MATRIXSYNTH Turned 12 Today!

Yep, we are almost a teenager. I'm going to keep this post super short compared to previous years, where I went into a long diatribe about what this site is about. I'm guessing if you are here, you already know. If not, be sure to come back often, and stick around for a bit. :)

I do want to thank ALL of you, the readers and contributors of the site. It's an incredibly flattering and humbling experience to realize how many people take time out of their busy schedules to both visit, and contribute to the site on a daily basis. I hope this site, and what goes up, makes your day just a little bit better. I want to thank the people that create the content that gets featured on the site - all the makers and users of the gear we love. We sometimes take things for granted, but honestly, it's only been 12 years since we have been able to see and share so much in our world of synths. This site started at the birth of media sharing sites like YouTube, and before SoundCloud. The purpose of this site is to showcase our world. Be sure to support others when you can. I hope this site does.

Finally, I want to thank all of the sponsors you see on the site, and of course all of the supporting members of MATRIXSYNTH. Without your support this site simply would not be possible. Thank you so much!

P.S. We are at well over 150,000 posts and counting! :)

MATRIXSYNTH Turns 7!!!

Today marks the seven year anniversary of MATRIXSYNTH! The original matrixsynth.com actually launched way back in October of 1997 as MATRIX SYNTH. I never took it down, BTW. Click here to see it in all it's old school glory. If you thought there was too much green on this site, just check that baby out. BTW, check out the manufacturers list under MFG. I stopped updating it about the time I started this site in 2005. You can see what modular manufactures, and of course others were around back then. It's an interesting look back in time... Kind of why I started this version of the site actually. I'll get to that further below.

Last year I skipped the site stats and kept the anniversary post relatively short. I used to post stats for the site and a general blurb on what makes the site tick, but it began to feel redundant so I skipped it last year. Well, I kind of missed it, and I know some of you enjoy the stats thing, so I'm bringing it back. And CatSynth did it for their six year anniversary post yesterday, so there you have it. Actually I was planning on including stats before I read that post, but I do like CatSynth. The site has grown quite a bit and we have a ton of new readers who don't really know the background of MATRIXSYNTH so I thought I would share some of that as well. I've also had a few people ask me to do personal interviews. I always turn them down as I do my best to keep myself out of the site so I don't ruin it for anyone. It's kind of like the whole Wizard of Oz thing. Enjoy the Oz in MATRIXYSNTH, and don't let the wizard ruin it for you is my only advice. That said, I decided this year to reveal a little more about my synth history than I normally do. Don't worry though after this post that's it. This site is about the gear only. I see it as my job to bring it to you unbiased and get the heck out of the way. Seriously though, I really do my best to present what is out there free of bias for you to consume and form your own opinion. I do this for three reasons; one, out of respect for the person that created the content, two, so I don't accidentally prevent you from getting your own experience out of the post, and three, because of how much goes up on a daily basis - it saves you and me time.

But, in the anniversary and New Years posts I do tend to make up for my lack of words big time, so bear with me or just skip to what you like.

Before I begin with the stats I do want to give a big thanks to everyone that visits, supports and contributes to the site. THANK YOU!!! It really is a tremendous amount of work, so all the kind words and support make a huge difference. Every single post you see here is hand posted. There is no automation. The site takes roughly four to eight hours on average a day (closer to eight) and sometimes up to ten hours. This is every single day, including weekends. Out of the seven years running the site I have only missed one day (by accident - more on that below), and the only day I take off is Christmas day when I put up only one post, which surprisingly can be torture in not posting. The posts you see here are a combination of stuff I find out there on my own and stuff people send in, which is quite a bit. The site started as a hobby and has fortunately grown into a small business with the help of sponsors. Note sponsors are always on the right. In the history of the site there has never been a paid post on the main site, and if there ever is, I will be sure to call it out in the post. That said, THANK YOU SPONSORS! It's one thing if the work only consumed my time, but it in turn consumes my family's time, so every little bit helps. THANK YOU! You make the site possible!


First the stats!

We still haven't reached world domination. Everything you see with a shade of green is a visit to the site. Check out Africa! The few in white mean no visit came in. The top map is for the seven year history of the site and the bottom is for this last year. Click on each for the full size shots. As you can see they are pretty much the same. Still no hits from North Korea.

On the other hand we had 122 visits from Syria within the last year along with traffic from other war torn countries. Incredible! Please keep safe out there! You are in our hearts, thoughts and prayers.

The top 10 visits by country:

1. United States 982,943
2. United Kingdom 258,070
3. Germany 183,138
4. France 168,649
5. Canada 142,553
6. Italy 109,605
7. Japan 84,202
8. Sweden 76,948
9. Australia 73,881
10. Netherlands 72,680

And the overall stats:

Source: Google Analytics for the year (July 20, 2011 - July 20, 2012):

6,364,538 pageviews
2,838,084 visits
972,065 unique visitors.

Source: Site Meter for the life of the site:

32,734,610 pageviews (18,557 average per day)
15,658,114 visits (7,822 average per day)

Google Analytics (started April 5, 2006):
30,795,628 pageviews
14,313,210 visits
4,258,879 unique visitors.

Note unique visitors can be a bit misleading as I believe it's based on the individual browser and cookies vs. IP Address or individual, so for people checking in on multiple devices and even multiple browsers on the same machine, each one counts as a unique visitor. The numbers are likely lower.

Unfortunately I do not see a top posts for the last year in Blogger so we will have to go with the top posts for all time:

New Schmidt Analog Synth Debuts at the Musikmesse
Apr 5, 2011, 22 comments 13,412 Pageviews

RIP Mr. Tsutomu Katoh - Founder of KORG
Mar 15, 2011, 6 comments 12,542 Pageviews

New Tom Oberheim SON OF 4 VOICE
Jan 25, 2011, 10 comments 7,811 Pageviews

M-Audio Venom Review and Interview with Product Manager Taiho Yamada
Mar 23, 2011, 6 comments 7,186 Pageviews

New KORG Monotribe In the Flesh
Apr 4, 2011, 26 comments 7,149 Pageviews

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CLICK FOR MORE »

MATRIXSYNTH Turns Six

MATRIXSYNTH turned six today! 62482 posts later and the site is still kicking.

I started this site back in July 2005 to simply track everything I came across in the world of synths. Back then everything was scattered in various forums, email lists and websites. Blogs were relatively new and Flickr and YouTube were just starting. It's hard to believe but in 2005 I was lucky to break more than five posts a day (the average was 6.69). Today I have a hard time keeping it under fifty posts a day (the record was a whopping 100 posts in a single day on March 28 of this year). It's amazing when you think about it. Not my posting endurance! ;) But rather the fact there is so much to post - that more and more people are sharing what they are doing. The synth community has grown. We have grown. And in my opinion that is pretty cool.

Every now and then I think about what I should be doing on the site. Should I limit what goes up to more press release and news type items. Should I limit how much I put up. Should I voice my opinion more often. I then I remind myself what the site started as and what it is meant to be. What makes this site tick is the insight into the everyday use of synths. It's not only about the makers and product announcements, and when it is about them it is often from the perspective of the makers as users. Think of the boutique modular makers and the videos they share with us. Think of the one person iPad developers and what they share. Yes press releases are covered, and now and then I have shared my opinion, but in general the site has always been about simply presenting what's out there as unbiased as possible and letting you take what you want from it. Everyone is different and everyone will appreciate or not appreciate posts differently. Sometimes the site feels like a conveyor belt sushi line. I put the posts out and you pick what you want.

Before this gets too long, I'll wrap this up by simply saying THANK YOU!

This site is about us, the users of synths. It's a log of synth history and what we were doing with our synths over time. When you look back at print magazines before the age of the internet, you'll typically find interviews with big name artists, press releases and gear reviews, but what we don't unfortunately have is a daily log of what everyone was doing with the gear, and we had very little media (videos, pics, and audio). Now we have that and you all make that possible. I can't wait to look back ten, twenty, thirty years from now and see what people were doing. If we only had that in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. BTW, whenever you have time, take a random peak back at some of the archives on the right. It's a fun look back.

THANK YOU!!! Time to post!

5 Years of MATRIXSYNTH!!!

It's that time again. Today is the five year anniversary of MATRIXSYNTH!!! I like to share a little bit about how the site ticks in these posts, some of the history for those that don't know it, some miscellaneous insights this year, and of course some numbers.

It all started back in July 20, of 2005, with a brief post wishing Dr. Bob Moog well. The brevity of the post was a bit of a foreshadowing of what the site would become.

I started the blog when the old site just wasn't cutting it anymore. I created the old site back in 1997 (before The Matrix movies ever existed BTW) as a personal portal for the various synth sites I used to visit. In 2005, blogging was just becoming popular. I found that I had a difficult time keeping track of things in email, my favorites list and the old site. The problem was many of the interesting bits were buried within sites, and possibly more importantly, a new method of sharing information was just emerging. Flickr (Feb 2004) and YouTube (Feb 2005) were just starting, Vimeo (Nov 2004) was relatively unknown, and SoundCloud (Aug 2007) wasn't even around yet.

In 2005, I created MATRIXSYNTH, the blog. I started tracking "Everything Synth". I let people know on various synth forums and email lists I belonged to about the site. In time it grew and people started sending things in. I realized what the site was becoming. It wasn't just a place for me to track stuff, but a place for anyone into synths. It was a daily heartbeat on what people were doing with their synths, not just a news site. In the beginning I posted every single image that came in on Flickr featuring a synth, and every single video on YouTube. It was fascinating at the time, because before then you never really saw what other people were doing, unless you knew them, or unless they had the means to host their own website. Flickr, YouTube, SoundCloud, Blogger, Word Press, and other hosting sites changed this. The site became a place for people to share and promote what they were doing. I received emails from people thanking me for connections they made because of the site. Many sites announced themselves here including DVDBORN (Jan 2, 2006), Muff Wiggler (Dec 4, 2006), TRASH_AUDIO (Oct 22, 2007), Analog Suicide (Dec 23, 2007), NOISESOURCE (April 22, 2008), and many others. The site currently gets over half a million pageviews a month. Think about that. More on the numbers in a bit. Before I get bombarded, I no longer post site announcements simply for the sake of site announcements. At 50 posts a day, it would be suicide and with the amount I post and I would take you all down with me. :) Posts have to be about specific synths, and via links are given.

There have also been a plethora of product announcements from manufacturers that read the site - too many to list. BTW, be sure see the MANUFACTURERS section on the right and the MANUFACTURERS page for a list of manufacturers that read the site and have taken the time out to send in a small 250px x 100px image. Note placement on this page is free. If you are a manufacturer, send me an image and I will add it. Note some dealers are listed there as well. Back to some history...

When I first started the blog, I wanted to put up a post at least once a week. It turned out to be more like once a day. I then wanted to put a minimum of five posts up a day, and then 10. I remember days when I didn't think I was going to hit it, and I remember days when I was so stressed out due to the sheer number and complexity of certain posts that I was ready to give it up. Every single post on this site is put up manually - there is zero automation. I now put up close to fifty posts every single day, seven days a week! With the exception of August 6, 2005, at least one post has gone up every single day since the inception of the site. If I only knew then what I know now I would have posted something on that one day. [Note: I thought I missed more than one day, but I couldn't find others - check out the archives in the right by clicking on the side triangles to drill down - if anyone finds another day I missed, let me know]. For those that are curious, it takes me anywhere between about four and six hours a day to do this. How do I have the time? Eight hours (usually less) of sleep, eight hours work, and eight hours for everything else (blog). I do contract-based work from home, so the entire day is pretty much spent behind my laptop working, with only a few breaks for food and a bike ride so I don't melt into my lazy boy. Weekends I get out and make time for my synths, friends, family, etc. The site pretty much is a full time job including weekends. How do I do it? I love it!!! That and there is a technique I honed over the years as crazy as it sounds. The more you do anything, the easier it becomes. It doesn't feel like work to me and even though things are not automated, I have a rhythm and a routine that I have relatively mastered. It took a couple of years to get that rhythm down. Now it's a bit of an addiction. That and with contract-based work I also work in surges, meaning some days are busier than others, and in between contracts I have more time on the blog. It all just works out. This brings me back to the note on that very first post back on July 20. At the time, I really didn't know what to say. It was an awkward first post but with the news that day, I knew that had to be the first post. I thought about what to write and I realized there was nothing I could say, other than providing the link, asking others to wish him well, and getting the heck out of the way. The post wasn't about me, it was about him. That has pretty much evolved into the theme of the site to this day. I want people to experience what others are doing, not my reflections on it. Once I realized that, posting became much easier. Part of this was also realizing that the number of posts going up can be difficult to consume, for myself included. The less I say the less time I waste. I try to keep things short, to the point, and myself out of the post. The site is a bit like conveyor belt sushi, a buffet, or tapas bar. Stuff constantly comes in and you can either take all of it in, or just pick what you want. The cool thing is everything is archived so you can come back to it later.

Some people ask me why Blogger? The reason is it's free and it's owned and hosted by Google. If I'm ever unable to run the site for whatever reason it will stay up. We have lost too many great synth sites over the years unfortunately. The excellent drummachine.com immediately comes to mind. If anyone remembers the site, it was the best site dedicated to drum machines - tons of pics, details and audio samples. It's now a promotion site. This is going to sound crazy, but the limitations of Blogger also keep things a bit more manageable and in check. I like the site as it is. It is what it is and that's what makes the site.

Time for some numbers. I'll try to keep it short this time. According to Google Analytics, since the inception of the site, there has been a total of 8,054,806 visits and 16,856,224 pageviews. That's up from 5,774,890 visits and 11,233,869 pageviews as of last year. If you look at the bottom of the site you will see Site Meter has me at 8,337,466 pageviews. This is because I started Google Analytics after Site Meter and I missed adding back the Google Analytics code a couple of times when updating my template. If you click on the map, you will see we are still missing a few countries. North Korea, I haven't said anything bad about you!!! It blows me away to think visits came in from some places. I chose the map for the image in this post because of this. This site is global. You get to see what people around the world are doing with synths on a daily basis. The site exists because of everyone out there who loves synths - you, me, and those that may not even know about the site yet. It's been a great five years and I look forward to the next. THANK YOU!!!

Update: Twitter: via Chris Carter!!!
http://chriscarter.co.uk/ @chris_carter_
http://www.throbbing-gristle.com/
http://www.chrisandcosey.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Carter_%28musician%29

HAPPY 5th BIRTHDAY MATRIXSYNTH from Chris Carter on Vimeo.

"Experimentally yours...

Chris Carter"

Update: I forgot to note the number of posts since the inception of the site. Including this post there was a total of 43,951.

Four Years of MATRIXSYNTH!

Today marks the four year anniversary of MATRIXSYNTH. First off I want to say thank you to everyone that reads and contributes to this site. THANK YOU!!!

I started the blog as a place to track everything synth initially for myself in 2005. Before then, way back in October of 1997, I created MATRIXSYNTH.COM. I created that site to host some light synth content on the synths that I owned. If you click on the nostalgia link there you will see the list. I captured the introductions for each synth in their respective manuals and I captured their editable parameters; how manufacturers write about their synths has always fascinated me. The rest of the site was just my window into the world of synths. On the left frame I had a link list off all my favorite sites. Clicking on them would bring the site up on the right pane. Back then Sonic State and Harmony Central were it on the forum front. VSE didn't come around until 1999.

In 2005, I decided to create MATRIXSYNTH, the blog, to track everything synth. The old format obviously did not make sense anymore as the more interesting nuggets of info were embedded deep in websites, and new formats of media were gaining popularity, such as YouTube, Flicker and so on. The number of links would become unwieldy. As of this post I am currently at 29,162 posts on MATRIXYNTH alone. On MATRIXSYNTH-B I am at 3,086 posts, and the new MATRIXSYNTH-C, I am at 63 posts. The B site is auctions only, the C site is focused on the music, and this site is focused on the gear. The line can be fuzzy, but the idea is if a post gives you a good sense of what a given synth can do, it usually goes up here. I also created SYNTHWIRE back on 10/14/2005 for others to post.

Now for some numbers. I think I'm going to make a tradition out of this. Every year, on the site's anniversary, I will share the overall site's stats since it's inception, and on every New Year's Day I will share the stats for the prior year.

That said, if you look at the map image above you will see that to date the site has had over 5,271,468 visits from 207 countries/territories. I say over because I didn't start using Google Analytics, the stats program the image came from, until April 5, 2006. According to Site Meter which I started earlier I'm at 5,774,890 visits and 11,233,869 pageviews. Below is the traffic chart also from Google Analytics which has the site at 10,456,937 page views. Last year I commented "As for numbers, this is post #17,087, the site has had over 2,958,261 visits, 880,569 visitors and over 5,253,505 pageviews." Over the last year alone the site had 2,319,045 visits, and 5,214,272 page views. Pretty cool when you think about it.

If you click on the map at the top of this post you will see different shades of green. The darker the green the more visits from that country. Note this is from April 5, 2006 until now. Any green means a visit from that country. I think I found a bug in Google Analytics. If you look at last year's map and compare it to this year's, you will see that some countries that were green then, are now white. If you combine the two we are closer to world domination! :)

And... that's it for this post folks. I need to get back to work, the blog and a little break. Thanks again for a great four years. I'll keep marching on as long as I can. I can't wait to look back 20 years from now into a glimpse of what the makers and the users of our synths were doing on a daily basis. Thanks everyone!!!

YMO Technopolis Live - 3 Years of MATRIXSYNTH

YouTube via matrixsynth.

OK, it's the day after my official three year anniversary on the blog. I wasn't going to mention anything but I figure why not. As for this video. Someone just commented on how it was their favorite. I of course watched it again and realized how good it was. I also noticed that out of 34,470 hits on the video, only 35 came from this site. I usually get a heck of a lot more, but I realize this is because I put up this post back in August of 2006. The obvious observation is I have a heck of a lot more visitors today versus back then so people are missing a LOT of old content. My recommendation is to visit the archives every now and then, but... there was an article I read on the guy that is credited with starting blogs and he gave a few rules on what a blog should be. First, posts should be very short, two they should capture and send people to other sites, and three you should actually post the same content more than once! I used to have a rule that I only post things once. I'm not about to go crazy posting things I already put up, but considering what a "blog should be," I'll be putting stuff up that I might have put up in the past (like this video) should it strike me. If you've seen it already, just ignore it and appreciate that others are now enjoying it as well.

As for numbers, this is post #17,087, the site has had over 2,958,261 visits, 880,569 visitors and over 5,253,505 pageviews. We have not yet conquered the world. Click the world map image below. The green countries have visited MATRIXSYNTH. A bit crazy when you think of it, especially when you consider Iraq and Afghanistan. Anyone into synths there have my utmost respect. Thank you and of course thanks to everyone else that has visited. The white countries however, have not yet visited! I'm guessing either I'm banned in those countries or internet access is of course very sparse. Not sure what the North Koreans have against me though... they do have a kick ass website. Anyway... to those of you that appreciate the site and to those of you that have contributed, THANK YOU!!! I've mentioned it privately to a few people but my goal is to have somewhere for people to be able to reflect on what was coming through the synth waves in this day and age. The site is a repository of everything synth, every day from the inception of this site until I finally stop posting. I'm hoping this will be an interesting look back in time 30, 40, 60+ years from now. It's far from perfect, but IT IS a slice in "synth time." Whether you appreciate it or not, it exists and will continue to exist. To those that support the site: you get it, you know who you are, and THANK YOU.

One Year Of Matrixsynth

The short version:

Today marks the one year anniversary of Matrixsynth. It's exactly one year and 3148 posts since I started this site to track everything synth. Thanks to everyone who makes this site great by either sending stuff in, posting in the comments or spreading the word.

The long version:
I started this blog because my old site Matrixsynth.com/old simply wasn't cutting it anymore. I created the original site in October 1997 as my portal into the world of synths. I'd see an interesting site and add a link (BTW, the alias matrix and the green on black color scheme came well before The Matrix movies. My first and favorite synth was an Oberheim Matrix-6, hence matrix. I'm a synth geek not a Matrix movie geek).

As time when on I found it difficult to find stuff I previously came across. So... I figured what better way to store and make all of this available to others than via a blog. The idea is very simple. I sub to a bunch of lists, feeds and forums; people send me stuff, I interact with people and I see things I want to save for posterity. When I see something I think I might want to see again, I post it. No discrimination. BTW, if you haven't noticed, this site is not meant to be a journal or publication. It's just a bunch of stuff about synths. If you enjoy synths, I hope you enjoy what you see here. It's a heartbeat on what others also into synths are doing, or rather what I happen to come across on a daily basis. Nothing more, nothing less.

When I first started the blog I never would have guessed so much stuff was out there. People asked me if I thought I would ever run out of things to post. I actually wondered myself. The answer turned out to be only if others out there run out of things to share themselves. Which leads me to...

THANK YOU

I want to say thank you to everyone out there who supports this blog. Anyone that has sent me something worth posting. Anyone that takes the time out to engage in the comments and of course everyone that reads this site and spreads the word. Thank you. It's actually crazy. I started the blog to track stuff only I came across. It's turned out to be a whole lot more. I never would have thought people would be enriching the site via the comments and letting me know when there was something else worthwhile posting. Thank you. BTW, you should notice that I frequently update my posts with comments and I always give credit when credit is due.

As a side note, at one point I offered to open up Matrixsynth for others to post but I got a resounding NO, so I created SYNTHWIRE for others to sign up and start posting. You can also promote your own stuff there, so use it!

Back on point. So, what next? Another year of posting. Thanks all, it has been one heck of a year.

Special thanks to moogulator of sequencer.de, Tom Whitwell of MusicThing, Peter Kirn of Create Digital Music, James Grahame of Retro Thing, Chris Randall of Analog Industries, Circuitmaster of GetLoFi, Carbon111, George Mattson, Brian Comnes, Dave (The Packrat), Dennis Verschoor, fmasseti, Loscha, Ross Healy, Steve Barbour of Gnostic Rocket, vlada of One Blue Monkey, deb7680 of Chroniques de la Mao, Rick of Electricmusicbox, Heath Finnie, DVDBorn, Mark Pulver, Doktor Future, Cikira, and of course Elhardt. ; ) You all contributed a little extra to the blog in your own way. Thanks for that.

And of course to the late great Bob Moog and all the synth manufacturers out there. Thank you.

And last but definitely not least, a HUGE thanks to my wife and daughter for tolerating the time and effort I put into this site on a daily basis. Thank You!

Update: I also want to thank Fernando Alves for making my favicon way back, and Paul and Brian Comnes for being the only two people that bought my matrixsynth shirt way back.

And of course, every person or site I've put up a post on. Thanks for having something worth posting about. ; )