It all started with a documentary on Netflix, 'I dream of wires' all about the history of synths.
I'm a pretty good (well was!) piano player (grade 8) so I want to delve into monophonic playing with all those wild sounds.......I also do home recording and want to use synth sounds, tangerine dream sort of feel......I need to buy one!!
I don't want vintage but a new, modern and reliable instrument, it would be useful if I could also use it as a midi controller when using it with pro-tools or Sibelius 7 .....a couple on the short list are....
Moog sub 37
Nord lead A1
Roland JD-XA
Looking forward to hearing your comments
pembers
Feel free to pm me any further requirements. We can supply all those synths and many more through our educational consultancy - UCan Play. We can also advise on software including ProTools, StudioOne, Cubase etc and will try to help you work out what the best system would be for what you are wanting to achieve musically.
You don't have a Roland TB 303 sitting dormant in a dusty cupboard do you ?
Sadly not, but we can supply a TB3 which is a cool alternative at a very good price! AIRA gear really does rock!
Ah, it was just a bit of nostalgia kicking in, I wish I had the time to lose hours like I used to....
In my misspent 80s youth i was in a group, i sang and played keboards, i bought one of the first "Oscar" synths, the guy who built them originally had a company called "EDP" they made the wasp synths, his parents lived in yarm, he delivered it to my house, over the years had a few more, arp axe, minimoog, a " cat", and many others, im looking to get back into it again, been looking at the micro brute.
If we are talking drum machines TR-707 please...12 Bit of joy!!
Tangerine dream! saw them many years ago at newcastle city hall, the soundtrack to the film "the keep" is great.Originally Posted by pembers
We love Roland's TR8 and that gets a huge amount of use in our studio. I also think that the Korg Volca instruments will become classics in their own right. Very impressed with what they can do individually and together.
yes that was good, my first one was a very basic boss dr55, saved space in the van! no drummer needed.
Can you get hold of a micro brute?
Yes, not a problem. Drop me a pm or email me at jonathan@ucanplay.org.uk and I will get a price over to you.
What album was the concert.....not that 'Tange' did that many albums!!!!
Me and me brother saw them in Hammersmith Apollo (I think) about a year ago....Edgar's last tour RIP
Cant remember what year, think it was the early 90s, lots of spandex!
edit, it was 1981, http://www.voices-in-the-net.de/tangerine_tree_10.htm
Last edited by jimp; 31st December 2015 at 23:40.
^
Wow that's a trippy period of tange, my first concert was Melrose tour in Nottingham
im not sure but i think one of their sons played guitar on stage.
This is my fave at the mo!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DYzsz2U7RM0
very good, i picked a second minimoog up for £80! from a shop in boro in the early 80s
WTF!! I'll give you £81 for it!!!
long gone, if id kept all of the synths i had i would be rich! tried to get away with the dx7 but gave up!
first synth i got was a kwai from kays cataloge.
^
Strange how many bands used yamaha dx7, but not many liked them! More of an instrument emulator than a modular synth.....but I would like one!
pain in the ass to programme, fm synthesis stuff
heres one for a laugh! us in 1982, in a small club,
ARP oddessy, crumar string machine and a burns black bison guitar!
Jim, that's not you with the Flock of Seagulls barnet is it?heres one for a laugh! us in 1982, in a small club,
ARP oddessy, crumar string machine and a burns black bison guitar!
Cheers,
Neil.
I've just bought the new Arp Odessy for the UCan Studios and it is a beautiful bit of kit. Like the Aira gear, a fraction of the price but a nice take on a vintage bit of gear.heres one for a laugh! us in 1982, in a small club,
ARP oddessy, crumar string machine and a burns black bison guitar!
BTW as close as I get to a synth is sitting here playing, "Are friends electric?" on my Stylophone.
Cheers,
Neil.
thats cool!
lol, which one?
The bloke on the right of the pic..
This one!
Cheers,
Neil.
ha ha, no thats a guy called "sav".The bloke on the right of the pic..
This one!
Love the desk lamps as spots! Lolheres one for a laugh! us in 1982, in a small club,
ARP oddessy, crumar string machine and a burns black bison guitar!
You don't have a Roland TB 303 sitting dormant in a dusty cupboard do you ?
xoxbox if you can solder!
I got a Korg Volca keys off her indoors for chrimbo, and I've bought myself the beats, bass and a mini kaoss pad too. Loads of analogue goodness, having lots of fun with them, and my 8 year old son is enjoying twiddling the knobs and playing on the kaoss pad.
In the same boat exactly as OP - have played piano for years and have a lovely acoustic yamaha piano, but after seeing that documentary, started regretting selling my Korg M1 around the time my kids were born :-)
Along with the synths the OP mentioned, does anyone know if there is there any value in any of the cheaper synths around the 300-400 quid mark? (say Korg MS 20 or Roland Aira system 1)
Or the Yamaha reface range? (tried them out and seemed a lotta fun but the mini keys might grate)
Give me a Hammond or give me death.
From the OPs original post it would be the Nord for me.
As above I've gotten rid of most of my synths now as they took up too much room, and of all the ones I had I still think the Korg MS2000 was highly underrated (and now pretty hard to find).
As usual, try get hands on with each somewhere before buying.
Has no-one gone DAW? I used to have a room full of kit - fond memories of the TR505, Yamaha SY77, Kawai K4 etc. - but now it's just Cakewalk Sonar for me with a load of plug-ins. Only a very part-time light user these days but I'm amazed how well it all works.
Ive just been looking at the Volca range, they look amazing! how are you getting on with yours?
Have a look at the Roland JD-Xi, it does have mini keys, but looks one hell of a bit of kit for the money.
thanks - not seen that one before - does look pretty cool!
I'm really enjoying it, fantastic for the price. Criticisms are it would be nice to have more memories or be able to save externally but that's minor. I've got the Volca Beats too and it works well to sync them together and mess about. I also have the kaoss pad which I'm using to add effects. I'm getting the Volca Bass tomorrow.
For the OP, maybe have a look at Novation Ultra Nova? I have the mini Nova which is good fun.
Do pm me for preferential prices on all Korg and Roland gear. Happy to help fellow TZers through my company UCan Play.
Im getting to like the Novation Ultra Nova, some nice sounds on demos ive seen.
edit, what about the Roland GAIA SH-01, which one would you choose?
Last edited by jimp; 2nd January 2016 at 22:48.
I've always been fascinated with synthesiser music and have many albums in my collection, some good and some not so good. My brother planned to get together an 80s revival band 4 or 5 years ago and set about acquiring some of the classic analogue synths of the day. He managed to get a Jupiter 8, Prophet 5, Minimoog and a couple of others before the project fell through and, much to his regret now, sold them all.
My nephew has his own recording company specialising in re-mixes and he uses software emulators of the classic synths which, whilst not suitable for gigging, work well in the studio.
This track has some of the classic synth sounds (in my opinion).
Eddie
Whole chunks of my life come under the heading "it seemed like a good idea at the time".
An interesting diversion, “HTML”-909 Gives You an Iconic Drum Machine in Your Browser
http://massappeal.com/html-909-gives...-your-browser/
Love that track Eddie.
Good juxtaposition between synth sounds and Steve Winwood's great blues voice.
Cheers,
Neil.
OP - if it were me, I'd go for the Moog Sub37, has the tone to suit the music you like, though personally I'd go for the Roland.
Here's a couple of mine...
Anyone tried CAUSTIC 3 on their ipad-tablet-device-thingy ?
It's amazing... if you buy it (about £5) you can then save your creations. It will also interface with MIDI devices if you have a OTG cable for your phone / tablet.
There's a desktop version too.
Excellent for whiling away dull train journeys.
Yes I think you are right, its the one im siding with........the roland looks amazing thou!
Slightly off topic, I went to a Philip Glass Ensemble concert in 1986.
At the front of the stage were four people playing keyboards, all facing side on to the audience - the two on the left facing right, the two on the right facing left. Smack bang in the middle of the stage, with his back to the audience, was for want of a better word, the conductor/mixer/whatever.
At the back of the stage three people floated around on wind instruments/vocals.
The sounds of four people playing synths/keyboards at one time was incredible. I'm willing to stand corrected on this, but I reckon there were no sequencers. They played in real time from sheet music - I know this as you could hear one hand out of eight stop playing when it was used to turn the sheet music. Still to this day, I'm not sure if the guy in the middle was actually hitting the off-switch on the amps when it came to the end of a track - the stop when all the players stopped was perfection in timing.
The closest I ever got to seeing/hearing Tangerine Dream live for me.
Rob.
You might also like Steve Reich's 'Six Pianos', which is done in the same way, only, you know, more pianos.
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