Synths—Is it Time to Let the 1980s Go Again?

[ProfD]

9 hours ago, Thethirdapple said:

That said: what the same 1k-3k amount of money buys me today is a full blown workstation. So the value and reason of buying a Juno or any piece of vintage gear now, is not comparable by this single utility variable.

Right. That same $1k-3k can buy a brand new synth far more powerful than a Juno or any vintage piece of gear.😁😎

[JoJoB3]

I...can't bring myself to sell my hardware synths (yet, I should say).  Visually it looks like an issue but audibly a very fun issue. Each fulfilling a role.

[Thethirdapple]

Less is more…

 

There is a direct connection being made in my “self” when playing and creating sounds directly with electricity thru analog circuitry which simply isn't there for me when using a digital computer.

 

An abacus and or digital computer both provide a means to solve arithmetic, one is way faster and less prone to errors, the other tickles my intelligence and allows me the time to contemplate the journey rather than fixate on the destination.

Being “wrong” is a powerful tool at getting closer to a particular sound or thought. Being slightly “out of tune” by having that slider or knob set ever so slightly, differently from last time brings a richness to the experiences. In contrast,  pushing equal increments of single bits yield the same result no matter how slightly i nudge the knob on a digital synth the increment is never in-between 0 and 1… but hey, do I want a VCO to go horrible out of whack while playing, nope, hello DCO. And even that got poo poo’d on at the time…
 

And Im all for people hating on vintage gear, makes them wonderfully affordable! 🤫

 

As the late great Dennett would say its the “qualia”…

 

 

 

 

PEACE

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[Tusker]

3 hours ago, Thethirdapple said:

In contrast,  pushing equal increments of single bits yield the same result no matter how slightly i nudge the knob on a digital synth the increment is never in-between 0 and 1…

 

You must be referring to vintage digital synths? Thanks to a half century of Moore's Law, modern digital synths can have very high resolution.

[Stokely]

Eh, I doubt even hardcore "in the boxers" (like me) would ever hate on a room full of vintage synths   

I got to play on Arps and old Moogs and other vintage gear while at college (synth labs for the music production dept) and later ran rooms full of midi gear.  It was inspiring and definitely a fun place to be.    Flip flip side, that stuff uses a lot of power and takes up a lot of room!

Having everything on the computer--assuming you'd need the computer regardless--is way cheaper and miles more convenient if you are doing tunes with lots of tracks, that's why I stay in my box.   The sound is there, for me, or even the convenience wouldn't be enough.   But if someone else dislikes using software or digital, more power to them.  Lots of ways to skin a cat or however that saying goes.   There's part of me hoping not everyone gets like me, because then why would the synth makers keep making synths?     I get as excited as anyone when an OBX8 gets released, even if there's no way for me to justify getting one just for live gigging.
 

[Tusker]

12 minutes ago, Stokely said:

Eh, I doubt even hardcore "in the boxers" (like me) would ever hate on a room full of vintage synths   

 

👏  For sure, we've got to get past the idea of hate on one side or the other. It's about mutual love and respect. I use both types of tools. Admittedly I am more in the box these days. Still, digital synth aficionados like me can respect the vintage synth makers, players, restorers and collectors. We are kinfolk.

 

I'll be in Orlando in the middle of May. Excitedly hoping to spend a free day at Joe Rivers's museum again. It's been awhile. Hoping he's still active. 🤞 👍

[Stokely]

Whoa, I never even heard of that   Gee, I've only lived here a million years.  Yeah, don't get out much except for weekend gigs and (for the past 20 years) constant kids' soccer practices and games.

The link on that page is mighty odd, went to some Thai language page.

[Tusker]

Yes It's odd. I am going to call his number and maybe call around with some friends. Fantastic guy. I think he's still teaching at Full Sail. A couple of decades ago I was fortunate to see keyboardist Patrick Moraz at his place. But people move on. 🤞

[David Emm]

21 hours ago, Mighty Motif Max said:

For what it’s worth, I don’t even own an analog synth. FM stuff I have covered, but not analog. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t like one though. 😉

 

Heresy!

 

Eh, its all rather funny to me, because the slowly whirling cloud of my synths over the years has spun like brooms in Disney's "The Sorcerer's Apprentice." I'm slack-jawed to have a CS-80 and the super-rare Synthex with a click. Sure, I felt like a demigod while sitting in the middle of a ring of hardware goodies, part of the time. I also did a lot of screaming at MIDI splitters and disk drives that went GERNK! at the worst points, which I don't miss at all.

 

Oddly enough, that helps my composition. The energy goes into the work more. So yeah, I've hugged my synths today and pretty much every day. Its one of the best First World problems you can have. The only real constant has been keeping a main synth with welcoming keys. The rest is galactic gravy.

[David Emm]

1 hour ago, Tusker said:

I'll be in Orlando in the middle of May. Excitedly hoping to spend a free day at Joe Rivers's museum again. It's been awhile. Hoping he's still active. 🤞 👍

 

If that works out, please post a brief review. If you can manage a few pics, even better. I remain mildly dazzled by the presence of several major synth museums in the world, especially those that let you rent a classic vintage piece for a few hours. A sample-minded person with a digital recorder can end up going home with some serious treasures.

[J.F.N.]

Here's a tip for your next vacation, Switzerland, and the SMEM.

 

 

[David Emm]

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

Here's a tip for your next vacation, Switzerland, and the SMEM.

 

 

 

Those places are astounding. I can just hear 30-year-old capacitors making small crackling noises as they expire. Part of me wishes those synths could be handed to people who would play them, but maintenance of aging instruments is no small matter. That goes double with pieces so old & complex, most of the people who can repair them are already backing St. Peter on Mellotron. Still, its a beautiful collection.   

 

[Jose EB5AGV]

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

Here's a tip for your next vacation, Switzerland, and the SMEM.

 

 

 

My second daughter lives in Switzerland... Time to pay a visit 😅

[AROIOS]

12 hours ago, Thethirdapple said:

...In contrast,  pushing equal increments of single bits yield the same result no matter how slightly i nudge the knob on a digital synth the increment is never in-between 0 and 1...

 

Sorry to break it to you brother. This is just typical urban myth pushed by sentimental illiterates and snake-oil salesmen who don't understand Nyquist-Shannon Theorem or Fourier Transform.

Our human perception has quite limited resolutions. And we are highly susceptible to our mental masturbation and external suggestions. There's a good reason double blind tests became standard practice.

[J.F.N.]

5 hours ago, Jose EB5AGV said:

 

My second daughter lives in Switzerland... Time to pay a visit 😅

 

Definitely!!!

[The Real MC]

11 hours ago, Tusker said:

I'll be in Orlando in the middle of May. Excitedly hoping to spend a free day at Joe Rivers's museum again. It's been awhile. Hoping he's still active. 🤞 👍

 

I'm afraid that museum has closed at least twenty years ago after Joe went through his divorce.  He has been AWOL ever since.

That Synthmuseum.com website hasn't been updated in years.

[Thethirdapple]

11 hours ago, AROIOS said:

Sorry to break it to you brother. This is just typical urban myth pushed by sentimental illiterates and snake-oil salesmen who don't understand Nyquist-Shannon Theorem or Fourier Transform.

Our human perception has quite limited resolutions. And we are highly susceptible to our mental masturbation and external suggestions. There's a good reason double blind tests became standard practice.

The meta-awareness of forum posts never ceases to amaze…

 

Shared individual perceptions ought not be mistaken for universal truths…

 

Qualia, in my interpretation, is not a constant, nor a sensation which can be “wrong or right” as judged by others…

 

Just keep making music!!!

OH YEAH,  a double blind fold is standard practice around here! 🫣

 

 

 

PEACE

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[J.F.N.]

On 4/22/2024 at 10:30 AM, Thethirdapple said:

Less is more…

 

There is a direct connection being made in my “self” when playing and creating sounds directly with electricity thru analog circuitry which simply isn't there for me when using a digital computer.

 

An abacus and or digital computer both provide a means to solve arithmetic, one is way faster and less prone to errors, the other tickles my intelligence and allows me the time to contemplate the journey rather than fixate on the destination.

Being “wrong” is a powerful tool at getting closer to a particular sound or thought. Being slightly “out of tune” by having that slider or knob set ever so slightly, differently from last time brings a richness to the experiences. In contrast,  pushing equal increments of single bits yield the same result no matter how slightly i nudge the knob on a digital synth the increment is never in-between 0 and 1… but hey, do I want a VCO to go horrible out of whack while playing, nope, hello DCO. And even that got poo poo’d on at the time…
 

And Im all for people hating on vintage gear, makes them wonderfully affordable! 🤫

 

As the late great Dennett would say its the “qualia”…

 

 

 

 

PEACE

_
_
_

 

 

We have come very far in terms of maths for creating things that gives us the idea of an analog world, while on the other hand the strive for perfection in music production today is ridiculous. If I listen to something that was produced pre-millenium, not seldom there's an organic feeling to it, even if the music is very produced. Back in the days music was not quantized, drums, and a lot more, are as a general rule always quantized today in pop/rock music, singers did their best, multiple takes and pre-computer chomping (cut in/out on tape etc.) made vocals feel "real", today everything is beyond perfect, math is there to "save the day", always.

 

With this, I belive there is no reason to think that a perfect model of an instrument would make any difference compared to the instrument modeled, within above mentioned context. However, when sitting and fiddling with an analog synth, oftentimes we do experience the imperfections, I know for one that my Prologue, which is a hybrid, has a tendency to tune out depending on the weather, and so does my AS-1 and DM12 as well, sometimes just a little, and sometimes way out so the tuning process is a must. Everything inbetween perfect and way out is definitely an inspiration at some point, and I am not only referring to the tuning, but as a whole, I guess this is why the "vintage" knobs are a fact EVEN THOUGH they are found on analog (yet modern day made) synths.

[CyberGene]

I’m all for people having fun and feeling good, as I said previously, and there’s a lot to love in a nice vintage analog synth, however expensive it is. But I have no delusions regarding its sound. Software models are as good sounding as an analog nowadays. 

 

 

[J.F.N.]

2 minutes ago, CyberGene said:

I’m all for people having fun and feeling good, as I said previously, and there’s a lot to love in a nice vintage analog synth, however expensive it is. But I have no delusions regarding its sound. Software models are as good sounding as an analog nowadays. 

 

 

 

It's definitely impressive, we live in an era that is unparalleled to any time before when it comes to accessibility of great sounding very useful music gear, lovely time to be a creative soul!

[Tusker]

7 hours ago, The Real MC said:

I'm afraid that museum has closed at least twenty years ago after Joe went through his divorce.  He has been AWOL ever since.

 

So sorry to hear that. He hasn't been on social for about ten years AFAIK. 

[Tusker]

1 hour ago, CyberGene said:

I’m all for people having fun and feeling good, as I said previously, and there’s a lot to love in a nice vintage analog synth, however expensive it is. But I have no delusions regarding its sound. Software models are as good sounding as an analog nowadays. 

 

 

Very well said. There's a vintage car show here in the summer. One my neighbors has a Silver Ghost from the twenties which his pride and joy. When the weather is nice, he brings it out. The kids in town love to toot the rubber ball horn. I stick around when that happens. It's a great sound. At the car show, he is one of the stars. Rightly so. There's a maintenance shop here in town, which helps keep his car running, year after year. For them, it's a labor of love.

 

Similarly, I reckon old analog vintage synths will become more and more prized inside smaller and smaller milieus. There's no doubting their immense capabilities and character, some from the design, some from the aging of the circuits. Every succeeding generation owes the early synth-makers a debt of gratitude: for the imagination, the courage, the example. That's why I love to play the old synths when I can.

 

Can I replicate their sound? Never to a 100% to be honest. But what I love is the music, and modern instruments have a ton of character also, if you are willing to put it in. The key ingredients for character are imperfection and eccentricity in my experience. Today, if I am imitating a drum loop as it might have been performed with an Akai S900, I might want to downsample it to 12 bits. To add some crustiness. To get some character. If I am imitating vintage analog oscillators on a modern analog synth, I've been known to send tiny amounts of white noise into the pitch modulation CV of the synth. To create some jitter. To get some character.

[J.F.N.]

1 hour ago, Tusker said:

Can I replicate their sound? Never to a 100% to be honest. But what I love is the music, and modern instruments have a ton of character also, if you are willing to put it in. The key ingredients for character are imperfection and eccentricity in my experience. Today, if I am imitating a drum loop as it might have been performed with an Akai S900, I might want to downsample it to 12 bits. To add some crustiness. To get some character. If I am imitating vintage analog oscillators on a modern analog synth, I've been known to send tiny amounts of white noise into the pitch modulation CV of the synth. To create some jitter. To get some character.

 

Exactly that, same kind of things I do when replicating analog synth sounds on digital machines, adding pitch modulation of some sort in some way, if possible slightly modulating envelope times at certain events, etc. all to try to get the imperfection, the feeling of things not being too static, alive, and as we say indeed, character...

 

For sure the reason round robin was invented, adding a way for samplers to represent real world sounds in a less static way...

 

[My Keys And Me Are Vintage]

I am also of the group that drooled over the glossy magazine ads for new gear in the 80’s. Way, way out of my price range back then. But i enjoy the hell out of finding well-used neglected old synths cheap now and bringing them back to life. But as we age out, the interest in the old gear will age out, too. Sitting behind the wheel of a 1973 Mercury Cougar convertible will always be a sweet joy, but not so much when sitting in a 1953 convertible; I have no emotional attachment to things before my generation. My son has no interest in knowing that this synth over here had the first sequencer built in, or the res knob on this synth could do crazy sounds, or this is the synth sound used on Ronnie James Dio albums. All he knows is it’s a bunch of dusty old stuff his father spends too much time fixing and cleaning. I still have hope for a nephew or grandchild to show interest!

 

But how to compare to a computer VST? There is a smell to an old synth, a feel, a scratch on the display from that crazy drunk chick falling on my stuff. Will the kids in twenty years have sentimental feelings over software they used in 2024? Time will tell. But these old synths will not last forever and those that remain will stay desirable and valuable to those of us who remember their glory days! 

[Jose EB5AGV]

34 minutes ago, My Keys And Me Are Vintage said:

I am also of the group that drooled over the glossy magazine ads for new gear in the 80’s. Way, way out of my price range back then. But i enjoy the hell out of finding well-used neglected old synths cheap now and bringing them back to life. But as we age out, the interest in the old gear will age out, too. Sitting behind the wheel of a 1973 Mercury Cougar convertible will always be a sweet joy, but not so much when sitting in a 1953 convertible; I have no emotional attachment to things before my generation. My son has no interest in knowing that this synth over here had the first sequencer built in, or the res knob on this synth could do crazy sounds, or this is the synth sound used on Ronnie James Dio albums. All he knows is it’s a bunch of dusty old stuff his father spends too much time fixing and cleaning. I still have hope for a nephew or grandchild to show interest!

 

But how to compare to a computer VST? There is a smell to an old synth, a feel, a scratch on the display from that crazy drunk chick falling on my stuff. Will the kids in twenty years have sentimental feelings over software they used in 2024? Time will tell. But these old synths will not last forever and those that remain will stay desirable and valuable to those of us who remember their glory days! 

 

I have had another hobby since I was a boy, electronics. It specialised in amateur radio and test equipment gear and I collected and fixed tons of related things for decades. That was the starting point of my 22 years of R&D work and also of my current electronics home lab (already for 12 years), where I develop my current job. So I can't really be angry about all those things which helped me to build my career. But, as happens with old synths, younger people just don't care about those nicely built HP / Tektronix/ Marconi ... generators, oscilloscopes and analysers, built to last using the very best materials, as gold plated PCB contacts, Teflon covered coaxial wires, heavy aluminium cast chassis and such. So now I have a warehouse full of yesteryear electronics which nobody but I seems to care about 🤔

 

It is not just for the large amount of money I have spent on that gear, which in perspective is as money burnt, but the lack of appreciation by my children / wife and by people in general, makes me sad, as the only way out is to trash most of it.

 

I hope my growing collection of music gear does not end in a similar way. I am mostly interested on 80s plus synths (lots of them bought faulty and fixed by me) and accessories (well, and also some guitars, electronic drums, EWIs, amplifiers, ... 😬). My idea is to clean up the currently area full of radio and test gear and convert it into a music studio plus storage area for music gear. At least I will be able to use it and, in the future, my heirs can do what they wish with all of that (I hope it keeps some value so they can cash it, but don't lose my sleep for it 😅)

 

Anyway, what would be of us without our toys? 😉

[J.F.N.]

58 minutes ago, Jose EB5AGV said:

 

I have had another hobby since I was a boy, electronics. It specialised in amateur radio and test equipment gear and I collected and fixed tons of related things for decades. That was the starting point of my 22 years of R&D work and also of my current electronics home lab (already for 12 years), where I develop my current job. So I can't really be angry about all those things which helped me to build my career. But, as happens with old synths, younger people just don't care about those nicely built HP / Tektronix/ Marconi ... generators, oscilloscopes and analysers, built to last using the very best materials, as gold plated PCB contacts, Teflon covered coaxial wires, heavy aluminium cast chassis and such. So now I have a warehouse full of yesteryear electronics which nobody but I seems to care about 🤔

 

It is not just for the large amount of money I have spent on that gear, which in perspective is as money burnt, but the lack of appreciation by my children / wife and by people in general, makes me sad, as the only way out is to trash most of it.

 

I hope my growing collection of music gear does not end in a similar way. I am mostly interested on 80s plus synths (lots of them bought faulty and fixed by me) and accessories (well, and also some guitars, electronic drums, EWIs, amplifiers, ... 😬). My idea is to clean up the currently area full of radio and test gear and convert it into a music studio plus storage area for music gear. At least I will be able to use it and, in the future, my heirs can do what they wish with all of that (I hope it keeps some value so they can cash it, but don't lose my sleep for it 😅)

 

Anyway, what would be of us without our toys? 😉

 

Even if I had ridiculous amounts of cash, I would not stoop to the idea of buying old classic synths en masse, as already mentioned several times in the conversation there is a lot of service and maintenance required, and it won't get less with time. I could imagine grabbing a Matrix 12, a Jupiter 6, and a Prophet VS, as those are my all time favorite synths, and there is nothing like them on the market so far, and get them fully renovated and all components up to scratch, then use them a lot to make them stick alive. Though more realistically, my hope is that Uli will do something about this during the next years, please take my credit card!! I don't care about the nostalgia or economical value of them, I just want the machines to play with in their full body of features and sound character, yummmmmy!!!

 

 

[RABid]

Problems in my early keyboard playing days. (Early 1980's)

Figuring out how to make my mini Casio sound like a real piano while saving for that $4000 CP70.

Keeping analogs in tune.

Scrambling to program the synth sounds for the next song in a 5 second break.

Getting someone to help you move a Hammond, Leslie, Rhodes and a variety of synths.

Choosing between better gear, or buying a house.

 

Problems for new keyboardist today.

Managing 4000 presets in a single keyboard.

Deciding which sub-$1000 do it all keyboard to buy.

Choosing between an iPad, MacBookAir, or a Korg module to expand the sound pallet.

 

Every day I wonder what it would have been like to start my keyboard journey with a Fantom 7.

[Stokely]

Beyond analog vs digital, workstation vs simple synth, one thing I definitely appreciate:  build quality.

Other than the key feel, this doesn't make a ton of logical sense--once the thing is on a stand, does it matter if it's metal and wood, or cheap plastic?  For me, whatever the reason, it does.   I never have warmed up to my Modx7 despite the fact that it's really a powerhouse of sound and functionality.  

Logic and reason sometimes get checked at the door    I have friends who hardly have Scrooge McDuck money yet buy or lease luxury cars.  I'm NOT a car person, it just needs to get me there reliably. But that's their thing, to each their own  

[synthdogg]

Man, I feel like I've really been on a journey with this in the last couple of decades. There are so many great sounding synth options in the world right now between modern hardware, vintage hardware, and software, that I have to admit that for myself....sound is not the chief driver of why I buy (or hang on to) hardware keyboards anymore. There's a LOT of psychology involved, and I respond differently as a musician to different instruments. I play differently if I'm playing my Prophet 10 and adjusting knobs on the fly than if I'm playing a Prophet 5 plug in from a controller. It's not because one is better than the other, it's just how I'm responding to it in the moment. I still love my Juno 60 and keep it super close at all times because it's just so easy and fast to turn and flip a few faders and have a musical, usable sound. 

 

When I read message boards and read people getting into the minutiae about why the vintage version of Synth X is better than the reissue of Synth X, which is WAY better than the software version of Synth X I think we've lost the plot, and at some point we're just arguing to argue and may as well be talking about politics or religion. What inspires you? What makes you smile as you create? This is music, it's supposed to be fun. Yeah, most of us have some types of gigs that we need tools for just to get the job done...I get it. Sometimes I will choose a tool that's more convenient than fun for those moments, but that is not the whole of me as a musician. I really just want to play, and I want to have fun and be inspired while I make music...so I'm going to make sure I have access to instruments that are fun and inspiring for me. 

[EscapeRocks]

19 minutes ago, synthdogg said:

When I read message boards and read people getting into the minutiae about why the vintage version of Synth X is better than the reissue of Synth X, which is WAY better than the software version of Synth X I think we've lost the plot, and at some point we're just arguing to argue and may as well be talking about politics or religion. What inspires you? What makes you smile as you create? This is music, it's supposed to be fun. Yeah, most of us have some types of gigs that we need tools for just to get the job done...I get it. Sometimes I will choose a tool that's more convenient than fun for those moments, but that is not the whole of me as a musician. I really just want to play, and I want to have fun and be inspired while I make music...so I'm going to make sure I have access to instruments that are fun and inspiring for me. 

Yes

 

I've learned as I get older:  Get what you want/like.  Don't worry about what anyone else thinks about your choice of instrument because, frankly, it just doesn't matter.

Just look at my current sig line under "gig rig"  

 

It's like synthdogg said above, "I really just want to play, and I want to have fun and be inspired while I make music...so I'm going to make sure I have access to instruments that are fun and inspiring for me. "