yes this is what i was looking at, it does look great.
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Syntorial is great. I’m having a lot of fun with vital too.
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Hey wait. Don’t you have a Kilohearts subscription? If so you have Phase Plant. It’s a professional grade powerhouse, IMO the best synth you can currently buy (this is like saying the best bass you can buy though so it is very subjective).
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i do. up until now i never really looked at phaseplant, ive just used the individual effects like a pedal board.
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It’s more or less one of the outstanding “do everything” synths. You can’t really buy a better one, the differences are purely subjective at its level, and I love its workflow.
If it had a bummer, the only bummer would be no standalone version, it only works in a DAW. Which is not terribly uncommon but standalone versions are nice for noodling.
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Hey @Billn, a couple more options for you.
First off people seem to like this one, though I don’t own it:
Also, I feel like an idiot because I just discovered that an old plugin and one of the first I had ever downloaded was also inspired by the Nord Lead 2. It’s Synth1, a free VST that’s been around over a decade. It’s probably the single most installed VST of all time. Plus, it’s free.
https://www.kvraudio.com/product/synth1-by-daichi-laboratory-ichiro-toda
It’s ancient but still sounds good. I can’t use it (it’s not Apple Silicon native) but you might want to grab it and play with it.
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hey im asking out of curiosity and not because i want it, i would be completely lost for months with this monstrosity. but do you have/tried/thoughts serum 2? i heard about it way before i even knew what it was.
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I haven’t tried 2 yet but Serum is one of the all time greats. I prefer Phase Plant by a lot for both its UI and workflow but as far as wavetable synths go, Serum is also top notch.
Serum 2 will end up another one of the GOATs, I am sure.
But you already have Phase Plant and honestly it sits in a very similar space, with a workflow I like better.
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So word is that Serum 2 is great but is extremely CPU-hungry. I’d hold off.
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Universal Audio runs a special today, where you can get two of their plug-ins for USD 49.
There is a bunch of good plug-ins to choose from (some of them representing/emulating seminal hardware for recording and mixing/mastering).
It’s branded as “Hip Hop Month Feature Deal”
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Distressor is outstanding, one of my go-to compressors.It is a great model of the classic.
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I realize there are no “better” or “worse” necessarily, but I think I might grab that Fairchild Compressor instead…
Also: I know (think I know) that you are a Valhalla guy, but what about that Lexicon reverb?? That’s a classic too…
Actually I don’t own any Valhallas right now (except Supermassive). My main reverbs are MCharmVerb, UVI SparkVerb, and the Kilohearts one.
Lexicon made by favorite Delay of all time and PSP Audioware has a great plugin version, the PSP Lexicon 42. I am sure their reverb is great.
Really recommend the Distressor plugin though.
just curious, @howard any thoughts on poly aftertouch? seems like and interesting thing but not really widely used. i still cannot even play a proper piano chord but hay i’m trying, so not something i could use at this point.
and i just noticed that i have a whole series of questions that start with “just curious” to you. insert synth-curious joke here.
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Polyphonic aftertouch is nice in that it lets you be more expressive - for example, when fingering a chord, pressing down harder on one of the notes while sustaining will emphasize it. But really it’s far from a make or break feature until you get pretty technically skilled.
The direction everyone is going for that kind of expression now is actually MPE - MIDI Polyphonic Expression. This is like an expansion of poly aftertouch to also include moving the finger up and down the key as well to vary another parameter. So, as one common example, imagine having something analogous to the “pitch bend” and “mod” controls separately on every individual key.
There are also other interesting takes on this like the Osmose:
Hah! No worries at all. It’s a big world and it took me like a year just to get back in to it, despite it being my original instrument.
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very cool
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FWIW: I look at Poly Aftertouch as a nice to have at most but I am not technical enough to really take advantage.
Normal aftertouch is a must have though.
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oooh that is very helpful actually. i knew there was a difference but i wasn’t sure how much it mattered. if i ever get good enough that i actually need a halfway decent keyboard on anything i will keep that in mind. that will be approximately 2 thousand years from now.
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I don’t want to undersell it either - there’s simple cases where you don’t have to be very good and it’s still nice (i.e. holding down an octave and aftertouching the lower note more than the higher, etc.) But I wouldn’t kick a keyboard to the curb if it didn’t have it.
My keyboard (Arturia KeyLab 61 mkII) has polyphonic aftertouch on the pad grid but not the keys, for example; the keys are just monophonic aftertouch. That’s fine with me because it also has a very nice keybed.
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