MATRIXSYNTH

Artist Picks: Best Music Gear of 2024 (Part 2)

video upload by Perfect Circuit

Check out the accompanying article on our blog, Signal."

"2024 is soon drawing to a close—so, we're taking a look back at the year, and taking account of all of the weird and wonderful instruments that gave us some inspiration this year. Synthesizers, drum machines, and Eurorack modules to samplers and effects, this year had no shortage of inspiring instruments.

So, we reached out to some of our friends and content creators to fill us in on their year, asking one simple question: what was the coolest piece of gear YOU got this year? For some, that meant brand-new releases, but for others, it meant sitting down and digging into classic instruments.

In this video, we hear from:
0:05 Emily Hopkins on the Expressive E Osmose + Vongon Replay
3:36 The Midlife Synthesist on the Arturia Polybrute 12
5:36 Son Wu on the Elektron Octatrack
10:38 Monotrail on the ADDAC507 Random Bézier Waves
13:32 Surco on the Shakmat Battering Ram + OXI Meta

Check out the accompanying article on our blog, Signal."

You can find additional Artist Picks: Best Music Gear of 2024 posts here.

Christmas on Synthesizers - God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen. Roland D-50, Roland Juno-60, Moog Sub37

video upload by Elmar Mihm

"All Sounds from Roland D-50, Juno-60, Moog Sub37. No external FX or EQ.
Hope you enjoy! Merry Christmas!"

Arturia PolyBrute 12 - Generative Patch layered with OB6 Pad

video upload by Scott McAuley Sounds

"Patches will be available at https://www.orano.co.uk/shop or http://www.synthsounds.co.uk

Noodling around with the generative capabilities of the PB12, utilising the looping envelopes and multiple mods, to create a looping generative typ atmospheric patch.

these type of patches are great fun to explore, and can really take you on a journey.

this is a long one, and stays all on same chord throughout.

hope you enjoy!"

Reveal Sound Spire Free Dark Ambient Presets. No Talk Demo

video upload by Anton Anru

"Darkwave Cinematics is a collection of 50 presets for Reveal Sound Spire.
The bank of presets consists of: 7 Basses, 6 Drones, 5 Keys, 6 Leads, 8 Pads, 8 Strings, 5 Synths, 5 Textures.
📻 The soundset is inspired by sci-fi movies, soundtracks, dystopian stories, urban landscapes, noise ambient albums, experimental modern art and sound design.

🌌 Get this soundset: https://antonanru.sellfy.store/p/spir...

The bank spans a broad spectrum of timbres: dark, noisy, lo-fi, retro, romantic, melancholic, nostalgic, soundscapes, atmospheric, detuned, cold, distant, dull, big, massive, epic, bright, orchestral, distorted, metallic, tense, atonal, non-harmonic, fx-like, evolving, moving, sweeping.

🔮 Each preset is designed with dynamics in mind - by using the modulation wheel, you can give your timbres a more expressive sound. ModWheel opens all layers' filters, enhancing the brightness of the sound.

🎛 Each preset has 4 Macros that make it easy to develop timbre and adjust key parameters.
The macros are a significant part of the soundset. They can change tone, stereo width, modulation depth and rate, noise level, distortion, detuning, effects mix, and others.

Ensure that you are using the latest software version.
To add presets to the collection, open the plugin browser, push Import, then select the presets on your computer. Or you can place the folder with the new presets into the Spire user folder.
Push Rescan to update the collection. Now you can see the new presets inside the browser.

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The Sequencers of 2024

video upload by Omri Cohen

"You can find these patches, along with many others, available on my Patreon page - / patches-from-of-117758937"

00:00 - Introduction
00:13 - ArpSeq
04:38 - Morpheus
07:44 - Benjolin
10:04 - CV Funk
13:25 - OrbSeq
15:15 - Misc

Live Osmose session - mixed bag...

video upload by SynthAddict

Blue Mondayish ELKA OMB5 with Custom Drum Kit

video upload by ohm_studi_ohm

"I just finished servicing an Elka OMB5 and building a custom drum kit for it so I had some fun with it.
All sounds are from the OMB5, no fx used."

ELKA OMB 5 with custom drum kit

video upload by ohm_studi_ohm

"herre is a demo of an Elka One Man Band with custom drum sounds.

The OMB5 is a nice 4 part arranger with rhythm channel, bass channel and 2 accompaniment tracks. Sounds are FM (from the elka ER/EK/EM 44) and the drums are PCM sampled from the Drumstar 80. It has MIDI in and out so you can either control and play the different part from the keyboard or from MIDI, it syncs and transmits clock as well as single input notes or sequenced notes. I like using it with external midi controller so I can play the 3 different melodic part separately (when playing from the keyboard notes always trigger the 3 part together).

Though the drum samples are actually quite good if you like 80s sounds (especialy percussion and cymbal sounds), I decided to replace some of them with some I favor more, using sounds from LinnDrum, Oberheim DX, Roland TR808, CR8000 and TR707. I also adjusted level by using compression on some other stock sounds.

The audio format used in the OMB5 (and the Drumstar 80 which drum part is derived) is the same as in those classic 80s PCM drum machines, ie 8 bit µ-Law unsigned sample. Sample rate is 25000 hz (or so) in that one.

Replacing sound is not as straightforward as in those drum machines because instead of using 1x eprom per sound there are several samples per eprom (7x 256 kbyte eproms are used in the OMB5 to accomode for 32 sounds) so you need to edit the audio file and replace the existing sample with your own but it needs to start at the exact same adress as the original one and it should have the same length or be shorter.

So basically what you do is:
read the eprom bin
convert to uncompressed audio
edit that file and edit/replace the sound you want making sure you dont change file size nor start adress of the sound
convert the uncompressed audio to µ-law 8 bit
burn the new bin file

if you're interested in getting those sound I can sell you a full 7x eproms kit ready to use. I can be fitted in the DrumStar 80 too.

here is a list of the 32 sounds, with original and replacement when there is:

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