Best of tiny synths / sound sources

The Lounge Other Gear
#1

As much as I love the 1010lemondrop for mangling samples, there’s something about running live input through it that is way more appealing when playing and experimenting, it’s more organic.

Wondering if anybody has any recommendations for something seriously small to use as a sound source? I’d prefer to avoid samplers and phones, only direct input. I have no idea how it would sound, but I’ve thought about a NintendoDS with the Korg software, but I think that’s a bit overkill.

Happy to hear any quirky/weird ideas thanks.

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#2

The volca fm and fm2 are great small sound sources that pair fairly well with the lemondrop. The fm2 uses a trs type A midi port, while the original fm has a 5 pin midi port, so if you wanted to sync them via midi you’d need an additional adapter for the fm2 (the lemondrop uses trs type B for sending midi out, but it can accept either standard for midi in)

You could also try out a cheaper handheld recorder like the Zoom H1n

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#3

I love the Audiothingies Micromonsta 2. It’s polyphonic and bitimbral. The interface is straightforward and I think it sounds really good. They can a bit hard to get new, due to limited production, but they pop up on the used market from time to time. It’s virtual analog, not granular, like the Lemondrop, but it sounds like you’re not inquiring about granular specifically, right?

I really liked the Lemondrop sound, but did not gel with the interface that much, so I didn’t use it enough to keep.

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#4

The Roland S-1 seems like a great little box for not a silly amount of money.

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#5

While not exactly a sound source itself, a small contact mic + headphone amp could remain in the “tiny” category while allowing you to use various things around you as a sound source

Edit: or expanding to microphones/pickups generally, feedback could be an adventurous source

#6

I approve this! I use the roland s-1 with my Digitakt or with my phone (koala sampler) when im moving around.

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#7

It’s a great pair with an op-z. Get the line module and you can send multiple synth tracks to the lemondrop and mangle away and bring the audio back into the op-z to combine with the rest of the mix.

#8
  • Pocket-sized AM/FM radio
  • Old MP3 player
  • Stylophone
  • Speed-modded cassette player
4 Likes
#9

Some cool ideas, the radio might end up a bit too crazy, but I’ll try out some stuff through a phone and see what happens.

Stylophone also looks interesting.

I have a portable MIDI controller … I’ve had the OP-z before l, didn’t gel with it at all.

I’m thinking the MC101 or TR6s could be fun options, but maybe too much.

Ideally if such a machine existed it would basically just be a tiny guitar/piano synth, doubt something like this is in anybody’s radar of needs though.

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#10

…tiny as tiny can…aaand flexible…aaand cheap…aaand geenious somehow…and open to open source algorithms of many mutable sorts…korg nts1.

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#11

I’ve been having a look at it, it looks straight up perfect to be honest.

The similarity of sounds when imported as waveforms is close enough and it’s tiny.

Does the NTS2 have similar/better capabilities in terms of waveform importation? I’m having trouble finding people actually using the NTS2 as an instrument rather than a visualisation device.

#12

any recommendations for a contact mic and headphone amp that go together well? :slight_smile: (and can be fed directly into a digitakt)

#13

…afaik…the nts2 is made to be a analytic/visualization device and nothing like the nts1 at all, apart from same formfactor and comes also as an easy tiny diy kit…nts1 was an unique 'n neat little gamechanger in various osc models and fx ala carte open source…and that’s about it…

#14

I also thought of nts-1, which I used to have but not at the same time as lemondrop.

What would be cool is the LD can make your nts-1 polyphonic.

Only downside is lack of patch memory for nts-1.

#15

Maybe I should take a better look at the manual but this video seems to show something like patch memory?

#16

Only kind of … the NTS-1 has slots for 16 different oscillators. That video demonstrates creating an oscillator for one sample. But it’s only the oscillator that varies … if you load a new oscillator, the envelope, filter, reverb and delay all stay exactly as they were for the previously loaded oscillator. You don’t even get to save the oscillators own settings with the oscillator ‘patch’ because … it’s not actually a patch.

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#17

Some fantastic user oscillators and fx that have been developed for it that push it to really impressive places. Been messing with Tim Shoebridge’s ‘Drone’ oscillator for it this past week and it’s amazing.

#18

This is quite literally all I need in a tiny device, ordered!

#19

Perfect recommendation, ordered, can’t wait!

2 Likes
#20

Some great suggestions… a few more:

PreenFM2
Mutable Shruthi
Fred’s Lab Tooro
Empress Zoia
Poly Beebo
Nord Micromodular or Drum mk1
Tascam DR-05 or other small recorder for field recordings

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