Anybody Play with Analog Synths?

[Volitions Advocate]

NOTE:  Mouse over for links of Products I mention.  The forums doesn't make Hyperlinks visible otherwize for some reason.

Ok so as i've been researching my way into the world of midi guitar I've come to learn a few things.

#1.

Everything Roland has in the GR/VG/VB product lines is not true synthesis.

The VG products just use Midi to give you more options on your guitar.  such as digital detuning.  The VB is the same t hing but for Bass.  And the GR series.. While making more direct use of Midi... Isn't really a synthesizer.. its just sample triggering basically.
I took the GR20 home with one of those nasty godin nylon stringed monstrosities to try it out, and while there is a novelty of playing piano, sax, and sitar on your guitar.. its just a novelty and I'll never use it.  I want real synth sounds, not bubble gummy 80s sounding saw waves that I can use for 10 seconds a Set so that my band can finally play Jump w/o a keyboard.  and I DON"T want to buy a keyboard synth to do it.

So... enter the Synth Module.

My new plan is to decide which one of these to get:

Roland GI-20
or
Axon AX50

I was leaning toward the Axon until I found out that Roland makes a stand alone interface, and I'm kind of a Boss Label-whore so it's currently winning.
Price is pretty close to the same.  I think.

Anyway.  Once that is out of the way.  I now have Raw Midi Data coming from my fingertips and I need to feed it into something worthy.  My Drummer has a Korg Micro Synth which could work till I find something I actually like.. but Like I said I want a module because I have no use for a keyboard.

So...  I'm looking to the guitar forum to ask about synth modules... what has gone wrong?
I'm sure some of you guys have dabbled, or there may even be an enthusiast somewhere in our midst, and I trust the opinion of people here more than anywhere else on the internet.

i'm getting my inspiration for this last part of my rig from this guy:
www.amir-derakh.com

and the modules he uses are the Roland JP-8080 which is apparently not really an analog synth, but an analog synth modeller (thats what the guy from Roland said)
sounds pretty cool:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EIo8beILnY

And the Korg MS-2000R module,, which I can't seem to find on the Korg site. but Here's a link to another site that has info.

The only other place I've found with a great synth is Dave Smith Instruments,, but they're pretty damned expensive.
I've got my eye on this one:Prophet '08 but since i'm new to synth I don't really know all the things it does.
apparently it has 8 voices for instance.  I'm guessing I dont' need 8 voices just for using it with a guitar.  You can even get a version with real pots in it to give you the vintage feel.  hmmm...

I'm at a loss.. somebody help me.
Opinions?

My drummer tells me I need to go Software.
Are there any good software synths out there?   I'd have to go out and buy a net book or something for on stage in that case.

I understand a bit about how they work though.
I"ve figured out what Oscillators, LFO's and the ADSR does.

 

[Superlizard]

There's a number of software progs out there which emulate famous analog synths.

I use several myself (I'm more old-school inclined) which do these:

MiniMoog
Moog Modular
Prophet
ARP2600

etc

Check out Native Instruments webpage for some of these emus (and newer):

http://www.native-instruments.com/        :icon_thumright:

 

[Superlizard]

Ah, you're talking about *MIDI guitar* synths.  Disregard.

 

[kboman]

The Axon is newer and supposed to be more advanced, ie have better tracking, response and such (used by Robert Fripp). This topic intrigues me too, so I hope you get better answers

 

[Wyliee]

I use the Axon AX100 with my Yamaha bass.  Decent tracking and has a Yamaha synth daughtercard onboard.  The sounds are a bit FM synth dated though.  If you want a single rackspace solution, definitely check it out.

I also have a dedicated softsynth rig using an MAudio Ozonic as controller/audio interface and Reason 4.0 on a laptop.  You can get some pretty good instrument samples for Reason.

 

[Volitions Advocate]

Ah, you're talking about *MIDI guitar* synths.  Disregard.

No it still works SL.  The great thing about the interface is that I can use any synth module I want.

I could even plug it into a Korg Triton keyboard If i wanted to and then just use my guitar instead of the keys.  ANY synth will work so long as it is midi compatible.

As for Axon Vs. Roland.  I was talking to the roland rep, and he said the tracking on the GI-20 was about as good as on the VG-99, if anybody has played on one.  The GR-20 had awful tracking in comparison so I'm a little more optimistic about the roland one than I was when I first heard about it.  The Tracking is actually #1 reason I was thinking of going with the Axon.

I didn't want to go with the AX100 because I don thave a rackmount.  And any synth module I have will actually fit on my pedalboard if you can believe it. I"ve got a good 2 foot wide spot on my 48x18 board.

What is Ozonic?  I"m assuming softsynth is software yes?  I realize it's kind of a no brainer but I just want to be clear.

 

[bpmorton777]

Volitions,

I am the keyboard player in my band...Ive owned/used many vintage/anolog synths from ARP, Moog, Korg, Sequential, and Ensoniq

I am also a Roland GR33 user.

The GR synths are sample playback type synths (most stuff is these days), the VG stuff is mostly modeling synthesis which derives it's base sound (oscillator) from the strings though the hex pickup. its making guitar sounds mostly

The internal tracking on the roland GR33 and kin will be better than through an outboard synth or softsynth on your computer. Ive recorded midi tracks with mine and had to sit there for hours cleaning up stray midi data even with good technique.

you wont get great results strait away with any synth till you learn how to program sounds that work well with your guitar controller..the preset waves in the GR are set up to mesh well with this type of controller.  you will need a synth that can handle 6 separate mono synths each on their own midi channel as well.

guitar chord voicing is different from keyboards...and notes are struck instead of strummed as on a guitar. your "Jump" synth will sound off without a ton of practice.

my advice would be get the roland thing they make nowadays that has the synth built in. use it. get to know it and learn how to program new sounds on it.then buy something else to plug into it or just get a VG99 that has all the cool guitar/amp modeling stuff and the midi output.  still gonna have to learn the basics of synth programming and how they all make the sounds that they make.

Brian

 

[Volitions Advocate]

They must've done something odd then because the GR-20, the current model, has awful tracking, and all sorts of that stray data you're talking about.
Playing with the synths isn't something I"m shy about.  I'm a tweaker by practice.  I don't know what the GR 33 is like because they don't make them anymore but the GR-20 is really simplistic.  Theres only about 3 parameters you can edit with each patch, the sounds are pretty much what you get.

I looked at the VG-99 but really, its just a GT-10 with some midi functionality.  You can retune your guitar digitally etc.  And I already have a GT-10, the difference in price point plus the lack of an included foot controller make it a no-go for me.
Not that I dont want one.

I love the learning curve.

I don't want to sound like I'm shoving your advice back in your face.. but as far as I can tell, there is no such thing as programming new sounds on the GR-20.  And I like the idea of roughing it.

I wouldn't make the assumption that the direct interface had better tracking than the GR line if the guy straight from Roland doing the product demonstrations hadn't told me so.  So thats where I'm basing my assumptions.
Although You're right.. I have no idea how the synth would behave receiving midi data from the interface.

This is why i'm doing research.  I'd like to try out a few setups.  It sucks living in a small city where nobody stocks this stuff.

 

[bpmorton777]

just took a look at rolandus.com and the info they had on the new gr20 thing....total crap as far as programming and sound creation within the unit AND it's like $600 which is more than i paid for mine new with the pickup back when they made em.

I guess their focus is on getting the thing into a guitarist's hands and figuring that they will want to plug it into something else for sounds.

The VG99 really is a synth and not just a stomp box effect. it does what the VG strat does and much more.

you can pick up a used GR33 on ebay for less than the cost of the GI-20 midi converter. just a thought.

the problems you are having with the godin are probably setup with the pickup, there might be special settings for using the GR with the LRBaggs bridge...could also be that you just started trying them out and don't know yet what you can and cant play on a guitar synth. Really, there is stuff you just cant do that you would be used to on a guitar. on certain patches you cant do hammer-ons/pull-offs or bending or something else.

check out the GR-33's on ebay

Brian

 

[Volitions Advocate]

Yeah, I understand the "things you can't do" part.

I'm used to playing with a Guitar synth effect on my multi effects, and its even more picky.  It has to track individual notes on the entire neck because it doesn't have a hex pickup.

the GR-20 was just doing weird things.  Like playing on a piano patch, if the first joint of my finger managed to somehow brush against the high e or b strings out of nowhere there would be this run of 4 or 5 notes that would jump out at me that I didn't play.  Adjusting the sensitivity helped a bit on that.  I live in Canada, and the list price for those things is around 1000 bucks.  So its a bit steep especially considering we breached 80 cents US last month.

Getting a cheap GR 30 or 33 wouldn't be a bad idea.  It is after all what Amir uses.

but he does still use it with those synth modules:

 

[Patrick from Davis]

The Micro Korg is a fun little gizmo and a good idea.  Digital wave synth and analog filters.  The R3 is sort of the new and improved version of the MicroKorg.  And yes I know that they released a new Micro Korg.  The R3 has some of the newer features incorporated and it is easier to use.  For synth engine software, I hear mainly Reason by Propellerhead is where it is at.  I have seen some great chip tune emulation with Reason 4.  I am not at all sure about using a Guitar to drive it, but those are the toys that my tinkering noise making pals like.
Patrick

 

[bpmorton777]

I stopped having synth gear lust when I started using Reason. It's that good. infinitely tweakable synths/studio settups, sequencer, free patches on the internet etc. I also got Recycle to make my on loops which is useful for more than just the usual rap drum loop garbage you hear.

many pro artists use it now on a laptop on stage instead of bringing a ton of gear with them.

Violitions, have you thought about how you are going to control the synth when you get the gr/midi converter? I have one of those roland pickups on my strat which I dont much care for. it messes with the bridge action a little and keeping it close enough to the strings to work properly makes it bang into the strings sometimes...string buzz and such. got little notches on mine where the strings rub sometimes.

Im planning on installing a Graphtec Ghost system in my Warmoth...should be very cool.

Brian

 

[bpmorton777]

another note about the roland stuff....yeah, talking to a roland rep...they are gonna say anything to get you to buy...I believe IMHO that the tracking hardware/ software in all their new stuff is the same as the GR33. Easy way to make new products with old tech...they do this all the time with synth gear

take a look
http://www.kurzweilmusicsystems.com/Product.php?id=42

this damn thing uses 72 pin simms that computers used like 20 years ago ( click on the specs tab) total crap for a computer based synth. that's what they do with the synth stuff...dont think that roland doesnt do the same.

Brian

 

[Volitions Advocate]

I think I've found the winning combination.

Aside from not being able to decide yet whether to get the Roland GI - 20 or the Axon AX-50,  They both do the same thing.  And while both are mostly inaccesible save buying it outright.. I dont know of anybody who deals in axon-terratec stuff around here.

So I went to Calgary last weekend to talk to a guy at Axe Music about this stuff and I learned a few things.  Depending on the interface I can assign different strings to different midi channels and use different voices for different sounds.  But i'm not going to go that hardcore.. The most sounds I think I would use is 2 MAYBE 3 at a time but i doubt it.  But nobody makes a 2 voice synth module...

So while I could go all crazy with stuff like these (which is what I was looking at)

http://www.access-music.de/products.php4?product=virusclassic
http://www.access-music.de/events/11-2004/virusti_basics_desktop.php4
http://www.davesmithinstruments.com/products/p8m/
http://www.vintagesynth.com/roland/jp8080.php

It would really be overkill.  The thing I like about the Dave Smith Prophet is that its a true analog, but I'll never use all 8 voices simultaneously, because i"m just playing guitar and I'm not going to be using a sequencer, and there is a lot less to keymap on a guitar than there is on a keyboard.  But like I said, I wont be doing that anyway.

So I found some cool stuff that would work i think just the way I want it.

Here is the one I'm looking at getting first (probably, hopefully I can find it used or something)
the Waldorf Blofeld: http://www.waldorfmusic.de/en/products/blofeld/blofeld_user_interface

I've never even heard of Waldorf before, mind you i've never really been into synths before either.

I love that it shows you the wave forms right there on the screen and help you visualize your ADSR settings.  It also has a pretty cool arpeggiator editor.  Its digital but it sure sounds cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZPdB5PuYlE

And the other one I'm looking at, doesn't have quite as easy to use interface, but it is true analog and has some crazy sounds.
Dave Smith Instruments MoPho: http://www.davesmithinstruments.com/products/mopho/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFKgpIIrFjE

So I get rid of the massive polyphony and go with 2 mono phonic synths that are barely bigger than stompboxes.
I get my awesome sounds.. with enough variety to do whatever I want.  2 simultaneous sounds, and simple (sort of) stompbox functionality/formfactor


The only thing left is to decide on a friggen interface.

It would be fun to get a GR 30/33 (the overwhelming concensus online is that the GR-20 is a steaming pile of ...  erm. stuff) but I dont think I'd use the onboard sounds very often, but the price to get them would be a plus because they're old and sell for cheap.
On the other hand there is no "keymapping" on one of those, Whereas the GI-20 can split up the fretboard into as many pieces as there are midi channels.

I dont know anything about how the Axon does that kind of thing.

Then I suppose I'd have to get a small mixing board. like a PV 6 or something (do they exist? I'll check later) so I can route all this stuff to my amps without having to build any funky loopers/switchers.  and then that way I can hook up my Alesis Air FX as a footswitchable aux send on the board instead of always having it active in my signal chain.

Awesome.

I'm so ADD when it comes to this stuff.

 

[m4rk0]

this topic reminds me of a korg guitar synth that I had well over 20 years ago!! I believe it was the Korg 911
if you accidentally hit more than one string, it would sound absolutely horrible.. I had a lot of fun with it though.

 

[bpmorton777]

get a synth that has at liest 6 voices...that's what you will need for standard guitar synth stuff. the way you generaly set em up for guitar synth patches so they trigger properly is 6 mono patches all utilizing their own midi chanel (1-6) each string running it's own midi chanel in mono. you can do it other ways but then you sometimes run into triggering problems. even if you want the same sound on all strings this is the way they are set up  to trigger correctly from a guitar.

there's some good analog sounding stuff within the GR33 plus it has some other fun stuff in it like the trumpet sound and alt tunings, harminizer an such. there are more sound waves built into the unit than are utilized by the default patches.

like I said, get a GR33 and start out with that. get one of the newer GK3 pickups that will have the mounting bracket for a tuneomatic so you wont be drilling into your guitar. later you might want to get a ghost pickup for it so you dont have the ugly box hanging off the end of your axe. I have the older GK2 and had to dril 2 holes through the pickguard of my strat to mount it. I also had to cut the gk pickup mounting springs in half so I could get the pickup to fit underneath the strings without banging them.

Brian