As much as I love a lot of the software synths the new analogue synths are surprisingly good value for the fatness they offer, after I sold my Juno and Moog many years ago I wanted something to replace them that didn't cost a fortune. I just got hold of the Arturia Microbrute and the Korg Volca Bass and I love them. They are so much fun and both have a lovely fat sound, as close as virtual synths come you just can't replicate those grungey screeching blines and leads or phat squelchy basses. Both have midi and onboard step sequencers which are a lot of fun and quite easy to program. I especially like the volca for the money I bought it unused for £75 and though it;s lacking in knobs and faders and is very basic the sound is lovely and very similar to a TB303, it also has plenty of bottom end and I've used it for a sub and it got on fine you can also put batteries and in it and carry it round as it's tiny (be prepared to get some funny looks if you mess around with it on the tube). The Arturia is more expensive and I would say it's not quite as savage as the Korg for bass, it's great for leads and crazy sounding effects and has a lot more knobs and faders which being that neither synth has any presets is quite handy. As I said the only down side is there are no preset sounds, the Arturia only has a card showing the position of the knobs and faders, I suppose this does force you into being more creative as you are more inclined to program your own sound. If you want to try your hand at synthesis but don't want to spend lot's of cash you can pick up a Volca Bass or the similar keys (not as phat but with more features) for £99 new, this is cheaper than most soft synths and much simpler to program than most of the most popular ones, which are in my opinion overloaded with features. In terms of the Arturia this starts at £240 up to £450 for the mini brute, probably not worth buying unless you've got some experience in synthesis as it involves patching and routing which take a while to get your head round, still a lovely synth if you haven't got a tight budget. Saying that if you've got money to burn probably go for the bass station. I had the original which in truth was a cheap and quite temperamental bit of kit, this one is far better put together and has a number of great features like a delay effect, presets nice semi weighted keys and is probably the best quality for the cheaper end of the market. Obviously there are a number of other available with the moog being my favourite but unless you have about £800-3000 these are not an option, fun to go play around on in West End DJ and piss of the staff. Here is a picture of the two little babies in action and this is the latest track I made using them, with Massive and Kontakt using Steinberg and NI plug ins, I actually routed some of the tracks through the Arturias VCF and you can hear how grimy it sounds (listen to the vocal), you can actually do this on both synths which is a nice effect if you want some nice distortion and grit.If anyone else has one of these and wants to trade patches message me, I'll upload a few samples in the next couple of days, probably a reese or two and some lead sounds.
https://soundcloud.com/surplus1/dark-volca-wip
https://soundcloud.com/surplus1/dark-volca-wip
