Rare EEH/SSB Syntec Banana Vintage Analog Poly Synth

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via this auction

"Up for auction a very very rare EEH/SSB Syntec Banana analog polyphonic programmable synthesizer.
Made in Germany in the 80s by EEH and distributed by SSB.
Only 100 or so were made.
This one has MIDI and only a few had it.
The synth is in good cosmetic condition and works flawlessly.
Runs on 230V."

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EEH BANANA ANALOG SYNTHESIZER "SOUNDTRACK" FROM "BRAINAURA-MUSIC"

Uploaded on Nov 29, 2011 musivox·25 videos

So is it EEH, SSB or both?

"PHANTASTICS RELAXING SOUNDTRACK BANANA !YOU HEAR THE RARE PIECE ONLY 200 BUILT BY SYNTHESIZER ANALOG EEH BANANA FROM SYNTHESIZER STUDIO "MATTEN & WIECHERS" IN BONN GERMANY ! THE PLAY WAS PLAYED IN THE LIFE OF IMAGINATION 1995 NORTH BEACH / NORTHSEA GERMANY IN HOME STUDIO! I'M LOOKING LIKE ANALOG SYNTHESIZER + ALSO DEFECTIVE AND EXCHANGE-SWAP! MORE MUSIC HERE FROM ME HEAR YOU WITH "BRAINAURA MUSIC". MUSIC FROM ALL OF YOU HEAR BY ..... WWW.BRAINAURA.DE.TO....PLEASE GOOD COMMENTS !"

EEH BANANA "ANOVA" FROM: BRAINAURA-MUSIC

1984 BANANA Synthesizer German Ad

via synthmuseum.de

See the SSB channel below for more including a demo of one featured in a Moonlight Matters studio tour.

Moonlight Matters - Studio Tour

Published on Jan 8, 2014 Future Music Magazine·330 videos

"Future Music head to Bruges, Belgium to visit the amazing studio of Sebastiaan Vandevoorde aka Moonlight matters. See his vast collection of synths including the incredibly rare Yamaha EX1 and many other gems in our exclusive tour.

CREDITS
Producer - Chris Barker
Video Editor - Will Seelig
Videographer - Will Seelig"

Update: Synths featured in order with rough start times:

0:00:00 Studio Electronics Omega 8
0:06:30 Alesis Andromeda A6
0:15:28 Sequential Circuits Prophet-VS
0:19:56 SSB Syntec Banana Synth (like an SSM OB-Xa)
0:29:04 Sequential Circuits Prophet-5
0:30:53 Moog Memorymoog
0:36:10 Roland System 100
0:45:19 Yamaha EX1
0:56:30 Yamaha D85
1:00:18 Roland JD-800
1:01:30 Simmons SDS1
1:02:47 Oberheim OB-Xa
1:04:25 Roland Juno-106
1:05:15 Yamaha DX7 IID (has unison mode)
1:06:49 Yamaha YC45D
1:08:00 Roland TR-606
1:08:22 Boss Dr. Pads
1:08:37 Oberheim XPander
1:09:00 Roland SH-101
1:09:16 LinnDrum
1:09:53 Casio CZ-101
1:10:22 Simmons SDS9
1:11:53 Roland JX-8P

1982 German Banana Synthesizer Ad

via Synthmuseum.de

follow-up to this post.

1982 SSB Syntec BANANA German Synth Ad

via synthmuseum.de

Like a pinstriped blue Oberheim OB-Sx with more control.

See the SSB label at the bottom of this post for more.

SSB Syntec Banana

No that is not an Oberheim. This is the SSB Syntec Banana. The image here recently came up on AH and as you can see it is from sequencer.de. The person that posted it was looking for more information on. I dug through all the banana posts and found a post I put back up on October 1, 2006.

You can find more info at the previous post.
Comments disabled here to keep them all there.
I also put the images here.

SSB Syntec Banana

via this VSE Post.

inVrs: "i recently bought this very rare german synthesizer called "banana". it was manufactured by SSB (Synthesiezr Studio Bonn) and only about 100 were built as far as i know."

Analog Crazy: "The Banana is basically an Oberheim OB Polyphonic made only in Germany. Its flat top reminds me of the OB-SX but apparently it sounds more like an OB-8. You are lucky to have one because only 200 units were ever made."

dougt: "Supposedly they were trying to get Oberheim to market it that's why they copied the OB look..."

My question: Was it really called the banana? What's up with that?

Update via Dirk Matten in the comments:
"The price for the OB-Xa was DM 14.230 - the Banana sold for DM 5.350. Tschak!
It is not a Oberheim copy and the sound can be compared to Moog. We made it look like the Oberheims, because we sold the Oberheim line exclusiv in Germany, did all the advertising and marketing without any support, made the name Oberheim big in Germany - and planed to offer the Banana to Oberheim as a competetive item for the international market. Received quite a lot of requests from internation distributers. Even without having seen the product, Tom Oberheim told me that he would never produce or sell something from outside his company. This was a big mistake - that's what Russ Jones, marketing & sales for Oberheim, told me some years later. "Dirk, we both know that this would have been a big business."

Dirk Matten"

Update regarding the name:
"We also planned a drummachine "Coconut" and had the idea for an ad: my business partner and me as apes eathing bananas throwing with coconuts.

I asked several people over a long period and Conny Plank, most important producer in Germany, told me: Dirk, very simple "Harras" or "Hasso" like the german shepherd dog. That's what he thought would be fine for international success. We kept it national with "Banana".

harrharr"

Funny! : ) There would just something funny about owning a synth called the banana. I'd get a kick out of that.

Another Update from Dirk. Fascinating stuff:
"To be a little bit more precise on the historical aspect, which might be intersting to someone:

When Tom came to our company we asked him: "What do you think about a hot product from outside?" His answer was: "Every day I get a lot of letters and telephone calls from all over the world by no name people, who want to offer their ideas to me. Did Roger Linn call me? No. He did it himself."

We stopped that discussion, did not show the prototype to him, had a nice lunch in an italian restaurant in Cologne and decided to go the Roger Linn way."