I love my Moog rack voyager, I have owned loads of analogue synths and I have to say this one is the best I have owned great build quality and flawless sounds all that an analogue should be!
I have no worries recommending the voyager.
I use it for bass lines and bleepy sounds!
http://www.myspace.com/slownoises
Minimoog Voyager v/s Little Phatty?
Just checking out your Myspace mate, I'm on the 3rd track so far. Nice stuff, Plant Life is my fav so far. Do any of these feature the Voyager?JEZMONDO wrote:I love my Moog rack voyager, I have owned loads of analogue synths and I have to say this one is the best I have owned great build quality and flawless sounds all that an analogue should be!
I have no worries recommending the voyager.
I use it for bass lines and bleepy sounds!
http://www.myspace.com/slownoises
I got a Voyager OS about 3 months ago and I have never had anything like it. It's sits in the room looking amazing and every time I turn it on I get lost just fiddling and switching switches. Every step of the way amazing sounds come out. Without doubt the best sounding thing I have ever owned and a joy to behold. I can just mess about with it for five minutes, record where I'm at and build a whole tune out of it, whether it's a bass line, a melody lead or just some fucked up riff made from noises. I am completely in love with this thing.
bro, believe me the voyager is a ferrari, and the A6 is a nissan micra with buggered suspension.AK wrote:I haven't seen that osc thinness prob as I have been searching I must say. But then you are comparing it to the best synth even built.steevio wrote:the oscillators and filters are modelled on moog's, and i think one of the filters is oberheim stylee, but imo dont sound anything like them.AK wrote:Nice one. Yeah I thought I remembered you saying you had one. I know what you mean, when I first saw the specs and took an interest in it the other day, I thought, "Wow, best analog synth ever". Midi, polyphony, multi-timbral, it goes on and on. I guess something had to give.
As far as the sounds go, were you impressed?
when you stack the waveforms on the oscillators, it sounds thin, like theyre cancelling each other out.
thats exactly the opposite of what you want, phattness.
since i got the moog, i realise why everyone tries to copy those oscillators, they are awesome.
i think the thing i would say to anyone who has doubts about the moog because of its monophony, is forget it, you'll love the power of a real analogue monophonic synth, it sounds massive.
I caught a nice example of the A6 on Youtube HERE
Ok, mostly string/pad stuff but the end of which has some plinky affair and there's the tonality there, I guess you only get that non-aliasing tone with non-digital instruments but polyphonic pure tones at the top end too? This thing sounds crystal.
I guess I am not far from making a purchase ( on something - not necessarily the A6 ) and I have to consider the fact you just didn't get along with this instrument or whether your opinion is entirely non-biased.
Sound-wise, would you have this over the new Nord stuff or Virus Ti?
Thanks again for your opinion mate, it's valued.
theres just no comparison, dont even think about the A6, it's an unfinished synth built by geeks, with no quality anywhere other than in the concept, and there's no customer support whatever, alesis abandoned it as an expensive mistake.
edit - i should really do a proper assessment of the A6 and post it up, but i just havent the time right now.
but here's a few examples of why i hated it, and why the voyager makes it look like a toy.
it was largely responsible for a massive gap in my career of two years producing very little (one e.p.) simply because it was so unintuitive in use.
i bought it because it is effectively a massive modular synth in a box, but the mod matrix is unbeleivably fiddly and difficult to work with.
the encoder knobs are flimsy and way too sensitive, so when you try to dial in a value, it wavers around the value till you get it just right.
for instance, the (digital ) envelopes on paper are amazing, 7 stages, multiple slope shapes, polarity choice and loopable on all stages,
till you try to get a sound together !!
i once spent a whole afternoon trying to get a filter envelope right for a particular sound, because a) there's too much choice, b) it's just really difficult to dial in the values accurately, c) the sound didnt seem to relate to what i was dialing in.
compare that to the Moog, its never taken me more than 20 seconds to get an envelope right, when you turn those knobs it does exactly what you expect, when you turn the sustain knob (or better still use a pedal) during a mix, you get real sustain, like in a real physical instrument, its so intuitive.
i checked out all the waveshapes of the A6 on my oscilloscope, and i was shocked.
the sine wave isnt a sinewave at all, the two halfs of the waveform above and below the centre line are out of phase with each other, i really dont know how thats possible, but i checked all the oscillators on the A6 and they were all the same.none of the other waves are particularly accurate either.
the sub oscillator is supposed to be a sinewave, which would be perfect for me, but it isnt, its a square wave, which i dont find useful at all.
but the thing which makes this synth a dawg, is the horrible almost unreadable screen, and the almost unfathomable architecture of the menu system and fiddly encoders that go with it. its a mess.
i could go on and on.........
i had the A6 for three years, i learned it inside out, ive had dozens of different synths, digital and analogue, its the one synth i would warn anyone to stay well clear of.
league table
voyager RME ----10 (instant bliss in a box designed by god)
Nord lead 3 ---- 5 ( great architecture, but not enough mod possibilities)
virus ----4(good for mods, but thinner sound and too much menu
A6 ---- 1 (frustration in box, designed by men in white coats)
Thanks for checking my tunes out.
Plantlife has quite a bit of the moog on it basically all the sweeps and analogue effects I ran it through a TS 808 tubescreamer which gives it a bit more bite. The lead riff is a FR 777 which I have just rediscovered and I went abit over the top on that track
It also features on another track the moog is also the deeper bass riff on machines I triggered the moog from the FR 777 so it follows the lead. I had to eq the bootom end and roll the bass off as the moog is fantastic at massive bass sounds.
I have used NI stuff a lot too but I am definitely getting more into the analogue stuff again
best
Jez
Plantlife has quite a bit of the moog on it basically all the sweeps and analogue effects I ran it through a TS 808 tubescreamer which gives it a bit more bite. The lead riff is a FR 777 which I have just rediscovered and I went abit over the top on that track
It also features on another track the moog is also the deeper bass riff on machines I triggered the moog from the FR 777 so it follows the lead. I had to eq the bootom end and roll the bass off as the moog is fantastic at massive bass sounds.
I have used NI stuff a lot too but I am definitely getting more into the analogue stuff again
best
Jez
no worries mate, i wasted alot of time with that machine, i wouldnt like to see someone else make the same mistake.AK wrote:Thanks steevio, I wasn't aware you had that much time with it. To be honest, I really thought you had used it for a few weeks/months and simply didn't get along with it.
It's quite shocking now I know your real opinion. And I do value it too.
Thanks for the advice bro.
i'm sure theres some people out there who will just dial in the presets, bang some riffs into it and come out with some nice generic sounding trance, but if you want to go further and use it to its theoretical potential, its unrewarding.
