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Day One with the new toy: Naugahyde
Hey, Deron: You got a line on any deep discount Naugahyde suppliers?
So I went into hock for the next four months, and got a deal on a second hand Synthstrom Deluge. This just might be THE one. It is complex, and 24 hours in I know `I have barely scratched the surface, but you know what? I made the backbone of this track in under 30 seconds, without reading the manual. So, something is clicking with me here. Recorded straight into AUM, of course, for a little post fx fluffing, though you can mixdown right on the gadget if you so desire. Meanwhile, my sadly neglected Akai Force is giving me reproachful looks…
But hey, did I mention how small and goshdarn cute this Deluge thing is? About the same width and breadth as my IPad Pro, barely two inches deep, amd a real featherweight with it, though with the reassuring tank like build of something like a Digitakt. The Akai, meanwhile… Not so much.
And the Deluge is one other thing the Akai definitely isn’t.
Fun.
Comments
Hmmm you're making me curious again.
I remember a few interviews with Deluge's developers and for sure they've packed an insane amount of features into this little box.
And a mostly non-display workflow has its own charm me thinks.
Would you say that the Deluge inspires more musicality than the Force?
Ahhh always wanted one! Congrats on the new toy. Me jelly🤓
All your reasons are why I have one myself.
I can recommend ANY of the Boards of Deluge presets (5 volumes)
@Edward_Alexander : thank you! I agonised about it, as I already have way too much musical gear I never use, and didn’t want to risk just adding to the shelved pile. But… I had an inkling I might click with this one, so I took the chance of spending all my fun money for the next quarter year. Let’s hope I’m right. Omens so far are good.
@rs2000 : Only by a country mile.
I’ve tried to love the Force a lot, since it is so powerful, and does so much, (and cost me so much!!) but it just doesn’t click with me for some reason.
I don’t think there’s anything the Deluge does the Akai can’t (except run off a rechargeable battery) but a) the Akai is such a lardy beast that using it in a fixed location is the only option, not sofa friendly. And b) I get that heart sink feeling that Roland manuals also bring out in me every time I just try to use it.
Obviously RTFM and all that, and clearly some people get very accomplished with it, but I am very much not a manuals type of person, nor coming to that a structured beats ‘n’ choons pop ‘producer’, and I always see how far I can get on instinct with a new toy, and well… here we are less than 24 hours in, manual not read, and I have a completed track. Which has NEVER happened with the Akai.
It might just be a horses for courses thing.
As a non musician, I always liked the look of the Tenori On, and a long deleted IOS app which did something similar, and, well, the Deluge works pretty much the same way.
Dropping bleeps into a pattern with it running by ear/feel seems very natural to me, and an easy way to build out a track.
The onboard synths are surprisingly powerful, with some great third party packs available for them too, like the Boards Of Deluge series, full of the dusty, wobbly sounds and ominous growls that I like.
And did I mention it has a full sysex-compatible DX7 emulation in it now, as well as a full featured sampler, and looper? The fx aren’t great, (would definitely have appreciated a better, longer, reverb) but you can do full mix downs to SD card, export stems, import samples, and even record using an onboard mike. Sort of like a mashup of the Digitakt and Digitone. I can see there might be areas it could be better in, but there is a committed community, and the OS is now open source, so the goodies look to keep coming a while yet. It has cv outs to interface with my modular, and the sequencer which I have obviously only skimmed the surface of here is clearly very, very deep too…
New it is a pretty steep £1200 ish, but there are some good secondhand deals to be had. I got my OLED version for £850 with a deck saver thrown in, which I think is fair, if not bargain of the century. If I had gone for a non OLED version I might have got as low as £600. The machines are functionally identical, and there is a professional upgrade service to get an OLED fitted for around £150.
The grid made me think different to my usual way of working in AUM, and that is a good thing. At my age, anything that gives me enjoyment whilst having to think counts as cognitive physio, so I’m grateful for that. And I’m enjoying learning what it can do, which is pretty much the opposite of my experience with the Akai. Though I see they are now going around the £500 mark second hand, sometimes with soft synths and SSDs already fitted, which is a steal if the Force could. be with you…
I’m going to hang onto mine against the day I feel grown up enough to give it another go, but in the meantime: it’s play time.
@audiblevideo : interested to hear anything you’ve done with yours. Us aleatoric composers must stick together, you know!
I got Boards of Deluge #1, pretty sure I’ll get the rest as funds permit. Also a pack aimed at Dark Ambient (obviously!) from Oversynth.com called Reckage. Any suggestions which BoD pack I should go for next? Or any other sources for dark/industrial/noise patches?