... jd990 have sync for samples , you can play samples synced from every voice in patch .. so in that way you can have some harder leads ... i try to make my own patches on JD 990 , but it needs too much time ... cus this reason i thing jd 800 with realtime controlers is much useful for trance (goa) ... btw in JD990 you can plug one srjv expansion , jd 800 have not this option ... for some tb 303 like acid sounds jv 1080 is the best option , on secondhand market is the cheapest modul from Rolands JV - JD - XV generations (exept 1010 or 2020, pocket versions with two dial lcd) and a thousand of sounds from inetrnet ... if you need realtime control, and easy making your own sounds, here is a JD 800 .... i wish to buy one ;-))

and it looks fabulose

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:)  nice discussion .....

 

Indeed! Psynews makes sense again... :)

 

i was own Prophecy before 2 years and change it for Z1 , Prophecy is nice and fat synthesizer ,very good sounds , almost like analogs , but bad user interface ..and the whole mashine is little bit slow , i think P. have some hardware latency ... after , when im buying a Z1 ,same synthesizer technique , but not so fat like Prophecy ..i think i need one ,again Prophecy....

 

It's nice to hear, that the Prophecy sounds at least as good as a Z1. I just (well, a year and a half ago) got me a Proph, and it's amazing! Sure, every other preset is found on some KoxBox album, but the synth is terrific. The comb-filter oscilater is absolutely brilliant. I agree about the interface - it's the worst yet I guess. But pleeease, don't let that discourage you - get emagic sounddiver, and dive right in... All of a sudden the interface is perfect, and the sound even more so :D

 

Other than that, I treasure my Waldo MWXT - a different synth from all the rest. Old analogs like Roland's Juno-106 are great for bass. A have a Roland JV-2080 (which makes people go "what the hell is that thing? Why on earth do you use THAT?!?"), and it's a great workhorse, that can actually do nifty stuff... If you treat it well, that is.

 

-A

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" if you need realtime control, and easy making your own sounds, here is a JD 800"

 

i agree the JD800 looks like a great synth/keyboard. The reasons i would rather get 990 is that its almost 4 time cheaper than the 800 on ebay, the 800 is starting become "vintage", no body wants the 990 because of the UI. One thing that sucks that i read on the 800 is the controls only output sysex and not midi CC so you probly cant control anything else with the knobs.

 

"It's nice to hear, that the Prophecy sounds at least as good as a Z1"

 

i assure you it sounds WAY better than the z1. I was hoping to get the z1 to tweak koxbox presets but they just arent there, its to "soft" sounding. The best thing about the z1 i had was that i sold it a month after getting it for $150 more than i bought it for ;)

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" if you need realtime control, and easy making your own sounds, here is a JD 800"

 

i agree the JD800 looks like a great synth/keyboard. The reasons i would rather get 990 is that its almost 4 time cheaper than the 800 on ebay, the 800 is starting become "vintage", no body wants the 990 because of the UI. One thing that sucks that i read on the 800 is the controls only output sysex and not midi CC so you probly cant control anything else with the knobs.

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It's indeed crap that the faders only output sysex.

Also the faders seem to be very low quality. I tried a couple of machines which both had a few screwed fades, and that was some 10yrs ago.

If you get an exemplar today I would be amazed if it still was 100% working, and it will be damned hard to keep it that way.

 

And although I liked the typical Pleiadians lead, I must say that I was never so keen on the JD800.

It sounds great on it's own many times, but it was very hard to get sounds that actually fits nice in the mix. Somehow the sound is many times a bit uncontrolled and bloated. It's the filters that is the problem I think.

But sure, with a bit of work it sounds very good on some settings, but I'm quite lazy and rather go with instuments that I find pleasing to work with.

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wel .. you can buy a cheap midicontroller today , i use Behringers BRC2000 and its very

good to controling some old synthis with midi ... in 80 s almost all midi synthis have option to recive and send sysex messages ... so i use BRC to program an old Oberheim Matrix 6 , alfa JUno , JX8p ... but in 90s comes more complex instruments with complexer sysex messages (messages are longer ) and BRC cant memoryse that messages , so i cant use that controller for editing a patches on jd 990

JD 800 s sysex are compatibile with JD 990 .. so if you have both ... :) you are happy man

...about Prophecy ..its so complex and powerful synth engine , even you use an editor you need to spent hours and hours to program it ... 4 env generators , 4 lfo s , varius types of oscilators , and is FAT ... its like a modular synt

using editors is OK , but a realtime editing is very important , even if you make a good sound with editor , you need modificated it in arrangment ... so bad user interface can spend your creative moments ...

MW XT is realy unique thing , i think one of the best in last 10 years , not so popular like Nord or Virus Family , but i think this orange beast will be a legend B)

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"using editors is OK , but a realtime editing is very important , even if you make a good sound with editor , you need modificated it in arrangment ... so bad user interface can spend your creative moments ..."

 

while i totally agree with you, i tend to like synths that not many people use, and the synths that people tend to not use tend to be the ones with really bad interfaces. Im sure the popularity of the virus/nord is mostly because its such a nice easy interface to tweak.

I also agree the XT will be a classic, they have held their value extremely well since i started looking at them 5 years ago. Ive been waiting for them to fall inline with the price of other synths from that time(like a virus A) it just never happens!

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I agree too - isn't this wonderful :)

 

The Prophecy is rather easy to tweak on the fly - it has those five programmable knobs under the display for just the same ;)

 

There is one snag about the XT though... Maybe it's just mine, but it's seriously buggy. The knobs sometimes delivers values in the opposite direction of what I turn, some freaky stuff happens in the wavetable when I use pitchbender (only sometimes - but no modifiers are set for the table...), and LFO2 is just plain weird - at least on mine. I've updated OS a million times, but still... It must be a very good synth, since I love it in spite of it's flaws. She's a charmer!

 

-A

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I have both a JD-800 and a JD-990. Except some more possibilities like Osc sync, analog feel, a few more waveforms there are not many difference. However you can expand it. And there is an Vintage Expansion for JV-1080, but you can use it with the JD-990. When you enter this card into the 990, you get 256 (or something like that) waveforms. Like: Tb-303 saw, mini moog saw, mino moog Square etc etc.

Personally i use the JD-800 as a controller for JD-990. And it works super fine :)

 

The midi is kind of crappy.. with the sysex.. bleh :angry:

 

Moving over to Korg Prophecy. Indeed its a lovely synth, but not very user friendly. I had big troubles with the interface, so i sold it. And the Z1 is not as raw (like someone else mentioned). I can't really understand why, since it said the both have the MOSS technique, same fx etc..

 

The machines i enjoy the most are defenetly the Korg ms-20 & ms-50. I use them in combo. I love the filters!! Screamy stuff.. And you can route in there whatever you like. I recommend them.. Also the Waldorf Q is one hell of synth..

 

Spindrift: The doepfer modularsystem sounds very much like the Doepfer MS-404 (analog basssynth). Its not that exciting sound. But sound is of course very subjective..

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Vintage card contains some samples from analog legends,its tru , but going thru synth engine from jd or maybe Jv , they will be much thinner than originals , btw on Techno or Dance card (sr jv) you have more samples usefull for goa more Sh and Tb samples...

JD is a perfect pad synthesizer , good for basses and for acidic tb like sounds ...i was made some patches with samples from vintage board , but the sounds allways have that JD - Jv feeling , routing thru a synth engine from Rolands you get everytime that specific digital Roland sound ... but i like that sound :)

Amygdala ..

.......my Waldorf Xt have the same problems , so dont worry for that bugs , turn it off , and start again :)

 

Doepfer Ms 404 is a very basic little analog synth , i have one and sometimes can suprise me that little toy, one oscilator with saw and pulse (pulse can modulated with lfo) simple 24 db (not an 18 db ,like Tb 303) filter with cut off and reso , filter can modulated with env or with second lfo , and just one envenlope generator, you can use external input or oscilator for sound source...simpli but very useful for modulated goa sequences or for Tb like basses ,sequences ..... for the first listening ms404 was little bit thinn for my ears , but after using it in some tracks , i start respect this grey monosynth , you can hear it in mix allways , nothing spectacular but he is allways there .... :)

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Spindrift: The doepfer modularsystem sounds very much like the Doepfer MS-404 (analog basssynth). Its not that exciting sound. But sound is of course very subjective..

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The stuff I heared done with the Doepfer modular sounded really good and exciting.

It's hard to compare a modular with a simple monosynth though, even if they would use the same components.

I have no interest in an SH101 really, but the 100m system is a complety different story even if it sounds like the same oscillators, filters and envelopes.

For example modulation of oscillators and filters with audible frequencies can sound very different on different systems in my experience.

Have you used a decently sized Doepfer system and done a lot of FM and stuff like that?

I only heared very positive comments on the sound and expressiveness of the Doepfer modular, so I'm a bit curious what you base you view on.

 

I cannot agree too costly with real analogue synths.

Most of the digital machines mentioned here cost as much if not more than a real analogue.

Last time I looked you could get a pro-1 for some $350.

The ATC-1 was like $700 new in the shop.

The original microwave is not so often you come across, but i seen it a few years ago for less than $1000.

A small Doepfer modular system is like $1000-1500.

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The stuff I heared done with the Doepfer modular sounded really good and exciting.

It's hard to compare a modular with a simple monosynth though, even if they would use the same components.

I have no interest in an SH101 really, but the 100m system is a complety different story even if it sounds like the same oscillators, filters and envelopes.

For example modulation of oscillators and filters with audible frequencies can sound very different on different systems in my experience.

Have you used a decently sized Doepfer system and done a lot of FM and stuff like that?

I only heared very positive comments on the sound and expressiveness of the Doepfer modular, so I'm a bit curious what you base you view on.

 

I cannot agree too costly with real analogue synths.

Most of the digital machines mentioned here cost as much if not more than a real analogue.

Last time I looked you could get a pro-1 for some $350.

The ATC-1 was like $700 new in the shop.

The original microwave is not so often you come across, but i seen it a few years ago for less than $1000.

A small Doepfer modular system is like $1000-1500.

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I think its the sound itself on the doepfer i am not too excited about. I had a doepfer system for a month, but to be hounest, my knowledge was very limited back then, so i couldn't really use it like i would have used it today. I can't remember how the FM sounded on the Doepfer. I will check it out.

 

I can see nowdays that the analog synths are more expensive then 3 years ago. And the prices just keep going up. I prefer analog over digital/(and software) any day. But thats also something very subjective.

 

If you can find a Pro-1 for 350$ then buy it. Defenetly. I bought mine for 6500kr (about 550$) and sold it for the same price.

 

The same goes for microwave. That was extreamly cheap :)

 

The only problem with the pro-one is the tuning of the machine. Nightmare :(

Thats why i sold mine..

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Amygdala ..

.......my Waldorf Xt have the same problems , so dont worry for that bugs , turn it off , and start again  :)

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Yeah, that sometimes do the trick... At other times I edit one parameter, check if the wavetable fuck up, and load again if it does... Drag! But still - what a sound :)

 

As for modulars vs. the rest, I desperately want a modular. I have this insane need to amplitude modulate with audible frequencies... I haven't seen a synth that does this well, and with a non-fixed frequency. AM is sooo freakin' cool, it can really scratch you auditive cortex to a bleeding pulp :D

 

Actually, what I want is two oscilators, a mixer-unit, and an envelope generator - all super-quality, fast and accurate - then I'll be set. The oscilators should not be audible, but AM some external input through the mixer... That would be soooo sweet!

 

-A

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The only problem with the pro-one is the tuning of the machine. Nightmare  :(

Thats why i sold mine..

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Thats the problem with most old analogues.

The pro-1 tends to be comparativly reliable in my experience.

The prophet-5 for example is usually totally hopeless.

I bought one the same time as NI's plugin version came out.

After A/B testing them against eachother I very quickly sold the hardware version since it sounded awful in comparasion.

 

Old synths many times sound tired, thats the reason it's better to go for modern analogues when i comes to hardware synths.

For digital synthesis integrated DSP solutions is much more reliable and convenient IMO.

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