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The next half of my two part rack that I wish to build in the next year.
I absolutely fell in love with noise engineering stuff recently, as well as the Wogglebug and uBraids.
Should be a fun mixture of percussive sounds and analog crazy shit...

EDITED Mar 9th 2021, 15:26

Hey guys,

I planned this minimal system for very specific generative music purposes.

I wanted to limit myself to this tiny 42hp case by Erica Synth.
Beehive (Plaits clone) mainly in chord mode (I'm considering a Rings clone too, but Plaits is maybe more versatile), Monsoon for granular processing and reverb, Doepfer A-145-4 quad LFO for slow off-phase modulation on several parameters (so that the LFOs never come perfectly back into sync with each other): the goal is to achieve Brian Eno-inspired generative ambient / drone stuff, like he did with tape loops. That's it, really straightforward.
Then Ornament Crime for additional modulation, cross-modulation, random, envelopes, basic sequencing and so on; I'm also controlling stuff with the Doepfer dual VCA. Clock comes from a square wave LFO. I'm considering flashing the Hemisphere firmware to have more options on the Ornament, but I'm not sure.

So, I have 4hp left: what should I add? I was thinking maybe of some kind of attenuators / attenuverters to have more control on the CV, aside of the VCAs... or maybe a filter? What do you think?
Thanks.

EDITED Mar 9th 2021, 14:33

Thanks Garfield. Check out the new updated version of the recording. I thought the first version was a bit too high pitched, so I did a few more performance recordings of the very same patch, but with a lot of subtle differences including dropping an octave on the Mother 32, reducing the resonance on the QPAS, reducing the Maths controlled warble on the Mother 32, reduction of the level and repeats on the Mimeophon. Then I layered the multiple takes and have them slowly fading in and out over one main take. So in this version we have one main modular take, and two additional takes layered on top, and of course the birds. I pushed the birds up in the mix so you can now hear more of what they were doing. There's a lot more audible in this version. BTW - you'll hear some random clicks - those are birds landing on my feeder. :-)

Hi,
Faceplate with Cyclonix is the oldest version.
It runs the same firmware.

If the power consumption can be tallied in real time at the bottom of the rack, could it be possible to display a little window with the power specs to one side of each row? I know there's a way to see this on another page, but it would be helpful to not have to keep jumping back & forth between those pages.

Row title would be cool too, in the view described above AND/OR in the "show data" page.

I would say these feature requests ought to be Unicorn features.

EDITED Mar 9th 2021, 18:04

Oh wow, that's a serious beauty that Soundcraft Five series. With 54 frames you mean 54 faders? That's a beast of a machine!

Misspoke...it's actually a 52 frame. This means, yep, 52 faders besides the center routing/master section...48 mono, 4 stereo.

Hold on... 400 lbs that's I guess getting close to 200 kilograms! That's a serious thing, did you hire a crane to first remove the roof of your house and then let the desk go down into your house or how did you manage to transport such a beast? I live in that kind of cheap build new houses where everything is built just at minimum specs to keep the house standing but that's it, I think if I would put somewhere a 200 kg mixer I think it goes through my ceilings ending up flatting my coffee table in the living room! ;-)

My house is fairly typical mid-century suburban construction, with the section the studio's in dating from 1971. This is about the end-point for codes standards that would let you put something like this in without eventual structural damage. Further on into the 1970s, structural codes started to get lax, so that by the 1980s you wouldn't DARE do something like this. Plus, the whole thing, plus the patchbays and the computer work surfaces are on a large, multi-part BenchPro Dewey setup that can hold 2 1/2 TONS per unit. It ain't goin' NOWHERE!

FYI, see here for BenchPro stuff. When I got mine, they still sold direct, but you can find their stuff here: https://www.gotopac.com/benchpro-workbenches

As for these sort of things not being around im Deutschland, check THIS out: ujAAAOSwJ5BeHEks" target="_blank">https://www.ebay.de/itm/Mischpult-Allen-Head-ML-3000-832B-Kanal-Live-Mixer-mit-RPS-11/174154405138?hash=item288c695512ujAAAOSwJ5BeHEks It's in Baden-Baden, only EUR 1500. The Allen + Heath ML series was also in the running here for the upgrade, and while I was looking at the ML 5000, the 3000 is its little brother. And this thing is CHERRY...yeah, the deals are out there, just have to root thru the dross to find the GOLD.

EDITED Mar 9th 2021, 02:36

Oh, speaking of Takaab, they dropped something last week (I think) that ought to be on your watchlist, greenfly...and that's their new VLH module. You get a ring mod, noise gen, and most germaine here, a 1 and 2 octave suboscillator...in a whopping 2 hp. As someone who really enjoys the suboscillator capabilities of certain Roland synths (SH-101 and MC-202 most notably), the ability to drop that bass in parallel to another higher line just drives crowds NUTS.

Hi Garfield,

Thanks for the comments and kind words.

Seems like it comes out of both channels when I record but it only comes out of the left channel once I finish and press play.
I'll look into fixing it for next time, did some research but couldn't find a proper solution.

TL

Hi TeenageLarvae,

Ha, ha, sounds to me like a radio that has been broken ;-)

By the way, I only hear your noises coming through the left channel, is that a wanted result? Kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Lugia,

Oh wow, that's a serious beauty that Soundcraft Five series. With 54 frames you mean 54 faders? That's a beast of a machine! :-)

I just had a quick look here in Germany on eBay so far couldn't find much that's affordable, I found two serious large studio racks, used at about 18k Euro... not the prices you are talking about. Looks like there is a different market between the USA and Europe. Will check out further this week into this though.

Hold on... 400 lbs that's I guess getting close to 200 kilograms! That's a serious thing, did you hire a crane to first remove the roof of your house and then let the desk go down into your house or how did you manage to transport such a beast? I live in that kind of cheap build new houses where everything is built just at minimum specs to keep the house standing but that's it, I think if I would put somewhere a 200 kg mixer I think it goes through my ceilings ending up flatting my coffee table in the living room! ;-)

That Five mixer is just fantastic to look at, so I can imagine, or exactly I don't think I really can imagine, how fantastic that must be in usage, lovely! :-) Well done deal for S$ 1500! Have fun with it and I hope your floor can hold the weight ;-) Kind regards, Garfield.

Some simple more deliberate patching this time.

Used a stacking cable for the FM receiver which I jacked into the Cutoff for the Spectral Devastator and into the CV input of the Worm.
Worm went through the filter which was in it's turn is connected the ADDAC300.

The result is...unpleasant.

We don't have photos for all the panels but we'll work on getting some of the more popular ones up. Product photos are costly, so we may take a little while to knock them all out...but we're #workinonit :)

Guys and gals, I don't know how I lived without this little game-changer for so long. If you have multiple trigger sources and/or are programming techno drums on the fly, this is a must have. Cheap, small, passive... it's a no-brainer for me. This is exactly what I needed for a live rig. Highly recommended.

same for the black zularic repetitor I have!

I don't have a passive lpg - but I completely agree that they can replace vcas in some cases - mostly audio I would supect

still need vcas though - for modulating the modulation, non-filtered audio etc etc

Was actually wondering the same thing about the NE Ataraxic Translatron.
The empty panel looks so silly next to the rest of modules in my MG racks. Haha.

Great suggestion @brunomolteni, I love my Takaab LPGs.

Is there a way to upload a panel alternative with all the jacks and sliders present?
This module being manufactor approved makes it impossible at the moment, and the "empty" module looks wierd in a full rack.

you could kill two birds with one stone using passive LPGs instead of VCAs, if used for handling volume of different layers then LPG are great because you could potentially save on envelopes even, just send a trigger out of LL8 into the LPG voltage control and it should decay with a natural envelope, so you get vca + envelope in a tiny space, for example I bought a couple of takaab's LPG and they are 2hp for 2 LPGs, and it even comes with TONE control, so you can have longer or shorter decays... I've been using these since I got them and I love the sound of it.

Yes, learning the basics is in my roadmap, I'll check it out. Thanks!

a-116, a-136, a-137-1, a-137-2 are the ones I have

the maths illustrated guide is a collection of 32 self-patches for maths

this introduces patch programming of a single module (maths obviously) and will massively help in terms of how you think about patching overall - especially in terms of constructing complex functions from simple building blocks - this is a key skill for modular synthesis - which is why I always recommend maths as the first modulation source - even if you have lfos and envelope generators, mixers and attenuverters - get maths!!! there is nothing wrong with overlap of functionality, especially when it comes to modulation and utilities

matrix mixer:
mix copies of modulation sources to increase the number of modulation sources you have

feedback mixing - mix 3 inputs with an output - possibly filtering or otherwise modifying the output before mixing it back in

use to set up send/returns for effects - ie stereo signal in to 1 & 2 output of 1 & 2 to effect effect back into 3 & 4 inputs - mix 1 & 3 and 2 & 4 to outputs 3 & 4 (or similar with mono signals, more effects etc etc)

and whatever else you would use a mixer for...

the main disadvantage of the Doepfer Matrix Mixer is size (takes a lot of hp - 20!)

the main advantage of the Doefper Matrix Mixer is size (ergonomics)

Currently I have 3 matrix mixers - a pusherman, a york modular and a reverse landfill video matrix, I can see myself adding the doepfer, as well, at some point in the future!

VCAs - 2 for audio & 2 for modulation per voice - is a good starting point...

1 vca for basic note on/off
1 vca for overall volume - so you can bring the voice in/out
1 vca for modulation
1 vca for modulating the modulation
OR just 2 for modulation

not all voices will need 4 vcas, but some may need 10 - depemnding on hoow much modulation/modulation the modulation you do!

once you get into the technique of modulating modulation - you use a lot of vcas!!!!!

Veils is a great VCA - I don't have the new version but I do have 3 of the older version (I haven't counted, but I think I have over 40 vcas including those embedded in plaits, for example)

EDITED Mar 8th 2021, 15:38

This version has interresting patch notes. A lot of information in this muff thread.

EDITED Mar 8th 2021, 15:10

Thankyou Farkas, Lugia, troux, 33PO, Jim for the responses.

Ok so for VCA's, I am pretty set on the new veils, which gives me 4 of them ( is this a good choice?), The means with the two built into Braids and Plaits, I have 8 of them. ( Eudemonia and Behringer)... but honestly on the modulation front, I like doing all this kind of stuff in Bitwig and it's what I specifically bought the ES-8 for :)

FX Aid XL for fx which Lugia suggested to me before. It's leading me down the path of having the track pretty much ready on each channel with the only extra bit required being general mixing tasks in the DAW. I have a whole heap of UAD plugins and pretty much everything from Plugin Alliance as these serve me well on that front and is why I am inclined on wanting to carry on using these as I am competent with doing stuff inside DAWS.

I have the Quadrax on my wish list as again Lugia suggested this but on other threads I have seen Jim mention the illustrated manual for Maths an so bought that ( this was a good decision ) and although I said I don't want to know everything, I still need to know/understand the why a little bit better.

Jim- Which ones are the others please? I was including this one in my list A136, which I can get for £60. Lugia, I think the HP is putting me off on the Tip Top one and if I want to generate sub, the new BASS Mint plugin from Unfiltered Audio is excellent for this side. I also like the effect of wavefolding when its not extreme, so I think for the price and from what I have heard on demos, this A136 looks like it will be the one, but I'm curious about the other 3 Doepfer ones now. I have kinks and it's reading yours and Jim's posts that made me look into both of these so I'm glad I bought them.

Please someone tell me what I am able to do with a matrix mixer? ....and is the Doepfer one a good one to have? Again fairly inexpensive so I think I'd go for this.

I may have to park my drum rack and just use the Digitakt for this side which I'm enjoying. Parameter locks baby :)

EDITED Mar 8th 2021, 19:07

Many thanks for the above comments. In another forum someone has said I shouldn't be using a sequencer for a true Krell patch, which is probably true. I need to go back to Todd Barton's video tutorial and study it.

Thank you Garfield! Glad you enjoyed them. :)

Thank, guys!

I like all the doepfer wavefolders - I have all 4 - but I use them for video

They can be picked up very cheaply used - so are worth a try - even if you resell them

for audio I'd pick one of the other ones though - or a Befaco Chopping Kinky

I'd also want more basic utilities for modulation purposes - kinks and a matrix mixer would go a long way, possibly a sequential switch

EDITED Mar 8th 2021, 08:10

+1 for Bastl Waver

Yes @Lugia, the Random*Source Wave Multiplier is topnotch, big vote from me for that one.

I got a new desk last year...or rather, a new "vintage" desk: a 54-frame Soundcraft FIVE. Most people would tend to think this is a live desk, but the truth is that it ALSO makes for a fantastic studio console with a lot of flexible routing trickery...pair this with an ample patchbay setup, and you can go BONKERS on all of the AUX routing possibilities, the inserts on pretty much everything, the capabilities of the VCA groupings, and on and on...

But the kicker was the price: $1500. Why that cheap? Well...in live sound right now, there's a trend toward digital desks. They're lighter, easier to set up in a high-pressure live situation, and can store loads of settings. Great for live work, but kinda meh for studio. But the FIVE has epic amounts of analog knobs and such, not touchscreens and assignable controls that can get in the way in studio work. Yeah, sure...it weighs about 400 lbs (out of its road case...IN the road case, it's closer to 600), has a couple of big (albeit much quieter than I'd expected) power supplies (one is "hot", the other is normally in "standby" in case the other poops out, which is something you need for live work to keep from cancelling gigs), took TWO moving crews to get into my studio, and it requires a super-hefty stand to support its weight. Even with these hassles and what seem like shortcomings, though, this is probably the very best thing I've EVER mixed on...and that includes classic Sphere and Auditronics desks, Jeep Harned's Woodland Sound "arch-top" prototype, lots of more recent things (including a VERY hateful Yamaha automated desk as well as a very nice Neotek w/ "flying faders")...it even kicks the crap out of MTSU's venerable old Harrison quad desk, which I thought was killer UNTIL THIS.

As a result, I'd strongly suggest looking into some large-format live desks along the lines of the FIVE. Hell, you can find grand old pre-Uli Midas Heritage desks for under $5k if you really dig hard enough. F'rinstance, here's a 48-in Heritage 3000 for only $4k: https://reverb.com/item/38395868-midas-heritage-3000-2012-purple If you buy something like this, do make sure that it was properly taken care of; if it looks banged-up, knobs and fader caps missing, etc etc...give that a pass. But if you really dig hard on eBay, Reverb, and a few gear broker sites, and if you know the sort of configuration you need, you can make out like a bandit right now!

Well, on the waveshaper thing...I'm not quite so jazzed by the Doepfer stuff here. It's basic, inexpensive...but rather simplistic when compared to a lot of other possibilities. The Tiptop has the ability to throw two waveforms at each other via its dual inputs, plus you also get a suboscillator divider...this is similar to Antimatter's Crossfold, albeit considerably cheaper. Also, that new Intellijel Bifold is pretty attractive...it's similar to the Tiptop in some ways, but it offers a CVable crossfader to shift between timbres.

But don't neglect a few others if you can cram 'em in...most notably Random*Source's Eurorack clones of the Serge TWS and VCM, Dannysound's DIY clone of the Buchla 259's timbre section, Bastl's Waver which offers wavefolding AND VCO mixing, or Circuit Abbey's Gravity Well, which does what they refer to as "asymmetrical" wavefolding. Nice stuff...just depends on what space you've got plus which sort of "school of thought" you'd like to follow as far as the circuit's concerned.

wow, thanks. i have a lot of things to ponder now. i am definitely going to make some changes. i appreciate everyone's input and i think i have a much better idea about things now. I'll probably post again once i have a 'final' setup.

Great sounds once again. I swear the Serge stuff just sounds so natural. Woody and watery. Awesome.
-- farkas

Not surprising if you know the history...Serge Tcherepnin cooked up a set of basic modules with a lot of the sound based on Buchla gear. He came up with it because there was too much squabbling going on over CalArts' Buchla gear, so what he did was to set up an ad hoc "assembly line" that had builders setting up soldering stations on courtyard balconies there, passing the modules from one balcony to the next...builders paid for the boards and components, plus a prepunched panel full of holes which you then covered with a paper control panel layout then jammed the pot shafts and jacks through this.

Quite an interesting cast of characters were in the assembly line, too...two that I know of offhand were Kevin Braheny (best known for his Hearts of Space releases back in the 1980s/90s) and Chaz Smith (instrument builder and steel guitarist extraordinaire). But that Serge sound owes a lot to the Buchla 100 and the beginnings of the 200 systems.

Yeah...I don't recommend putting diagnostic gear into a functional synth build...but if you DO have a large setup, having a little "test pod" like this is damned useful. For one thing, it's small enough that you can move it around to where it's needed. And the O'Tool's functions are also pretty useful for checking calibration, etc on most ANY musical instrument, so this is set up so that it'll take any typical synth patchcable and you can still set up the 3.5mms on the pod to do any sort of test you'd normally do with a NON-modular synth. Plus, if you want to "relic" some calibration settings on a synth so that you've got a bit more of an "aged component" sound, you WILL need several instruments such as a frequency counter, voltmeter, o-scope and so on...or, just this pod.

Hi Mowse,

Wow, that's fantastic, congratulations on your album! Your above track is amazing... are you going to release this on CD and/or record, if yes, please let me know how/where to get this?

Thank you very much for sharing and kind regards, Garfield.

Nice patch!

EDITED Mar 8th 2021, 11:24

Hi Sacguy71,

Interesting post, I am about going the same path as you do, looking into a new studio setup with lots of things to consider... (lots of work and time)

For a board I am looking for a digital one, not much on the market though. I end up with either the PreSonus - StudioLive Series III or with the Allen & Heath - SQ series (the QU series is nice however not as flexible as the SQ series and just flat stiff compared to the very flexible PreSonus). Both are expensive however the Allen & Heath is topping that, not only with the mixers but with the Staging-boxes as well, kind of "forcing" me to end up most likely with a StudioLive board.

Pros and cons I see between those two, I focussed here on the main parameters however if I have overlooked an important one, anyone, please feel free to mention it:

• 48 channels on all models of Allen & Heath's SQ series, 32 channels on 32x StudioLive boards and 64 channels on 64S
• 24 DCAs for StudioLive and 8 DCAs (and 8 mute groups) for SQ
• 8 FX channels for SQ series, 4 FX channels for all StudioLive Series III models except 64S that has 8 too
• (Flexible) Mixes most StudioLive have 16, the 64S has 32, the SQ series have 12 mixes
• User definable keys, SQ has 16 of them and StudioLive has 8
• Allen & Heath SQ series SQ6 has 4 definable encoders and SQ7 has 8 definable encoders, the StudioLive mixers have none
• Allen & Heath stage boxes are quite expensive, PreSonus not only has cheaper stage boxes, rack mixers can be used as stage boxes as well
• Allen & Heath without extension card the board's USB can "only" handle 32x32 channels, PreSonus 64x64 standard
• Allen & Heath is very much oriented for right-handed persons (I am a left-handed person), PreSonus does that as well but less "heavy" as Allen & Heath
• Allen & Heath has the option to add a Dante optional card so one is ready for the (future) audio networking, PreSonus doesn't offer Dante at all (not onboard at least) and one has to use PreSonus' AVB networking. Just recently PreSonus came out with the AVB-D16 "Dante Bridge" as PreSonus calls it; in that way one can use StudioLive boards in a Dante audio network

Well there are tons of parameters more you can compare, I made quite a big spreadsheet for myself to compare the bigger models from SQ series and StudioLive and on some levels Allen & Heath seems to be better to me and on other levels the PreSonus seems to be better. What I feel interesting is that the PreSonus StudioLive Series III seems to be a lot more flexible then the SQ series from Allen & Heath. Allen & Heath SQ series managed to be much more flexible than the older QU series however to me it looks that it can't compete with the flexibility of the StudioLive series III. Flexibility seems to be important to me.

Well, that are my 2 cents ;-) Good luck and please keep us updated with what you end up with. Kind regards, Garfield.

YEAH!!! Congrats!
I'll listen to this on my commute tomorrow. The first track sounds great.

Hi TumeniKnobs,

Hoooo-ooooh, that's a nice relaxed track and this touch with the birds is just lovely. It's already Sunday and the end of the weekend, asking the sandman soon to fill up my eyes, your track definitely will help me in a beautiful closure of this fantastic weekend, thanks to you! :-)

Thank you and kind regards, Garfield.

Thank you both.
I like the sort of Fluxus approach to creating a one-take, living, flowing sound with all of the dirt and ugliness left intact. @troux, the drone siren sound is a rare overdub from the Prophet. I'm usually super uninspired if I sit down with a plan and start overdubbing tracks, so I typically only record and share when I feel a certain energy. It feels naked and authentic for me to approach music that way (even if it demands patience on the part of the listener. Haha).
Thanks again, and have a great week.

Hi ModLifeCrisis,

Nice track and Plaits is indeed an interesting module, I use it most of the times as well, there is always a nice (unexpected) sound coming out of it.

Thank you very much for sharing this and kind regards, Garfield.

Six months in the making, my first modular synthesizer album: Reticulating Splines. This is collection of eight tracks explores vast spaces and distant points of light. I hope you enjoy it.

Hi Farkas,

He, he, yeah! Nice long track, bit dirty but still easily within the acceptable, I don't mind to hear more of that kind of dirt :-)

Well, thanks a lot for sharing "your dirt" ;-) and kind regards, Garfield.

Nice tune @farkas, I'm really appreciating the sound design in this one, that faint background howl/drone is a great icing on the cake to the gritty vibes here. You need to post more often!

I’m yet to buy a wavefolder but still deciding between tip top, Intellijel and Doepfer . Any suggestions?

I would recommend taking a look at the Joranalogue Fold 6. I'm very impressed with that one.
Do I need more vca’s I have two built into Braids and Plaits?

Yes. If you would like to modulate your modulators... fade LFOs in and out, etc.
Is there an advantage to buying a dedicated fx module, like fx aid xl?

I think so. Modular effects typically allow for CV control of multiple parameters. That's not something you get with pedals or most other hardware. You can automate things in your DAW, but that's not as fun. :)

I’m finding that a lot of my patches somehow end up using maths in the signal path and I end up messing with that thing for hours as soon as I see another flashing blinking light show up which as a jack near it. What else is like this?

Quadrax with the Qx expander, Stages, and Befaco Rampage come to mind. There are plenty of cool modulation sources that would benefit from the addition of logic modules and a small matrix mixer too.

-- greenfly

Have fun and good luck!

Hi Baltergeist,

Oh that are three lovely tracks. The tension and the atmosphere you build up there are just fantastic! For me that sounds like great sound tracks for a great movie :-) The "Murder Hornet Draft" is for me my favourite number one, lovely track!

Thanks a lot for sharing this and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Brunomolteni,

That's an interesting jam you got there! He, he, the first few minutes when listening to your jam it somehow reminds me a bit of the older Dead Can Dance style of music ;-) Just a bit of Lisa's Gerrard voice and that's it mate :-)

Thanks a lot for sharing this and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Lugia,

That's a very interesting idea indeed. Thank you very much for sharing this with us :-) Kind regards, Garfield.

Great sounds once again. I swear the Serge stuff just sounds so natural. Woody and watery. Awesome.

Hi Steve,

Oh, that's a great sound! Yummy :-)

Can't you do a bit more of that sound? It's a sound that begs for more! Thanks a lot and I hope to hearing more from your Serge style, kind regards, Garfield.