Hey folks,

I'm about to visit Schneider's Laden in Berlin and was wondering how you'd develop my rack further if it was yours? What modules would you add and why?

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

ModularGrid Rack


Yo!

Depending on what style of music you make, there's a whole bunch of usefull modules out there!

Tell us more!


Thanks or your reply :). I think I'm leaning towards West Coast. Considering that I've been told that some of my modules aren't that great (envelope generators, mixers, VCAS, LFOs), I'd like to know what the limiting factors are in your opinion and what potential solutions are to step things up. I'd also like to expand the range of sounds in general, both for more traditional as well as experimental sounds. I guess I'm looking for flexibility and quality - and would welcome character and quirkiness. I hope that makes any sense... What would be your first point of attack? Which modules would increase the value of my system most? I'd like to build on what's already there if possible but wouldn't mind making changes either. Finally, I'd like to have a nice delay/echo unit (but that's more of a separate question, really).


I should also say that I have an 0-Coast, as well.


ok! kind of hard to tell for anybody else but...
If you want new type of sounds you can try some mutable instrument modules, Rings is my favorite!
You can also add some more modulation sources for weird sounds and traditional ones. The Batumi is a dope quad LFO with multiple options but it's just an exemple.
What i really like for conventional "instruments like" sounds is voltage controlled ADSR so i can vary one parameter with a random source and the decay with the keyboard tracking while triggering a short white noise with the "end of release". all that give a "alive" feeling to my sounds.
I also see you don't have sequencers or quantizers which are really usefull even if you play your sequences from computer or external "main" sequencer


Any examples of VCADSRs you like?

At the moment I'm sequencing from a Beatstep Pro which provides pitch, gate and velocity per track. How would you incorporate quantisers/sequencers? Which ones do you like personally?


The Doepfer A-141-2 is a good exemple of VCADSR.
A cool trick to do with a sequencer and a quantizer is to feed a 8 or 16 step sequence in the quantizer, select a scale in it that fit your original sequence, then transpose that sequence in semitons (directly from the sequencer or from another keyboard/midi track). Quantizer will maintain the "off" note in the selected scale so you will end with a very musical result.
Intellijel µscale, Penrose Quantizer are good option since you can program the scale you want on the little "Keyboard" panel


I think I may go with a Make Noise Maths 2 and a Mutable Instruments Veils tomorrow. Any thoughts on the VCA? Alternatives? I would like to have a mixer with CV controlled panning and level, but I think I may just use my external Mackie for now.