Arturia MicroFreak

this thing looks great and a real boffins treat!

Excited to get my hands on one of these. Wonder when weā€™ll see the LE/Expanded models appear? Someone earlier also mentioned a possible DrumFreak. Seems like a no brainer from Arturias POV.

Ooh a bonkers digi/analog drum freak would be awesome.

3 Likes

Hello everyone, Seb from Arturia here.

I have been a big Mutable Instruments and an Elektron fan for a long time. I was also responsible for the final product design of MicroFreak, including the addition of the Plaits modes.

I understand Ɖmilieā€™s reaction and Iā€™m glad we clarified things. Sorry again, Ɖmilieā€¦

When I got involved in the design of this instrument the kind of questions I was asking myself were things like :

  • How can I design an FM/Chord/VA algorithm that uses three knobs to control it and that is genuinely different from the way Plaits does it ?
  • Do I need to ?

I am truly happy (and proud) to see those oscillator modes in this instrument. Because they sound so good, and because they perfectly match the initial concept that we had for it.

I am also really glad to read all the positive comments on the sound / feature set. I canā€™t wait for the firmware development to be finished so that sound designers can start creating some cool factory presets !

Oh, and about this ā€œfirst in the Freak rangeā€ comment, we have naming rules for our products and 'Lab, 'Fuse, 'Brute, 'Step are what we call ā€œrangesā€, internally. MicroFreak is indeed the first one in the 'Freak range. There might be others in the future but donā€™t hold off for that as I am really focusing on this baby for now!

Cheers from L.A. !!!

32 Likes

Alls well that ends well :wink:

Hyped to get my hands on one of these! Great job dude, congrats :slight_smile:

Congrats on the synth! Itā€™s very well executed imo and at a great price. Iā€™m excited to get my hands on it.

Props to you / Arturia for reaching out to Emilie about the misunderstanding and not just changing the text and calling it a day.

Good show all around. :purple_heart:

3 Likes

Youā€™ve made a great synth and Iā€™ll certainly be grabbing one. Top work

1 Like

Donā€™t hold back on any details we missed then :wink:

Looks pretty special at face value already ā€¦ still a little impatient about clarity on the 4 Lanes of automation ā€¦ am I right that you select any controllable parameter (inc bend strip?) and itā€™ll then be tied to a lane ? some discussion on it suggested even more flexibility ā€¦ are the automation lanes the same length as the note track and is there any option for smoothing ?

I have to say it looks like so much fun, very much a sweet-spot synth for me - my only issue is choosing what gear to let go

Be a darling and throw in a tiny splash of subtle gritty low-cpu reverb for headphone jamming, somewhere deep in a menu is fine by us :wink: :thup:

3 Likes

Any plans to release the code for Arturiaā€™s oscillator models for this instrument under an Open Source license?

3 Likes

Yesssssss! Some gritty verb and delay options would be killer and totally round this out. Throw the op1 fx in there and job done!

Fx is only thing missing for me on this. If cpu and interface restrictions are an issue then Menu diving and non-automatable would be totally fineā€¦

1 Like

Some hard trolling here - some o-t fun to lighten the mood from earlier in the thread :wink:

4 Likes

Probably technically impossible as the signal path through the filter and amp is all analogue.

1 Like

I hope this gives the start for a whole line of cool stuff in collab with MI. Also hope other brands will team up, they would benefit so much more from combining forces.
I would love to have a Microclouds! Or imagine a Make Noise collab with a portable batterypowered morphagene thing!

Hey
will it be possible to add more of Plaits modes in firmware updates? Yes it is Open source on the website mentioned, so we can swap firmwares with already available Plaits firmwares?
Can you write your own wavetables?
And is the vowel section only the Formant? Or also the SAM and LPC?

That comes across as a little sad rather than funny, its one thing to dislike Behringers business model but to go to the trouble of making and releasing that in reponse, at that age, is embarrassing.

Each to their own. Not sure age is a factor. Nor is the trolling of the nasty type. I love my Neutron but Iā€™d have jumped for this Arturia if they were side by side in the store.

1 Like

I have been thinking of ways to nicely ā€œstereo-izeā€ the MicroFreak and came up with some ideas among gear I already have on hand (or would soon):

  • Strymon Deco
  • Spatializer chorus inā€”ahemā€”my many Elektrons
  • Stereo VCA such as Intellijel Azimuth II
  • Make Noise QPAS (preorder)
  • Much moreā€¦
1 Like

yeah - and more besides - the paraphony wouldnā€™t ā€˜spreadā€™ in this box anyway due to the filter - I like higher register synths to sprinkle a bit left and right - but still like this, itā€™s about what they do, not what they donā€™t and often theyā€™re better because of these design choices - if we always had what we wanted or were used to the chances are weā€™d follow the same paths - Iā€™m not a fan of keys, so Iā€™m glad of the touch plate to go at it in a different style

1 Like

as @RitualAudio posted this link in a non arturia related post I feel it belongs here so that everyone can read the story

MI very clearly explain the details. There is no controversy unless you create one - https://forum.mutable-instruments.net/t/about-the-microfreak/14878

So first it was a collaboration and now they have changed that on the website, weird marketing people, bit of a dissapointment for me if you hear how the story actually goes! That does not change the fact that Iā€™m still going to buy this synth and hope for a microclouds also!

3 Likes

Yeah - this is all amply covered above too btw - the message was to move on which weā€™re all taking on board ā€¦ the video is forgotten and the other stuff is hopefully behind them all - it would be a shame to tarnish a sweet little synth any longer

3 Likes