If You Could Only Buy One Analogue Synth, What Would it Be?

[JoJoB3]

4 hours ago, J.F.N. said:

Great timing for this clip to show up in my YT flow:

 

 

The D50 and DX7 haven't been hyped? Hmmm... Well...
They aren't bad boards but they've definitely been given lip service.

I've laid ears and hands on a Prophet 5 (that wasn't even working that well) through some outboard and it was a visceral experience.
You have to know what you're listening for but point is today's hot new hardware and software isn't touching it.  It was definitely 'a thing', well beyond 'a patch'.
Same would/should go for the minimoog. Usage is the unknown here in this list.

If he has issue with today's 'pricing of' that's different (and he can get in line like all others).

[J.F.N.]

1 hour ago, JoJoB3 said:

The D50 and DX7 haven't been hyped? Hmmm... Well...
They aren't bad boards but they've definitely been given lip service.

I've laid ears and hands on a Prophet 5 (that wasn't even working that well) through some outboard and it was a visceral experience.
You have to know what you're listening for but point is today's hot new hardware and software isn't touching it.  It was definitely 'a thing', well beyond 'a patch'.
Same would/should go for the minimoog. Usage is the unknown here in this list.

If he has issue with today's 'pricing of' that's different (and he can get in line like all others).

 

D50 was my bread and butter for everything not Piano and Organ, for many years (in the 90's), the first days/hours of programming was pure headache, but after muscle memory had grasped the menu navigation, it became a VERY versatile machine!'

 

Now some 2-3 years ago when I decided to get back into music again, I grabbed the "Boutique" version of it, but sold it after a couple of months again, a lot has happened since the D50 was invented, and it feels very outdated in comparison with what we can do with technology of today.

 

Same thing with Triton, grabbed a Rack but it it went out the house again after some months too.

 

[Jim Alfredson]

That's a tough one. I would have to say the PolyBrute. It's like a modern Matrix-12. If rumors of the new one are true, that's the one to get. 12 voice, polyaftertouch. Yep yep yep. 

It can do pretty much everything you want an analog to do.

[CHarrell]

2 hours ago, J.F.N. said:

Same thing with Triton, grabbed a Rack but it it went out the house again after some months too.

 

My first pro board 10 years ago! I'd been tempted over the years with a Rack, but as nostalgic as I am for that blue/white screen interface and grey color scheme, I think I'll stick with the (excellent) VST version. I still find use for some of those sounds, I even used one prominently in a film score I did last year.

[J.F.N.]

54 minutes ago, CHarrell said:

 

My first pro board 10 years ago! I'd been tempted over the years with a Rack, but as nostalgic as I am for that blue/white screen interface and grey color scheme, I think I'll stick with the (excellent) VST version. I still find use for some of those sounds, I even used one prominently in a film score I did last year.

 

I was not happy with the quality of the samples, spent a lot of time trying to program something useful, but apart from ending up doing imitations of "oscillator" based sounds, which I in reality have real synths to supply me with, there was nothing of interest in it for me. 

[CHarrell]

1 minute ago, J.F.N. said:

 

I was not happy with the quality of the samples, spent a lot of time trying to program something useful, but apart from ending up doing imitations of "oscillator" based sounds, which I in reality have real synths to supply me with, there was nothing of interest in it for me. 

 

That's fair. I used the Triton (non-"synth") for "stunt" sounds: sample libraries of course have become so sophisticated and feature all kinds of programming techniques that, in exchange for stronger realism, typically forbid certain kinds of performance. With the crummier and more simplistic samples of the Triton, I was able to do thing like pitch bends on tubular bells: something technically possible on the real thing, but most advanced libraries can't (yet) reasonably accommodate. 

 

In software, it's much easier of course to take a piecemeal approach like this with sounds...can't imagine I'd want to boot up a hardware Triton for the sole purpose of getting stupid with the ROMpler sets.

[marino]

On 3/22/2024 at 12:57 AM, analogholic said:

Did you get tired of the DCO sound? Btw, did you do any of the upgrades?  PWM etc

 

No, it's more the interface that I dislike. And yes, I upgraded to Vecoven 4.0 with PWM cards.

[JoJoB3]

18 hours ago, Jim Alfredson said:

That's a tough one. I would have to say the PolyBrute. It's like a modern Matrix-12. If rumors of the new one are true, that's the one to get. 12 voice, polyaftertouch. Yep yep yep. 

It can do pretty much everything you want an analog to do.

Hmm, Immuna give one a 2nd look and trial.

[Aynsley Green]

On 3/18/2024 at 6:15 PM, jazzpiano88 said:

Same here, but fortunately I kept mine.  It needs some work, as a few voices are intermittent last time I powered it up.  

It’s a funny story a musician  borrowed it who was doubling as a cast member in a production and it came back red from stage blood.  

Talk about just the perfect simple test bed to learn synthesis as a teen!    
 

I’ve got the OB6 now that is totally enough to keep me occupied as a piano player. 

 

Agreed, I feel the OB6 is enough for what I do - cuts through the mix in the way that I have been trying to achieve on my other synths for years! Such a classy instrument.

The OB6 is very limited in ways that the System 8 is not, but the rounded 'Roland sound' is sometimes too smooth for its own good, in a live context. The plasticky build quality and the 90s Matrix looks make me reluctant to use it on stage these days, too.

 

Maybe I'll upgrade to the OBX8 one of these days if I need two sounds at once - it's just too damn big! Any opinions on that 'Cloneberheim'?
 

On 3/22/2024 at 8:06 AM, J.F.N. said:

 

I love my Prologue 16, takes me back to the realms of Prophet VS (one of my favorite synths) and I totally agree that it's an incredibly versatile machine, obviously depending on what you've got in the multi-oscillator slots can take things one step further, still, in its base configuration, an amazing synth. Will never get rid of mine!

I also bought the Prologue 16, thinking it would be the ultimate for live gigs (16 voices, VCOs, 61 keys, DSP) - but the timbre is rather moody and dark, much like its looks - fantastic for epic/filmic/warbly sounds (nails 'Blade Runner'), but not so great for live pop contexts. It might be down to the filter design, but things get very midrangey.
Some very cool stuff happening in the Logue SDK scene that take it into all kinds of interesting territory, but again, unless you bypass the analog filter it's hard to escape that 'Prologue sound'. Using the Digital Oscillators live is also a challenge, given some of them can take 10 seconds to load, if they load at all! 
Still a great synth, but a very different flavour to the others.
If the OB6 is Champagne, and the System 8 is Whiskey, then the Prologue is a Stout.

[J.F.N.]

7 hours ago, Aynsley Green said:

 

Agreed, I feel the OB6 is enough for what I do - cuts through the mix in the way that I have been trying to achieve on my other synths for years! Such a classy instrument.

The OB6 is very limited in ways that the System 8 is not, but the rounded 'Roland sound' is sometimes too smooth for its own good, in a live context. The plasticky build quality and the 90s Matrix looks make me reluctant to use it on stage these days, too.

 

Maybe I'll upgrade to the OBX8 one of these days if I need two sounds at once - it's just too damn big! Any opinions on that 'Cloneberheim'?
 

I also bought the Prologue 16, thinking it would be the ultimate for live gigs (16 voices, VCOs, 61 keys, DSP) - but the timbre is rather moody and dark, much like its looks - fantastic for epic/filmic/warbly sounds (nails 'Blade Runner'), but not so great for live pop contexts. It might be down to the filter design, but things get very midrangey.
Some very cool stuff happening in the Logue SDK scene that take it into all kinds of interesting territory, but again, unless you bypass the analog filter it's hard to escape that 'Prologue sound'. Using the Digital Oscillators live is also a challenge, given some of them can take 10 seconds to load, if they load at all! 
Still a great synth, but a very different flavour to the others.
If the OB6 is Champagne, and the System 8 is Whiskey, then the Prologue is a Stout.

 

Yes, the time needed for shifting presets definitely is a serious constraint for "real-time" usage. I keep mine in the studio, great for all sorts of crossover digital/analogue sounds, as mentioned before, feels a bit like the universe of Prophet VS.

 

 

[Stokely]

I think the Summit is great for live use.   It's quite compact though the one beef I have is that it's so knobby that you kind of lack a spot to grab it on the back and top!   The presets definitely trend toward soundscapes and downright atonal modulated sounds that, while cool, are not what I need.  Novation also has a great web-based librarian and there are a number of free (and paid) banks of sounds.  The librarian makes it very easy to preview sounds and assemble custom banks, somewhat similar to Nords....this is a highly useful feature and I really only realize this when I use keyboards that lack it (Yamaha in particular is irksome, since their workstations are complex but they provide nothing in this regard.)

It can definitely do bread and butter synth, you just wouldn't really know it when auditioning the stock presets    Unlike maybe some pure analog machines, it delves into fm and wavetable iirc.   I'm more of a preset tweaker vs sound designer or I'd know for sure what engines it has.

Unfortunately my band  just isn't doing that much synth stuff, so the engine in my Nord (which IMO does sound good) suffices.  Strongly considering bringing it back out for certain gigs but I've grown quite fond of one-keyboard quick setups/teardowns!  Especially when doing outdoor gigs.