Rackbrute 6U - Electro Drums & Synths

Hey there, I'm 100% green when it comes to this stuff. Have had a traditional analog synth / drum machine setup for a while and looking to add/augment some of that with modular. I wanted the top row of this to be my dream drum machine, taking components from my favorite pieces of gear. The bottom row I was looking for unique sounding voices that I could do creative sound design with.

What I don't know is—what am I missing? Is there a module(s) that is essential to making this thing 'work'? that I need to include? My plan will be to program this with a Beatstep Pro. I considered the Arturia Minibrute 2S but I don't really need the synth engine there although I could be swayed if anyone has an opinion on it.

I plan to use some of my existing external effects which are not Eurorack so I added a module to hopefully help me use send/returns and account for the volume issues.

I may also consider using this live - any considerations there? I would like to sync it to my digitakt for that type of setup since that already sequences all my other machines.

Thanks in advance!

What's missing here isn't some magic module -- it's SPACE. You're trying to cram two different machines in a space that's really suited for only one. As a result, there are A LOT of things missing...VCAs, attenuators, FILTERS (good lord!), and so on. This is a poster child build for "Sexy Module Syndrome", to be sure.

First of all, get rid of this idea that you can cram a proper synth voice AND a full-on drum machine into a 6U Rackbrute. Ain't happening...at least, not with these huge spacehog modules. And this statement: "I considered the Arturia Minibrute 2S but I don't really need the synth engine there although I could be swayed if anyone has an opinion on it"...uh, no. Right now, if you intend on sticking with this build (which I do not advocate), all of the things you need to make this work are in the MiniBrute.

There's absolutely no way you can do proper "creative sound design" with the bottom row as it stands. There's far too much missing...there's not even a "voice" there, tbh. Delete this, start over...and the next time around, decide if you want drums or (NOT "and") a synth voice in the Rackbrute first and then build that out. And before building, study some other builds that have been done right to see what they require to do what they do. Otherwise, sticking with this sort of plan will result in building a black hole that sucks in money...but which puts out nothing useful in return.

Lugia, thanks for the honesty - like I said I'm really green when it comes to this stuff. As a first pass, I totally suffered from 'sexy module syndrome' - you got me there!

Your Minibrute comment is interesting, and I've looked at it a lot - would adding that get me closer to making this thing more than a money pit? I'm not opposed to having that (it looks awesome), but I have a handful of other monosynths. If it can sequence the modular well enough then that would be great and save me having to get a modular sequencer for now. I do want a modular sequencer but was definitely trying to CRAM stuff in here that I'd seen in various videos and liked.

All of that said, I started on this because I wanted drums - I've had various desktop stuff from Jomox, Acidlab, Korg and so forth but really wanted the best of all in one unit - including the Syncussion module. If I took the bottom row off and focused solely on drums I guess I'm still unsure what modules to add/remove. There are so many racks on the site it's hard to find ones that are built by knowledgeable people and not other noobs like me. I'm open to any suggestions people have here on the site.

Thanks a lot for the two cents, I've got a long way to go before I start putting this together for sure!

Building a drum machine in Eurorack is a VERY expensive proposition. You have to recreate all the parts of a drum machine out of individual Eurorack components. There are manufacturers that do make self-contained drum voices. But then you're basically back to where you started from.

I would consider it IF I wanted to get down to the very roots of the sounds and modulate various aspects of the sound that you can't with a normal drum machine. But if you go that route, you're basically building drum sounds from scratch: VCO, VCF, VCA, envelopes, and whatever else you want to throw at it.

If you want absolute control over your percussion and play all of it live, then you're going to need several of the modules above in duplicate. You're also going to need to mix it all... ON TOP of anything else you're doing in Eurorack.

Some deep thinking on what's practical, affordable, and if you really want to go this route. It would be far cheaper to create sounds one-at-a-time and then simply record them into a sample playback module once you're happy with the sound.

Building a drum machine in Eurorack is a VERY expensive proposition. You have to recreate all the parts of a drum machine out of individual Eurorack components. There are manufacturers that do make self-contained drum voices. But then you're basically back to where you started from.

I would consider it IF I wanted to get down to the very roots of the sounds and modulate various aspects of the sound that you can't with a normal drum machine. But if you go that route, you're basically building drum sounds from scratch: VCO, VCF, VCA, envelopes, and whatever else you want to throw at it.

If you want absolute control over your percussion and play all of it live, then you're going to need several of the modules above in duplicate. You're also going to need to mix it all... ON TOP of anything else you're doing in Eurorack.

Some deep thinking on what's practical, affordable, and if you really want to go this route. It would be far cheaper to create sounds one-at-a-time and then simply record them into a sample playback module once you're happy with the sound.

-- Ronin1973

Ronin1973 - thanks for the thoughts. Really helpful for sure. Here's my question (again, not knowledgeable here) - why can't I just use the drum trig outs on the Beatstep Pro for each of the drum modules I have here. I could use one of the gate/pitch outputs for the Syncussion as well to get pitch control. If I had another sequencer in here, perhaps the Erica Drum Sequencer then I could use that instead - right? Or would I still need VCAs for that? Also, I hear you on the mixer but I have an Erica mixer in that setup - 6 channels, why doesn't that work?

My plan wouldn't be to play this live but for sound design that I will sample into my digitakt or ableton and use from there. I assume I could create loops and record them too for arrangement later. Thanks so much for helping me!

Ronin1973 - thanks for the thoughts. Really helpful for sure. Here's my question (again, not knowledgeable here) - why can't I just use the drum trig outs on the Beatstep Pro for each of the drum modules I have here. I could use one of the gate/pitch outputs for the Syncussion as well to get pitch control. If I had another sequencer in here, perhaps the Erica Drum Sequencer then I could use that instead - right? Or would I still need VCAs for that? Also, I hear you on the mixer but I have an Erica mixer in that setup - 6 channels, why doesn't that work?

My plan wouldn't be to play this live but for sound design that I will sample into my digitakt or ableton and use from there. I assume I could create loops and record them too for arrangement later. Thanks so much for helping me!

-- fdbeardd

In order to play live, you'll probably want to minimize the amount of patching. If you're going with dedicated drum modules, you're basically limited to the same functionality of a less expensive drum machine unless those modules have CV inputs to modulate their settings. Those modules will be a bit more expensive than something like a Tip Top drum module. It's not that it doesn't work. It's that you're reinventing the wheel with a much more expensive wheel. My advice would be to set-up and price-out your Eurorack solution, look at the features and possibilities, then compare it with an off-the-shelf drum machine. Are you getting that much more functionality and for how much? If you're paying 400% more for 10% more functionality, you'll have to make a judgment call for yourself about it. Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Maybe you should. But I'd consider the price in dollars and HP space. That money and space may be better devoted to something else.