A4 strengths ? : Getting outside the 'typical' dull sound?

Well I’m sorry but I chose that word for a reason it couldn’t be less ambiguous and it is perfect to describe what I feel when I play this synth! Sorry! Sugar coat it if you like by calling it mid or vanilla when I ear the sound that the A4 produces in most cases I find it has that characteristic that makes it… dull.

Now I was originally interested to see if others shared the same view (and it looks like it) but sure that’d be great to know why for sure and to see if there is anything we can do about it. Sorry I didn’t mean to start a heated nerd war or anything.

Someone proposed to use a preamp, another suggested the use of multimode filter so why not I’ll give it another shot.

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Since Nick Batt from sonicstate.com made his review about the Dominion 1, this synth went up to my wishlist of monophonic synths. It’s a synth with much personality and great sound. But I would keep my AK.

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Hmmm … I’m scratching my head about the sound of A4 too. But I have it for just a month, too short to judge. In the beginning I was surprised by the variety of sounds it can produce (free presets from net just to get the idea of what’s possible). Bought it specifically to tandem the Linnstrument. It excels in MPE voicing - create one MPE enabled voice (3D parameter response), copy it over 4 tracks/MIDI channels, save the kit, save the pattern and bam, directly switching MPE sounds as patterns. So far so good. I also like the versatility of the sound engine. But my intention is to use it as a synth in prog rock band (guitar, bass, drums, singer) which already is mostly on heavy and distorted side of the spectrum. I’m afraid that A4 will get swamped with it’s not so bright sound. Thanks for the tips above on peak filter btw! I do like it’s sound but maybe on it’s own or in different context. FM options of A4 are promising but I was not able to dial anything useful yet. Have to play with feedback too.

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For me I haven’t yet found the benefits of the AK being designed to sound intrinsically unique or that it’s a good thing that its character is different from other synths etc. Outside of the sequencer possibilities at least. I had a lot of time with a novation mininova before buying the AK and the lack of a big/pleasing intrinsic character but having a ton of options often reminds me of the mininova sound when I’m dialling stuff in on the AK. It just has that vibe a lot of the time. AK obviously CAN sound a lot better than the mininova in everything it does after labouring on it but I find them disappointingly close in many aspects quite often. It just doesn’t spit out ‘wow/perfect’ very easily. I still need more time with it though so I’m giving all the people that dig it the benefit of the doubt for now and hold off selling it in hope I can get to the same place they are. For now I often reach for my volca keys over my AK though, which is something I never expected to be doing before I bought one. I just like synths with some kind of vibe/character that speaks to me and I’ve yet to totally connect with the AK outside of sequenced sounds, which normally sound great to be fair.

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Absolutely agree. I also like synths, which have a specific soul directly after switching on. It’s like with traditional instruments. Buy a acoustic guitar from Martin or from Gibson and you can tell the difference.

You are completely right, if you say, that quantity of features doesn’t make a great instrument. I have a Mininova too. It’s a nice little thing with many features … and very mobile.

My personal way to the AK was, to try the differences it provides - compared to my other synths. I love this “unsymmetric” behaviour of the Transistor Puls waveform and the features for crossmodulating the oscillators. From the spec of the A4/AK I expected to get some gritty, snaring, and formant like sounds and I did. Some of them have such of a dominance that I have to rule them in at least during mixdown. TBH those sounds are supposed to lead and cry rather to be warm and smooth.

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i’m selling mine because lately i’m using it exclusively as cv source for my other synths… plocks, sequencer and lfo’s are very nice indeed, so i was wondering if is that a good reason to keep an A4?! i don’t think so
A4 excels in lot of sounds that’s true, especially the ultra modulated ones… but when i compare classic single voice sound with my Future Retro XS there is no game. Less is more sometime;)

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I’ve spent a fair amount of time, trying to slim down a live setup and was hoping that A4 could take most of the synth duties.

…but yeah, it is limited. I could definitely do without.

Mid-range arps are something it’s pretty good at, but top end and bass - just isn’t cutting it for me I’m afraid.

I’m thinking of moving more towards a core set-up of OT, Rytm and Virus. OT sequencing the Virus.

Not planning to sell the A4 yet though…

Open the filter LP fully, get your basic sound using the SV filter, then adjust LP filter to taste.

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@funqpatrol I see what you mean about the “dull” sound.
I had such trouble in the last few months. But I found that, like the Monomachine, I really manage to bring it to life through p-locking the sounds like hell.
And with conditional trigs (and probabilistic ones in particular) I felt that you can bring change easily (e.g. cut a chord with a new chord that retrig the envelope, probability 33%)

I found that using the filter resonance you can get bells, with the feedback osc you can get amazing kicks, with FM you can get some dirt. And the 2 overdrives sound different.
In the end, I figured that if my sounds sounded the same, it was because I was always starting from scratch and setting the parameters more or less the same.
E.g. I have not messed with the AM that much, can’t say I master this. And I can’t say the 2x2 LFO + 2x2 FEnv extra destinations are used, far from it… Modulations have a huge impact on the final sound, haven’t they ?

It’s true the basic sound is pretty much the same, but you can have it evolving in so many different ways…
IMO, Elektron synths give their best on evolving loops rather than just playing pads with a keyboard. The no-keyboard versions of Monomachine and A4 make sense in this regard.

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without sounding harsh, a lot of the complaints that are often cited above and elsewhere often reveal more about the approach of the poster than the potential of the hardware … let’s look at this another way, is something dull because it is fundamentally so or it it because the pilot can’t make it fly the way they want ?

having two filters in line is an opportunity to do something interesting, but I bet a lot of a4 patches are sat with a LPF hogging the MMF slot

if I wanted a Moog I know what i’d do, but I find the sounds of other synths much more interesting, the ms20 voice, filter scope and architecture is my favourite single voice, but I can comfortably make the A4 do what I need and find new corners, but I cannot even get close with my evolver or especially prophet, they’re both nearly as complex and I know my way around them very well, but they’re not in the same category for generating new interesting sonic material

some gear, generally more restricted and specialised just sits in a great sweet-spot for the most part, some gear maybe sounds sweet when you know how to use the tools or put the time in to find out how to make it do your thing

it has to be said though that the AR produces some mighty fine big synth bass wow now, so given that the sole filter is somewhat similar to its a4 equivalent and they’re both dcos it points towards oscillator arrangement(non width variable), voice simplicity/directness or output stages as being a factor … the a4 makes very special noises for me though ymmv

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My a4 sounds fantastic. You all must have got duds :slight_smile:

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Yeah you’re probably right. I end up with sounds that I quite like after spending time on it. Like someone mentioned, it’s great for midrange arps/sequences. Just can’t help feeling like I’d like them even more/spend less time tweaking/have more fun if the intrinsic synth sound/filters hadn’t been designed the way that it has been. Maybe I just dislike the AK UI/Architecture more than I dislike its actual sound. Knob response curves + menus feels a little like trying to draw curves on an etch-a-sketch sometimes…Guess I’ll eventually either learn it deeper and click with it or sell and move on.

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The fine thing about the AM is that we can use 1->2, or 2->1, or both in parallel, which is uncommon. Ever tried to FM/AM an oscillator and then “sync” it to another, which defines the pitch? This can get very interesting sounds. The A4 is the only analog synth I know of, which provides those different envelops. It really makes a difference using something bi-linear (attack/release) or bi-exponential or log-exponatial etc. … so it’s quite easy to get something more smooth or punchy at the end. Often we are missing the punch using those modern digital/analog hybrid synths, because initialised patches default to linear envelopes and we don’t change this.

I think, there is a lot of truth in saying, modulation is the soul of a sound.

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I think if you compare with specialist synths then expectations may not be met. A4 is a synth aimed to cover a lot of ground but has its own distinct sound and UI. It will not do everything perfect, but does its own thing well.For me it covers so much in one box it reduces need for other synths.

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often that’s actually being generous, it can be incredibly and unjustifiably difficult to step up some params, nothing compares to a one-knob-per-function interface though and I think that’s the point for above, some things just can’t be justifiably compared … expectations I guess, but preset browsing is not reliable and some kit takes time to work out, the AR sounds out of this world when you work with it, but I don’t care at all for the default kit and much of the factory content

the other aspect not touched on is that the engineers tweaked the output side to give the AK a bit more openness and depth, maybe there are outta reach circuit aspects which influence the sound presentation

Here too. On paper the perfect box. Sequencer, effects, compact, 4 Parts. But didn´t like the sound. And it often sounded thin. Got some good things out of it. But maybe 1/10 times. Often frustration.
Sold it and have now a Nordlead A1 for poly-stuff and my modular system for mono sounds. So much better soundwise and fun to program. But man, really miss the sequencer.

I’d love to learn more about these functions. Is there any decent tutorial material about AM, Osc Sync etc out there on Youtube? Or about the potential with envelope modulation? I’d love to open my eyes a bit on this stuff.

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I don’t like the presets on the A4 but find it to be a very versatile synth. It’s not the best synth for ‘raw character’ but I find it sits very well in mixes and when you factor in modulation options, sequencer and Overbridge it’s a beast.

A lil’ jam with not very typical A4 sounds

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At least I don’t know about any video tutorials on this topic …sorry about that, I would love to share. Maybe others know. What I can share is some of my humble experience gained from various recources (textbook style) and trial and error.

Example … if you apply AM or FM you can create pretty disharmonic sounds, which might have at least two bands of frequencies, which are non-harmonic. This generates those metallic or wooden timbres. If you then sync such a modulated oscillator to another oscillator, the sound will be forced to the pitch of the syncing oscillator and the AM/FM modulated part of the sound becomes sound color only.

Now change the AM/FM modulation frequencies or intensity and you will get very interesting and differnent sounds at a fixed pitch. It is very rewarding to change the frequencies of the FM/AM modulation source and the AM/FM modulated oscillator until a sweet-spot is found. But there is some searching involved. Sometimes detuning the modulation frequency a third, or fifth apart gives more interesting results than an octave. Most important - listen carefully for sounds, which seem to converge to a less gritty, wobbly, or noisy timbre - from here it could be only a little fine tuning that is needed to hit one of the sweet-spots.

Example: On the A4/AK you can use a LFO (with or without keyboard tracking) as FM-modulator, VCO1 as the FM-destination and then sync this to VCO2. For a performance you can use the joystick to modulate the frequency of the VCO1, or the LFO, or the modulation depth …

Concerning the envelopes… In the old days, when envelopes were generated by real analog circuits, we had so called RC circuits, which had an exponential/logarithmic behaviour. This often is overlooked, if a sound is supposed to be “old-school-analog”. At the end it’s only about how an attack will rise, or a decay, or a release will fall - and how our hearing perseives the sound. Our hearing is logarithmic and if an envelope is linear, the modulated effect (pitch, volume, brightness) of the sound will be perceived more smooth, if it’s exponential it will be more punchy.

For many more interesting details I would recommend the great series we have on sound-on-sound …

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/allsynthsecrets.htm

And there is more

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this is fucking amazing, in the beginning its almost guitar-like sounding very loosely in tune.
care to share how one approaches that?