NAMM 2017

Since my first NAMM visit in 2012, every year I have posted about modular synthesizers (and other interests) at the end of the first day to get the word out to those interested.

In the intervening years, modulars have become popular enough that professional music media outlets cover all the new stuff, sometimes as early as the day before NAMM starts, so no more scoops for me. I am officially retired!

So I went to NAMM this year with a more casual attitude (on rainy Friday, day 2, even!) and chatted with lots of friends, met some people, saw a lot of cool new stuff and still have some photos to share. I won’t go into great detail about anything, since it’s covered elsewhere. Come on in and check it out!

Below are Kris and Stephen at the Noise Engineering booth. I had my pass thanks to them!

I am an occasional helper at Noise Engineering as a beta tester for their modules as well as sometimes making design and feature suggestions.

Here are the three cases they had this year, with many new modules coming out this year:

I can’t wait for this sequencer!

Synthrotek had this amazing repurposed rig for the show:

Of course Bryce Recordon, of the Waveform City podcast, was there:

And Bana Haffer was doing demos at the Make Noise booth.

The new Make Noise Morphagene below:

The Koma Electronik Field Kit is awesome:

Pittsburg Modular had these awesome video game cabinets set up:

Skein Modular had some really cool cases:

The WMD rig:

The QuBit bubble that everyone had to take a photo of!

  

LZX had some really cool video modules:

The new Malekko Voltage Block:

Sputnik Modular’s rig:

Skyler, with his Apogee Jam, recording directly into his phone to eliminate the insanely loud NAMMbience:

Some other cool random stuff I saw includes the new Stylophone, which is super fun with a built-in delay:

The handcrafted Theresyn:

They have built-in speakers and the tall ones have resonating strings.

Vintage Vibe make Rhodes style keyboards, but they had a couple new models that also sport a little ribbon synth built in (the ribbon is the silver strip just above the keys). This was a bass model. They had the lids off to show the mechanical parts. It sounded awesome, especially playing a bass line and occasionally doing a downward slide!

This beautiful Travis Bean:

A clear demo model of the Center Point Stereo Spacestation v.3. I have an older Spacestaion and love it. It is a stereo amp, but in a single cabinet. If you know how mid-side mic technique works, this is that in reverse!

 

And Lowrey – still in the game!

Thank you Noise Engineering for the pass – I had a blast!

NAMM 2016

For the past five years I have gone to NAMM to take photos and post about (mostly) eurorack modular synthesizers for the relatively small community of users and manufacturers. Though I think this community has grown so much during this short time, and is now getting so much coverage, that perhaps my services are no longer needed and maybe I should retire after this year. We have hit the turning point where there are so many new modules (and manufacturers) that it is difficult to keep up with all of them, so I’m sure I’ve missed some stuff this year. Below are a ton of pics – click on them for hi-res. Enjoy!

Eurorack’s all grown up and no longer downstairs at NAMM!

As some of you know, I am a helper elf for Noise Engineering. This year I helped prepare for NAMM at the NE HQ. The Noise Engineering modules are in new shallow aluminum cases from Sub Modular.

Absurdly, I didn’t take any close-ups of the NE stuff at NAMM, but I’ll update this post with some later. Here’s the Noise Engineering booth. Thank you, Stephen, for the NAMMM badge!

The Tiptop booth. Always great to catch up with Gur and Tomio. The new cases are looking great, and watch for several new Z-DSP cards coming soon – they sound amazing!

Make Noise. Got a tour of the new Tempi module…

and tinkered with the 0-Coast

Had a great time with the Malekko crew this year. Congrats on the Roland collaborations!

New cases and modules.

Rad dudes

Cool new pedals

How cool? this cool. Shredworthy even.

4MS rig featuring a new stereo delay with a huge amount of memory (3 mins, I think?)

Audio Damage had some cool custom cases and were showing their new drum module.

I’m pretty sure Chris just told that guy I’m a dork.

Bastl’s crazy rig. I shot a video that I’ll try to get up here later.

WMD booth. Great chatting with William and the WMD crew.

Verbos booth.

Vermona monosynth and modules.

Abstract Data’s rig.

Intellijel had new cases and modules, including the new Rainmaker module.

The case has an intentionally deep lid for keeping it patched in transit.

Pittsburg’s new stuff.

Koma’s rig.

Industrial Music Electronics (formerly The Harvestman) set up.

Sputnik had a bunch of new stuff.

Snazzy’s case and new pedal.

Endorphin’s rigs.

Synthrotek

ZVex entries into euro. I love my Fuzz Factory guitar pedal, so this should be interesting.

STG

At the Big City booth I played this insane Schmidt synth and a real Mellotron.

Moog had a crazy cool set up with a ton of Mother 32s. I can’t help but think the Modular on the Spot gatherings inspired this desertscape arrangement!

Moog also had some museum pieces set up.

Obligatory Stevie Wonder pic (on the escalator)

Oberheim/Dave Smith stuff

OB-6!

Two Voice

The Linnstrument is really fun and playable.

Three New Pocket Operators from Teenage Engineering.

There were several new euro manufacturers I was unaware of below, such as Rossom.

Mordax

Soulsby

AOA

DT

Birdkids

I think I may have to own one of these someday – Rickenbacker 12 string.

And to wrap up, some random weird stuff:

I saw a lot of friends, met some new ones and had a great time. Hope you dug the pics.

Cheers! (that’s Steven from Noise Engineering and Chris from Sub Modular)

 

 

 

 

 

My Modular Synthesizer

In April I started my modular system. There are several formats to choose from but I decided on the Eurorack format as it’s generally cheaper and there are a lot of manufacturers in this format, which means lots of choices.

What I love best about it is that it ends up being a different instrument each time it is patched from scratch and the discoveries seem endless.

Having done a ton of research before going down this road, it didn’t take long to fill my case with modules.

The case I went with (from Tiptop Audio) folds up for portability and is small enough to take along on a flight as your carry-on.

Though I imagine security may have a few questions.