Of course you can do drum machine sounds on an analog modular synthesizer. Easy. However, it is somewhat strange to use big parts of a huge machine for some sounds easily available on much cheaper hardware. It is fun, anyway. There are four percussion sounds here:

1. A bass drum, created with a resonating A-106-6 Xpander Filter (12 dB output), sent through an A-137-1 Wave Multiplier I for some nice distortion.
2. A snare drum, created witrh some coloured noise from an A-118 Noise generator, sent through an A-106-5 SEM Filter and then through an A-137-2 Wave Multiplier II for a fat rich tone.
3. A percussive sound, created with an A-117 „808 noise“ sent through an A-124 Wasp Filter and (after the VCA) through an A-188-2 Tapped BBD for more „ringing“ sound.
4. Another percussive sound, created with some A-118 white noise, sent through an A-105 SEM Filter.

All percussive sounds are controlled by four A-140 ADSRs, controlled by two A-155 Sequencers (triggers and filter CV sequences). Everything is synced via Midi from Ableton live. Here I use a simple arpeggio to control the bass voice: three A-110 VCOs sent through an A-108 Ladder Filter (24 dB output). That’s it, recorded live, no overdubs, just a few effects from Ableton and mastering in Cubase.

Here we go:

Track length is 06:59.

Have fun,

Andreas

This is another improvisation – this time Ableton Live does some controlling of the A-100 system. Digital meets analog. We start with some pink noise put through an A-108 Ladder Filter and an A-127 Triple VC Resonance Filter. Soon, there’s some drumming from EZdrummer put through Ableton’s built in effects. The bass line we hear is just one single A-110 oscillator (put through an A-137-1 Wave Multiplier and an A-101-1 Vactrol VCF in lowpass and bandpass mode). Quite fat, huh? Then we have some side-lines (same melody as bass line, just transposed) with triggers derived from the bass line via A-160 Clock Divider and A-165 Trigger Modifier. One side line consists of two A-110 VCOs put through an A-106-1 Xtreme Filter, the other one is a single A-111 Highend VCO which is sent into an A-137-2 Wave Multiplier II and an A-106-5 SEM Filter (highpass mode). Both wave multipliers are modulated by several independent LFOs.  That’s it, basically. Just a few effects from Ableton added and then mastered in Cubase.

Here we go:

Track length is 07:25.

Have fun,

Andreas

So here’s another improvisation with the Doepfer A-100 (take care, this is quite „hardcore“…):

This is quite a long piece (ca. 24 min), so take some time to enjoy weird things happening…

We start with a bassdrum (coloured noise put through the A-106-5 SEM VCF), followed by some rhythmic sound (808 source into A-101-1 Vactrol VCF and then through the VC panner – controlled by a fast LFO). Both rhythm „instruments“ were triggered by the trigger out of an A-119 external input, fed by the VCO output of an A-196 PLL (filtered through an A-106-6 Xpander VCF) fed by an A-111 VCO (pulse out). The A-111’s pulse is modulated by a sine LFO. That’s the rhythm.

Them we have the PLL VCO output as a sound source itself: we send it through an A-108 ladder VCF and then into an A-188-2 bucket brigade device. Envelopes are A-140 and triggers are modified by A-160 clock divider and A-165 trigger modifier.

Track length is 24:34.

Have fun,

Andreas

This is another Doepfer A-100 improvisation. This time somewhat rhythmic and, hum, in a strange way danceable (is this me speaking?):

As always, here comes the nerdy part:

Bass Sequence: 3 x A-110 in A-106-6 Xpander Filter, all outputs through A-155 Sequencer step inputs, pitch is controlled by A-155. Bassdrum: A-108 Ladder VCF into A-137-1 Wave Multiplier I. Hihat: A-1188 White Noise in A-106-1 Xtreme Filter. High Sequence: 2xA-110 in A-101-1 Vactrol VCF and A-188-2 Tapped BBD (stereo out), pitch controlled by S&H (with Quantizer).

Track length is 10:35.

Have Fun!

Andreas

This is a first experiment with an anlogue machine (Doepfer A-100). Everything here is improvised, no overdubs, just some slight reverb and delay from Ableton Live and some mastering with Steinberg Cubase. Some basic preparations had been done to create the patch, the rest has been patched on the fly:

There’s no such thing as a defined melody or rhythm here ;-)

Ok, now here’s the nerdy info on this track (as always): It starts with coloured noise (from an A-118), put through an A-127 Triple Resonance Filter (which reminds me of the PS 3100 resonance filter). After this, there’s an A-111 VCO put through the A-137-1 Wave Multiplier. Quite a nice evolving drone sound. Then we have a bass by an A-110 VCO (I really LOVE the raw sound of the 110!!) put through an A-108 Ladder filter (low resonance, quite a beefy sound). This is modulated by the Complex Envelope A-143-1. Then come some notes played on keyboard. This are again two A-110s put through the smooth A-106-5 SEM filter. Finally, we have an A-117 Digital Noise put through an A-106-6 Expander Filter (24 dB LP) being modulated by an A-140 ADSR (triggered by the first EG of the A-143-1 Cmplex Envelope). That’s it. Patched „on the fly“  and recorded with a Steinberg MR interface in Live.

I would like to thank Mr. Dieter Doepfer (www.doepfer.de) for being such a cool engineer and entrepreneur! What a wonderful instrument! And of course the guys at hieber lindberg (www.hieber-lindberg.de) for their advice and many discussions about modular analog synthesizers (and the possibility to listen to all these nice machines in their shop, of course).

Track length is 16:13.

Have fun,

Andreas