Hi

This is my current rack about two years old now. I'm starting to feel a bit stale with it. I think I have a good basic set-up with a bit of everything and am happy with most modules. I'm thinking of ditching the output module and MI Kinks which will give me 14hp total spare. I am looking for ideas to fill that with something to give me a bit more excitement. I am mainly into ambient and drones, industrial and very much into experimental stuff using reel to reel tapes/loops, circuit bent toys and other sound mangling devices and home made instruments. As well as what is in my rack I have a passive self built unit giving me attenuators, mults etc numerous guitar fx pedals - delay, reverb, chorus, tremolo etc and also I have a Arturia Microbrute semi modular and Beatstep, and a Yamaha reface CP piano keyboard. So what do you think would give me a step up the ladder and some new inspiration please. Much appreciated.

ModularGrid Rack


The Bastl Grandpa granular sampler and Spa expander are an interesting, quirky, 10hp, lo-fi combo. I've been eyeing it for a while myself. Seems like a deceptively powerful texture generator.


A couple suggestions come to mind:

1) Add something like a DannySound CaliOsc + a Timbre or a Make Noise STO + an Intellijel Bifolder to get into some analog wavefolding and variation territory, I've been doing that with Random*Source Serge modules and really loving it.
2) Get a 4MS Ensemble Oscillator, tons and tons of stuff to explore in it from chaotic drones to lush synth strings.
3) Get a Tanh, don't change anything else and start exploring feedback patching.

Specific additions aside, the main thing that comes to mind for me looking at this rack is actually to set aside the Rings and to keep the Kinks. It's too easy to dial in good sounds with Rings which ends up making me lazy at least. Substituting it with something that requires more effort and skill will bring some of the excitement back into your patching, imho.


I had a different take on this. Since much of the architecture of the original build depended on normal-sized Mutable modules (or around that same general size), I opted to yank them and replace them with smaller clone versions. This freed up quite a bit of space, as you could imagine...
ModularGrid Rack
So, when you examine this, you'll notice that nothing was really removed as such...but the additional space in the top row allowed me to add a noise/random source, a second oscillator (the Knit, clone of Plaits), a waveshaper that can also crossmodulate signals from both oscillators AND which also gives you an suboctave source. Nanorings, your multimode, then a Monsoon, which is an expanded version of Clouds, ONE, stereo mixer, then Verb. This also puts all of the audio (save for the output module, which I kept here) in the top, modulation and control in the bottom.

And in that bottom row, I went off...first tiny thing there is one of Konstant Labs' PWRcheckr modules, lets you keep an eye on your DC rail behavior. Then I tossed the old Doepfer divider and dropped in a six-way clock divider/logic/multiplier to really punch up your timing control. Sequential switch next, then a dual CVable Boolean logic module for further messing around with timing behavior (plus, Boolean gates can also make for nifty waveshapers in their own right). Then we're back on track all the way down to the Batumi, which now has its Poti expander. ADSR after that, then I shrunk the Veils down to a Codex Modulex clone in 8 hp. Disting's next, then the output module which now has more to deal with, so yeah...it makes more sense now.

Sure, this is a massive reworking, and it does require a number of module swaps. But it also massively expands the timbral and timing capabilities. And in this case, I kept the original cab size...but it strikes me that you might actually do better by first expanding the cab itself to a dual 104 hp, which would allow you to keep much of the original Mutables AND also allow for the expansion. You might even consider one of Intellijel's cabs with the extra 1U (Intellijel format) tile row for additional functionality.


Nice on as usual @Lugia


The Bastl Grandpa granular sampler and Spa expander are an interesting, quirky, 10hp, lo-fi combo. I've been eyeing it for a while myself. Seems like a deceptively powerful texture generator.
-- farkas
Thanks will look into those.


A couple suggestions come to mind:

1) Add something like a DannySound CaliOsc + a Timbre or a Make Noise STO + an Intellijel Bifolder to get into some analog wavefolding and variation territory, I've been doing that with Random*Source Serge modules and really loving it.
2) Get a 4MS Ensemble Oscillator, tons and tons of stuff to explore in it from chaotic drones to lush synth strings.
3) Get a Tanh, don't change anything else and start exploring feedback patching.

Specific additions aside, the main thing that comes to mind for me looking at this rack is actually to set aside the Rings and to keep the Kinks. It's too easy to dial in good sounds with Rings which ends up making me lazy at least. Substituting it with something that requires more effort and skill will bring some of the excitement back into your patching, imho.
-- troux
Thankyou food for thought to check out. I really like Rings but starting to feel I am overusing it. The 4ms module sounds interesting


Thanks guys much appreciated. Lugia, thanks for spending so much time on it. Much to consider and probably a bit more than I have time or money to achieve it. Looks like a great setup and I can probably take some of that and run with it. I've been thinking about getting an extra case, something small like an Intellijel pallete but I would probably get more bang for the buck from upgrading from 6U 84HP to 104HP, reorganising it and adding some of the suggestions here.


Is there some way I can copy Luiga's suggested rack setup to My Modular page so I can work on it please?


Yes, if you click on the picture of Lugia’s rack, you should be able to select edit/duplicate rack in the top left of your screen.


Yes, if you click on the picture of Lugia’s rack, you should be able to select edit/duplicate rack in the top left of your screen.
-- farkas

Thanks