Patch of the Day - Harmonyhertz

I twisted my knee and had to undergo an MRI scan this week. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure, this is what it sounds like:

Harmonyhertz-PotD  by  navs

Having entered the machine, you're given a pair of noise-canceling headphones. The classical music that is piped through these is supposed to calm and distract you from the grunts and buzzes generated by the scanner. Don't know which device was responsible, but the kick and hi-hat pattern was a bizarre counterpoint. Sort of like a Clockwork Orange warehouse party. Someone with a sense of humour at Siemens, the company that built the contraption, decided to call it 'Harmony'. The nurse told me that the larger unit is called 'Symphony'.

THE PATCH

The patch features four voices: kick and hi-hat, ring modulated squarewaves, FM klunk and some 'ducked' classical music. Although I managed to use up nearly all of my patch cables, it was actually fairly straightforward.

Drums: MMF-1 sine wave kick, M12-filtered-noise hat. LFO provides rhythm, VCS provides gate delay for 'swing'.

Buzz: Wogglebug stepped out provides slow pitch changes for VCO-2RM. Two square waves, with a touch of XMod and manual pitch and PWM tweaking, are output from the ring modulator. Timing is generated by the burst out of the WB which is patched to a clock divider. The /8 gate signal triggers one Maths channel. An inverse /8 gate is fed to a second Maths EG so that the klunks are timed to occur after each buzz has sounded.

Klunk: M15 & AFG lin FM plus some pitch woggle and envelope thwapping from Maths and the mix out of an A-143-1. Maths' EOC used to trigger the Doepfer, klunk gated by M13 LPG.

Classical: Borg-filtered with a bit of FM from the combined buzz & klunk CVs. Vactrol speed in evidence as the CV takes a while to fade away from it's peak.

Ducking: this was achieved by sending the classical sample to the first channel of an A-134-2 VC Xfader, the audio mix of buzz and klunk to the second and applying the combined buzz and klunk CVs to the (asymmetrical) Xfader.

Hope you enjoyed the sounds and remember to look after yourselves!

This PotD dedicated with thanks to the docs and nurses.

New Series - Navs' Music Minute

First track in a new series of 60 second compositions. These are tracks featuring multiple takes, a little editing and some effects. In short, anything I can't file under 'Patch of the Day'.

Cat's Cradle by navs

Edit: the SC Player didn't seem to be working at time of posting. If it's still not showing the waveform, just click on the 'Cat's Cradle' link above.

The main parts (random melody & resonant sweep) were generated by a Jomox SunSyn, the occasional bloops, klonks & spurts were generated by a live patch featuring a Livewire AFG, modulated by a Plan B Model 15 VCO. A Wogglebug generated pitch CVs, triggered a Model 10 EG and controlled its Time Base.

For the main part, I cross-modulated the SunSyn's VCOs and set LFO1 to generate a random pitch for one oscillator and played the 'melody' by hand. Proof, maybe, that the best source of randomness is the human touch.

Patch of the Day - Arrhythmia

Take a generous handful of comparators, a pair of voltage controllable LFOs, a random source, a wave-folder and an equal measure of VCOs, EGs & VCAs. Toss them into a marinade of tape delay and poly chorus and this is what you might get.



All elements were triggered from a single clock source with subsequent rhythms derived from a home-brew dual comparator, Doepfer A-143-1 and Plan B Model 10. A sequential switch was used to inject random timing and pitch modulation.

Patch of the Day - Bugfest!

A 10 minute modular jam to close the month.



Everybody modulated everybody else. Enjoy!

Livewire AFG vs Cwejman VCO-6

(Picture shows AFG but no VCO-6:
I stupidly forgot to take a snap before I had to return it.)

Finally got round to compiling and uploading this test!

Livewire's AFG goes head-to-head with Cwejman's VCO-6, two similarly priced and spec'd high-end VCOs.
They both sound great, but do you need both?

Download the tests here (18 MB) and here (8 MB).

Thanks to Schneidersbuero for the loan of the VCO-6!

First Patch of the Year

Dusting off the cobwebs after a week on the Baltic Sea island of Rügen

Der Rasende Roland by navs

Another P3 driven track featuring four elements: VCO-2RM cross-modded and 'thwapped' by a VCS to a Model 13 LPG and gated by an A-143-1, AFG FM'd by an A-105, MMF-1 dual sine pinged & VC'd and some white noise sweeps.

Happy New Year to all!

Patch of the Day - And The Bells Rang Out

A festive Patch of the Day -

AFG FM'd, MMF-1 pinged, Super Jupiter XModded & Sunsyn plain old filtered, all sequenced by a P3.

and the bells rang out by navs

Peace & prosperity to you all, Navs.

Patch of the Day - Automation Uncertainty

Three VCOs running as External Instruments in Logic, random CCs & pitch information generated by a Sequentix P3 to various plug-in parameters.


Automation Uncertainty

The patch:
1) Livewire AFG linear FM'd by Cwejman MMF-1,
reverb depth modulation.
2) Cwejman VCO-2RM > Plan B M13,
delay time & level modulation.
3) Cwejman VCO-2RM > Doepfer A-105,
flanger feedback-level modulation.

Shame there aren't any decent, fully CV-able stereo effects in Euro format yet, as I'd far rather do this in the modular realm than faff around with assigning CCs. But in terms of flexibility and price, it's a good compromise for adding some modulation madness to your patches.

Patch of the Day - The FM Ratio Stepper

Who says you can't do decent Linear FM in the analogue domain?


The FM Ratio Stepper

Today's patch was inspired by my GAS for a Modcan VCDO and William H's excellent FM tutorial.

The idea was cribbed from the lovely 'harmonics' VCDO demo, with William H's ratio to pitch conversion PDF proving invaluable.

I used two channels on my Kenton Pro 2000 II to provide the separate CV's which were fed to my Livewire AFG (carrier) and Cwejman MMF-1 (modulator).

Oscillator Orgy!

What a week it's been. First I get my AFG back from Livewire, then I finally get my hands on a Cwejman VCO-6 and yesterday Tiptop Audio's Z3000 arrives at Schneidersbuero.
Oscillators. They're like buses...



There's been a lot of hype surrounding the Z3000, so I was keen to hear it for myself. I'll let the dust settle on my first impressions before posting the full test, but for starters here's an 'amuse-oreilles' :


Tiptop Audio Z3000 Demo

Apologies to Tiptop for the picture - I couldn't resist!

I'll also be posting an AFG vs VCO-6 clash-test. These two oscillators, while having completely different designs and concepts cover remarkably similar ground. Seems to me, that if you were currently in the market for a new high-end Eurorack oscillator, these would be the main contenders: at roughly the same price, both offer linear as well as exponential FM and some form of über-PWM.

This is what you can expect:


AFG vs VCO-6 Demo

One final teaser: I think I've cracked the secret to the AFG's Anti-Matter outputs. I'll post the full patch details, with sound examples and oscilloscope shots, along with the VCO test.

Till then, happy patching!

Welcome to Navs Modular Lab!

Welcome to navs.modular.lab, a resource for Euro format module reviews and samples.

Over the past year, I've tested more than 20 different VCOs, VCFs, VCAs, Modulators and Manglers and posted the results over at the Canecutters website. I'll be moving the tests from their old home during the next couple of weeks and adding some new ones. You can look forward to Plan B's Model 10 Polyphonic Envelope, Doepfer's Source of Uncertainty and some lovely examples of the Livewire AFG's FM capabilites.

This site will also be home to Patch of the Day, my modular patch diary which has just celebrated its first birthday.

But to kick things off, I've got some demos of Bleep Lab's Thingamagoop which I bought here in Berlin at General Robots - a great shop full of things you didn't know you needed.



Not exactly modular, but fun nonetheless!


Thingamagoop Rises


Thingamagoop Flies


Thingamagoop Modulates

Thingamagoop did his thing through Cwejman's MMF-1 filter and a Roland Space Echo. On track 3 I ran him through an envelope follower and took the signal to stimulate a pair of ring modulating VCOs (Cwejman's VCO-2RM).

Hope you enjoy the sounds & site and look forward to your comments!

Cheers,

Navs