Showroom Dummy (The Return)

It's been nearly a year since I last posted a little studio tour, so let's sacrifice to the oh-so-geekish exercise...

I won't go too far in details about the instruments themselves and invite you to check out the labels for reviews and samples.

A nice bundle of analogue power here...

We've got the Prophet 08 polyphonic synthesizer on the front, an outstanding, sophisticated machine, and no doubt future classic...

Then the no less fantastic Moog Little Phatty monophonic.

On top of that, Roland's 1986 Alpha Juno-1, a dark, brooding 8 voices synth.

Behind, the mellow, retro-80's sounding Korg Poly-800 (I'm running out of space, don't know where to put that one yet!).

Let's go digital with the deep, deep synthesis of Korg's 1990 Wavestation, the perfect tool for cinematic, creepy atmospheres.

The Roland D550, rack version of the famous D50, is on the right, behind its PG-1000 controller.

There's a Lexicon MX200 reverb unit on top of it, and an Electro Harmonix Big Muff fuzz pedal behind.

The red thing is a TL Audio compressor, on top of a Joemeek ThreeQ preamp/compressor/EQ.

On the left part of the working space, my good old Korg Electribe EMX drum machine, the PG-300 controller for the Alpha Juno-1.

The big white whale is the very newly acquired Crumar Bit-01, a fine and complex 8 voices analogue synth.

Another bunch of analogue Electroharmonix pedals on top of it : Stereo Pulsar (tremolo), Memory Boy (delay), Stereo Electric Mistress (flanger).

Hard to glimpse on the far right behind the table, a Microkorg and a couple more Electro Harmonix tools : the analogue Small Clone (chorus) and Small Stone (phaser).

Guitars, guitars, guitars...

A couple of steel guitars, which I use for my blues albums, and an Emperor Joe Pass hollowbody.

Not pictured : Peavey electro-acoustic, and my beloved Epiphone acoustic.

Software-wise : Sonar LE for recording... Gforce's, Virtual String Machine and M-tron as main VST instruments.

Showroom Dummy

Now that my setup is complete (I mean, for the time being), I think the time is ripe for a little explanatory tour.

As you can see, my studio is mostly hardware, which I tend to prefer for workflow and audio quality.

As usual, the pics links to higher resolution images.

The analogue bunch :

Moog Little Phatty : monophonic analogue, 2006 Tribute Edition, the signature Moog sound, all basses on my songs are played on this, and obviously it excels in leads. With the new arpeggiator, it's also a good source of interesting effects.

DSI Prophet 08 : polyphonic analogue (8 voices), 2007... beautiful and sophisticated sound. It's the instrument I usually use for lush, warm textures. The on-board sequencer and the ability to layer two patches are most useful to create loops and percussive grooves.

Roland Alpha Juno-1 : polyphonic analogue (6 voices), 1986... this is the one for eighties sounds with a lo-fi, dark edge. The classic Juno sound, in a punkier sort of way.

The virtual analogue connection :

Korg Microkorg : polyphonic virtual analogue (4 voices), 2002… a most successful, retro looking and sounding instrument, often derided for its toy-like appearance, but it’s a serious, surprisingly deep instrument, with great arpeggiator and a vocoder full of character.

Korg Electribe EMX-1 : polyphonic virtual analogue (16 voices), 2003… most underestimated drum machine and synth module… great sounds, great effects, and a handy 5-parts synth sequencer, allowing you to program a whole song in there.


The digital collective :

Roland D-550 w/ PG-1000 programmer : polyphonic digital (16 voices), 1987... one of the finest digital synths ever, cleverly using truncated samples to add "realism", which sounds dated today but that's what I love in it! Great strings, ethereal pads, but also a fantastic source of strange effects.

Korg Wavestation : polyphonic digital (32 voices), 1990… another fine digital instrument, of outstanding depth. The lack of a proper filter renders the sound a bit cold, but it’s the perfect tool for soundtrack or ambient work. With a little bit of programming, a single patch can provide a whole complex atmosphere.

Yamaha QY70 : portable workstation… in my bag on most vacations and weekends, a great tool to work out song ideas on the move, with very decent sounds.

And various Bontempi, Casio and Yamaha...

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