Moog Brings Back the Ancient Modular Synthesizer (This is Rather Awesome)

A Journal of Musical Things ^ | January 20, 2015 | Alan Cross

[Pelham]

You’re welcome ;)

[Pelham]

amazing

[ADemocratNoMore]

Real nice to hear, although modulars were never really “gone”, they have been in production by one outfit or another since the ancient time of the Great Analog Beasties.

Personally, while I've always drooled over such sexy pieces of hardware,, my lack of musical prowess precluded spending much money for keyboard instruments I could not play.

The PC, DAW and the VST changed all that for me and now I have several synths including the Arturia Modular V, the iMini, the Animoog, iSEM and iVCS3. In fact, I've got a few other MiniMoogs and VCS3s as well, both on my PC and my iPad, purchased at a fraction of the price of just one of the many modules that made up the old machines and I must say the softsynhs sound very close to the original for a fraction of the price.

I find it interesting to consider the evolution of noise generators, from the first drums to physical means of producing fixed pitches to electrical and electronic instruments that generate analog signals that resemble their physical predecessors to digital sound generators that were then programmed to have more of the quirks and instabilities of the analog world to physical modeling in software of the real world physics behind real world instruments.

One problem, the softsynths were lacking those big knobs and switches. The solution...

http://www.synth-project.de/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCYKA-Ty1Js

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXcIDzRtsJI

Some really incredible builds ! Later I'll post about the time I got beat up by Keith Emerson's Moog 3C.

[ADemocratNoMore]

> it had electronic innards and used 3 1/2 inch floppy disks to load program voices

I think you may be talking about the Synclavier CMI. “Twas over $50,000 in yesterdays money and was one of the very first digital samplers. Invented by a high school kid. Now available for the iPad for under $50!

[ADemocratNoMore]

Emerson had a Hammond organ that he coaxed into all sorts of tortured howls by bouncing it around on stage and rocking it back and forth. Doing so made the tone wheels and the spring reverb go crazy. He also stabbed the keyboard with knives to generate lonnnng notes.

[21twelve]

It was probably “Rondo”, where he plays his Hammond organ backwards, stabs knives between some of the keys, rocks the organ to produce the sound:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_RVm9BTUig

I saw them back in 1995 on their reunion “Black Moon” tour, having been too young when they were first together. When I saw Rondo being played live I was amazed. On the album it sounds like a bunch of random noise. Well - live it does as well I guess. But he was able to recreate that “noise” pretty much like the song on the album. It was pretty wild.

It was at a small theater in Pennslyvania. It took them three trys to get the concert started. The first two times they blew out the entire area’s electricity as soon as they started! (Seriously!) It was an hour wait or so by the time they got it figured out. I thought at the time, glad it is a bunch of old farts at the concert or there would have been rioting.

I believe they all still go on tours periodically. Although I think I read where Emerson has arthritis or some issues with his hands.

[21twelve]

The only concerts I have been to have been ELP, YES and Rush. (Rumors that Rush will be touring again this year).

Oh. And Leo Kottke! (On the other end of the spectrum).

[ADemocratNoMore]

> I think you may be talking about the Synclavier CMI.

I goofed - it should have read “the Synclavier or the Fairlight CMI. The Fairlight was the 50K beast invented by the high scholar.

[Jay Redhawk]

I fear the world of music may become a Moogerfooger Cluster Flux. LOL! (For those of you who don’t know there really is such a thing!)

[Liberty Valance]

bttt

[Yardstick]

I’m not a keyboard guy but it appears to me that we’re in the midst of a sort of analog synth revival right now. If you look through any of the big gear catalogs these days they keyboard section will be totally overflowing with reissue and vintage inspired instruments and modules. Lots of it is digital but it’s digital emulating analog and the overall structure is very old school with knobs and physical controls. I bought a little thing called a micro-Korg recently and it lets you stack up your (virtual) oscillators and filters and that sort of thing. It even has wooden end caps on the enclosure. Pretty neat.

[martin_fierro]

I’ve had that song as an earbug all day today thanks to you < |:p~

[dr_lew]

The pronunciation is more like Mogue.

"I knew that ... I think it's so funny that you think that I didn't know that."

Never saw his picture though! Says here he died in 2005. Never noted his passing, never even really thought about the guy. So thanks for the reminder, as it were.

[dr_lew]

I took my kids, back when they were kids, to a David Lee Roth concert at some outdoor venue in northern Chicagoland. I brought along some foam earplugs for myself, and used them intermittently. The “volume” or sound intensity, was ridiculous. The amplification was completely saturated so that the sound resembled jet noise. I didn’t get it.

On the way home my son commented that his ears were ringing, I said “That’ll go away, but of course you lose a little bit of hearing every time this happens.” He was like, “WHAAAAAATTTT?” I don’t think he ever went to one of these “concerts” again.

[Beowulf9]

Omg that made me laugh, sorry!