I've been MIA but getting back into the (acid!) groove

Life, as it does, has its way of intervening and getting in the way of things, and so I spent the last two months with the synths set aside and not making music. But! I did a lot of thinking in that time, and had a boatload of new ideas, and got to try a few this weekend. Here's the one I'm happiest with, hope you enjoy and you're all well!

https://stevehand.bandcamp.com/album/after-beach-acid

Made with:

Hey troux! Welcome back. I had a similar experience for a few months. Just lost a bit of my creative drive and disappeared for a while. I'm glad to see you getting in the spirit again.
This sounds outstanding. Love the mix too. Did you recently add the Squid Salmple to your rack? I don't remember seeing that before. How do you like it?
Take care.

Hi troux,

Glad to have you back on track ! I suppose we all have those times when we need to take a step back. And thanks for sharing this, lovely dreamy acid

EDITED Jul 19th 2021, 12:06

Thanks @farkas! I saw you were posting again too and have your songs in the queue, looking forward to listening to them. Re: the Salmple I bought it a bit before my hiatus so I haven't used it a ton ton, but so far I've been pretty impressed and I still have a lot to learn, for example I'd love to spend some time working to use it for live sampling. Overall though if you're aiming to make a live dance rack I'd say it's a pretty nice addition because its does a ton and the cohesiveness of the different drum banks and the ease of switching between them helps in experimenting quickly to find the right sound.

@toodee, thanks for the welcome back, and agreed, sometimes a break can really get the creative juices churning. Hopefully I can keep it up 🕺

EDITED Jul 19th 2021, 13:47

I saw you were posting again too and have your songs in the queue, looking forward to listening to them.
-- troux

Don't get your hopes up for anything groundbreaking. Haha. Just some looping experiments that I decided to record.
Again, good to see you back in action.

So, I just found out that me sending out hearts to @troux caused an issue in my message, but I don't care, I'm sending love with words then

I also had a question that got trimmed actually (if you can spare some time): I'm seeing 2 R*S VCFs in your setup, could you tell us more about those, why you have both and what they do for you compared to other filters you may have tried ?

@toodee I went on a real Serge tear awhile back and that's a big part of the why, but the more proximate cause is that I really super love the VCFS (which I had first) but find it also has a pretty distinctive sound, and one that's kind of smooth rather than aggressive and super resonant. So, I wanted to have another filter to mix it up for when I'm building my own 303 (instead of relying on the M303) and to get a little more intense and a darker vibe. That said, I was looking at the rack today and wondering if a Plaits or a 4MS Ensemble Oscillator might make more sense over the VCFQ there, especially if I could sneak in something like a WMD C4RBN. Future plans, TBD!

Stepping back and putting aside my particular acid journey, they are both really unique and interesting filters that don't quite sound like anything else I've used, so if you're curious I would definitely recommend them both, and I have a ton of love for the R*S modules in general too. Hope that helps!

EDITED Jul 19th 2021, 16:03

Also @toobee, for some reason I can only get emoji to work here if I google them and copy it from the results page, so here's some hearts back, thanks for the love ❤️❤️❤️

@farkas you are modest as always, looping experiments are just my cup of tea so my hopes remain high lol

Hey @troux, let me know if you decide to go with Plaits. I was thinking about putting mine up for sale on Reverb because I haven't been using it. I'll be glad to sell it to you for a fair price.

Loving the groove on this. The drums sound great - are they all Squid Salmple?

@farkas, nice, I'll give that some thought and let you know.

@TumeniKnobs, thanks! On this tune the bass and snare (or clap, I forget right now) are the Salmple and the hi-hats are the Hexinverter Mutant Hi-Hats whose sound I just can't get away from, I love em. The Salmple has a ton of different banks though so if you want another example you could check out this other tune I made a few days ago, same rack but different bank.

https://stevehand.bandcamp.com/album/poolside-acid

Hi Steve,

Nice long, relaxing track, yet great to listen at! Can you do more of this please? :-)

Glad to hear you are back with us together with your creativity! :-) Thanks a lot for sharing this with us and kind regards, Garfield.

Thanks for listening, and for the welcome back @GarfieldModular!

@toodee I went on a real Serge tear awhile back and that's a big part of the why, but the more proximate cause is that I really super love the VCFS (which I had first) but find it also has a pretty distinctive sound, and one that's kind of smooth rather than aggressive and super resonant. So, I wanted to have another filter to mix it up for when I'm building my own 303 (instead of relying on the M303) and to get a little more intense and a darker vibe. That said, I was looking at the rack today and wondering if a Plaits or a 4MS Ensemble Oscillator might make more sense over the VCFQ there, especially if I could sneak in something like a WMD C4RBN. Future plans, TBD!

Stepping back and putting aside my particular acid journey, they are both really unique and interesting filters that don't quite sound like anything else I've used, so if you're curious I would definitely recommend them both, and I have a ton of love for the R*S modules in general too. Hope that helps!
-- troux

Thank you very much for those explanations ! I'm really afraid of R*S because I think that if I start with that brand (the Res EQ has been on my radar for quite a while) I'd probably end up spending more than I should, they do offer very nice designs though, IMO a very nice balance of space and unique functionality. The only issue I have is that for this type of module and design (variable Q or slope is not something I'm used to) is that I would have to try them before buying and I have no way of doing that currently or for the foreseeable future. It's probably for the (financial) best...
I've also been trying my best to ignore that Sound Stage of yours, and the recent WMD designs because the part of my garden where I grow money has suffered from the summer droughts 😅

What are the parts composing your personal 303 ?

PS: now I'll just copy yours from this thread ❤️

If you want to avoid spending money on R*S I may be the wrong person to talk to @toodee! I'm a huge fan of the Res EQ and would probably suggest that as the place to start with them, particularly if you're looking for a unique module that can really spice up a patch, especially drones, feedback patches, or things based on field recordings.

Re: my personal 303 one example of it patched up would be like so:
Metropolis CV => NTO
Metropolis Gate => Maths Trigger 1
Metropolis Clock => Algorhythm Clock
Algorhythm Channel 1 => Maths Trigger 2
Maths Trigger 1 => Quad VCA CV 1 (cascades to CV 2)
NTO Variable => Quad VCA channel 1
(optional) NTO Square => NCOM => Quad VCA channel 2
Maths Trigger 2 => VCFS or VCFQ CV, Q, or Slope in
Quad VCA channel 2 (mix of 1 and 2) => VCFS or VCFQ audio in
VCFS or VCFQ => out or to effects

There's a ton of variations that can work from there but basically you have a sequencer with a multi osc voice (though it's integer ratio subharmonic) through a filter that you can then add accents to. In the tunes posted here I'm using the M303, but in other tunes on my bandcamp, in particular Live Jams for Scotland, all the synth sounds basically follow the guide above.

EDITED Jul 21st 2021, 05:05