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I'm leaving my home town for a (hopefully long) trip across Europe. As I was saying good bye to my modular system, the idea of putting up a small system to take away started to grow in me and I came up with something I would like to show you.
I have 3 constraints that guided my choice:
- Use a 4Ms Pod 64X cause it looks small enough and sturdy
- Try to use modules you have already (JF, Mangrove and Resonant Equalizer)
- Only add modules that are easy to find (I'm leaving in a month)
I'm not good at patching mentally (which makes planning a rack super hard haha) but the idea is to use Just Friends as a clock + source of modulation (ASR envelopes to VCA, LFOs to O&C quantiser, etc.) and O&C as a melodic sequencer and quantiser. I would use the 2HP loop to pre-record drones and multiple layers (I was going for the W/ initially but it's not available anywhere and I've never been fully convinced of the module). I chose 2 oscillators that should work great in pair: the mangrove is my favourite oscillator and I felt like almost any 6HP secondary oscillator would do it. But more on that second osc later.
I'm curious what you guys think of putting a REQ there. Obviously it's really big but it may be my favourite module and I don't know how to make music without it. I think it would be super helpful to create drones and I really need a sort of mixer. If you think of an alternative, what would it be?
Later on, I've found this video online: and it should give you a good idea of what I'm trying to achieve. But what really bugs me is how central the filter is in his piece and I don't thin the EQ would be as effective there. From this came a questioning on wether I should keep the second oscillator (currently an Instruo Ts-L although it's super expensive and I don't "love" it, but it could be Godspeed+ or a Dixie II or an MCO) or replace it with a filter (I was thinking of a µVCF because of its sine wave).
Of course, I truly want both and I've started to look at 80HP skiffs, but this is not the answer I'm looking for.
Anyway, feedback greatly appreciated.
Two things for me:
1. How do you plan on monitoring the outputs of this skiff? Maybe you're using an audio interface or something?
2. The Resonant Equalizer is huge at 18HP. You could add other modules that might be more useful in its place: an effects processor, a dedicated sequencer, a multifunction module like a Disting, etc.
Actually, I think the 4ms 64X is a rather poor choice here, given that only a couple more inches 'vertically' gets you an Intellijel Palette 62. Sure, 2 hp shorter, but you also get 62 hp of tiles AND the utility bar with two buffered mults, USB MIDI I/O, and your 1/4" audio outs.
Plus, this fixes one of Ronin's questions. The tile row has the ability to house Intellijel's Stereo Out tile (which directly connects to those 1/4" jacks). And as for his second, instead of the Serge version of this sort of thing, have a look at WMD's SCLPL. Also a resonant EQ albeit more limited in bands than the Serge, it DOES feature this "morph between settings" capability. Sequencer friendly, to be sure...and VERY capable while occupying 450% LESS space!
I'll bang on this when I get a little more nicotine in my system...just started this cigar, and the "brain food" hasn't kicked in yet!
EDIT: OK, here we go....
First up, this is in the 62 hp Palette, as mentioned above. The utility module gives you a pair of buffered mults and your 1/4" outs, plus the potential to add one of Intellijel's MIDI interfaces later on. I omitted that here because your description of the rig is less something MIDI-controlled and much more of a portable, manual tweakfest. And of course, your power connection is here.
TILES: First up, there the Intellijel Noise Tools gives you a master clock, sample and hold, noise source, and slew gen. Then there's your other VCO which can also be switched to LFO mode. After this, I put in another two VCAs which can be used in stereo. Then last in line is the Stereo Output Mixer, which can sum down two stereo paths to a single output. This connects directly to the 1/4" jacks on the utility bar, but you also have a direct stereo out so that you can take that summed stereo signal and mess with it elsewhere in the build.
MODULES: OK...the O&c is still there, but the little screened thing next to it is a multichannel sequencer, with five gate/trigs and one CV/gate channel with quantizing. The Paratek CV Peaks is an upgraded variation on Mutable's Peaks, albeit with full CV control over the stages in both EG channels. Your Mangrove is after that, followed by a Happy Nerding 3X VCA for controlling all three of the VCO levels pre-VCF.
And as for that VCF...I went with something like the Just Friends, but even crazier! The Limaflo Motomouth is a digital VCF that's also capable of operating as a formant filter; you can see the dial with the IPA phonetics vowel annotation in the middle left. So if you want a normal VCF, you've got that...along with the formant-based filtering the larger Mannequins module does. But the Just Friends doesn't have a morph control to shift from one vowel to the next, while this thing CAN do that. The C4RBN is also there if you need "conventional" filtering.
Then there's the FX module, where I opted for Frequency Central's Stasis Leak, giving you a choice of stereo reverb, tap delay, or chorusing. This also takes your mono "voice" signal and stereoizes it so it's ready for the WMD SCLPL...which is where that Stereo Output Mixer comes in. By having that in the tiles, you can use an out from the Stasis Leak AND from the SCLPL and then use that dual VCA to let one fade in/out against the other. And as for the SCLPL, no, it's not as complex as the Resonant EQ...really, it's more like a single resonant EQ band, albeit with a set of user-definable presets which can be morphed between, resulting in something even more filter-like and bonkers than the Serge clone. Hooking that preset "stepper" to a t/g channel from the Godfried will then result in sequenced TIMBRAL mayhem!
But yeah...this is what I was talking about above. Building these little portable systems is NOT easy...I actually revised bits of this several times for the optimal results...but by getting more functional density, adding some additional capabilities, and having that tile row, you wind up with a similarly-sized but WAY more powerful result!
Now, one notable omission here is the looper. It simply would NOT fit, and I wasn't going to stick you with that 2hp one because that's simply trying to cram too much behind 2 hp of panel space. But my idea here is that you actually might benefit more from a outboard looper for maximum sonic mayhem. Plus, the size works if you're going to jam it, the skiff, and the necessary power bricks, patch cables, and such into a nice gigbag (such as this: https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SubPhattyBag--moog-sub-phatty-gig-bag). And for that, I suggest the similarly-sized Boss RC-202, which gives you dual loop engines, onboard processing, live dub/delete, a "post-processing" headphone preamp, and a bunch of other stuff. Harness THIS (https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/RC202--boss-rc-202-loop-station) to the build above, and you've got a rig that fits in that gigbag for maximum mobility. All DC-powered, too...so if you wind up in some odd place with odd voltages, you can at least try looking for a suitable pair of wallwarts at some bigbox.
Wow thanks a lot to both of you for your answers, I can't stress enough how useful it is to me.
Ronin, I usually simply plug the mono out of a mixer (here the Joranalogue Mix 3 and a Quad VCA in y usual rack) straight into to a speaker. Far from being optimal but I usually don't have access to more than one speaker and I never use my computer to record or anything. That's probably something that I should have mentioned as it probably has a bigger impact on the skiff than what I thought.
Lugia, this is fantastic, really. I took quite some time to understand how you proceeded and it's extremely enlightening. And I'm 100% convinced that the palette is a far better choice, the Godfred + peaks combo is an excellent replacer of 90% of what I do with the JF and after taking a third look at the SCLPL I think I will be able to say goodbye to the RE.
The part that I have some issues understanding is the replacement is regarding VCAs and the absence of a mixer. I chose the Joranalogue because it acts both as a VCA and a mixer and although not having individual outputs is really limiting, I don't get how my different sound sources will be mixed at the end. Also, the 3x VCA is unfortunately not available anywhere at the time of writing. Yesterday I tried to reproduce the features of this skiff on my current system and I had to use my quad VCA as a final mixer.
Another thing I consider is the final (far higher) price of this new setup, which I'm fine with but will force me to split the bill on several months. I've updated the skiff with what I can afford now (and what's available): palette + 1Us + o&c + C4rbn + some sort of VCA, and I've created a small patch to see if that works for me:
I've kept the JF and RE for the moment as their size will only be an issue when I'll be able to afford their replacements. I've switched the IU VCO for a Duatt as I was desperately in need of a pre-mixer. I replaced the 3xVCA with a Tallin: it's only 2 VCAs but you get some extra features and it leaves room for the 2HP loop (not ideal but I really don't want to take external devices with me for the moment). Once the first part is bought, I'll get rid of the RE in profit of Sclpl and the stereo effect (if I'm able to find it).
~ Patch notes:
2 JF outputs (LPG mode) directly to RE. Pass comb2 to the Duatt and mix it with white noise then pass the mix to C4rbn and LPF out to stereo VCA (IRL I'd pass the HPF out to a VCA and treat it separately for pseudo hi-hats). Pass comb1 of RE to to stereo VCA. Then scan between the 2 sound sources using the stereo VCA, like you mentioned above, and pass them to the stereo output.
I haven't patched the rest for more clarity but not sure if that's an easy read haha. Now my issue is that the other sound sources (Mangrove and Loop) would need to be mixed and passed to both right inputs of the stereo output so that they're always present in the final mix. How would you achieve that with the system you designed? I'm probably missing something in the exact flow that you designed, with the mono to stereo transition around the stasis leak and the Sclpl!
Edit: ok, so the 3xVCA lets you cascade the outputs so that you actually end up with mixed sources! So I guess it's a Mix 3 with a tad bit more flexibility around individual outs. I wish it was available somewhere around EU...
Anyway, thanks A TON for your input, it helped me a lot although I haven't fully digested everything yet. At this point, my post probably looks more like personal raving and ranting, but I'd be happy to read more from you if you have comments on my answer!
The 3xVCA should actually be easier to get in the EU than elsewhere, given that they're in Germany. Bug Schneider's Laden in Berlin (here's the listing there: https://schneidersladen.de/en/happy-nerding-3x-vca) and see if/when they'll have them in again.
This is probably the fault of a few of us on here who've been giving advice. That triple VCA gives you so much modulation control capabilities in a skinny 6 hp that it's RIDICULOUS...for many of my builds, it's THE modulation row VCA.
The 3xVCA should actually be easier to get in the EU than elsewhere, given that they're in Germany.
Happy Nerding is actually from Ukraine, when info is correct. As Ukraine is not part of the EU, reorders can be complicated and take some time. Thus, every now and then it can happen, that the devices might not be available inside the EU.
First, I replaced the stereo VCA by a Ritual Electronics Pointeuse.
you can use an out from the Stasis Leak AND from the SCLPL and then use that dual VCA to let one fade in/out against the other.
Although I won't be able to fade in/out anymore, I really dig the idea of being able to switch both manually and from a gate signal. Also thanks to its internal flip-flop, it can act as a clock divider and a square sub-oscillator (perfect for the Mangrove). I'd take 2 if I could :)
This forces me to ditch the Noise tools. Fortunately Ritual Electronics will be releasing a 4HP noise source which, combined with the Pointeuse will still allow me to generate random pulses. I’m loosing the S&H ans slew limiter but get more hands-on fun and immediacy (I think). Also, my skiff is already in desperation of any sort of VCA so this feels like the right choice to replace it with a single trigger.
Lastly, this gives room for the guillotine. I really dig your idea of inserting a stereo effect at some point in the signal flow. This will work really well in pair with the Statis and is perfect with the Pointeuse already. Also, this will help beefing up the Sclpl when I get rid of the Resonant Equaliser!
I’l pull the trigger this afternoon :D
What do you think?
Something to consider as well. If you're in Europe, there are probably plenty of places to pick up modules on holiday. You can always swap some stuff out as you travel if you want to make some modifications.
You're definitely right. I haven't been able to locate all modules anyway!
I've bought the case and all the 1U modules except the stereo out (couldn't find it) already :)
I'll leave with the JF and the RE because swapping them is out of my price range for now.
This leaves me with 10HP that's supposed to be filled with a 3x VCA (6hp) and a filter or a stereo effect (4hp).
I've been playing with the rack for some days now and I thought I could share some feedback!
First having everything under hand really helped me see how much the improvements that you proposed made a lot of sense. The 1U tiles were such an important addition, the stereo effect is just perfect and I've had a LOT of fun with audio feedback pretty much everywhere in the signal flow. The mults are much more useful than I would have thought. More importantly, each time I felt like I missed something in my patch, I realised that it was offered in your original build (eg. I miss the Noise Tools a bit more than I would have thought) or the module was on its way (O_C is arriving in 2 days!).
So, I thought it was time to work on the second iteration with the idea of ditching the JF and the RE for smaller modules. But I soon realised that there was an issue with the build: the Palette cannot power more than 12 modules simultaneously. The original build included 13 modules (14 if you count the 2HP loop that I decided to keep). So now, the question is not so much about space but number of modules.
To mitigate the issue, my first idea was to find a passive attenuator to replace the Duatt. I found the Attenumixer from Zlob that has 4 inputs and a sum output. This just left me enough room to replace the Duatt and the Mosaic Clock with the Noise Tools.
This left me with the possibility of replacing the 18HP Resonant Equalizer with 2 modules (14HP) and the Attenumixer. I haven't decided how to replace it exactly as its internal circuit + its second input allow for so much control over feedback. But what I'm missing the most should help a lot:
- probably a second VCO
- a LP filter
- some feedback control
From this, I sketched the second step of my modular backpack journey:
I added a second Mangrove as VCO but a lot of other VCOs would work here. The second module would a a Sclpl, the C4rbn or even maybe the Tanh[3] from Instruo (https://www.modulargrid.net/e/instruo-tanh-3)
Anyway, I hope this will help some of you readers on your own path 👋
On the Intellijel Palette and your 1U modules, have you made SURE that all your 1U modules are in the INTELLIJELL 1U format? 1U falls into two standards: Pulp Logic "tile" and Intellijel. They are NOT compatible with each other. If you're going with the palette be absolutely certain those modules you've picked are Intellijel compatible.
