Lately I’ve spent less and less time actually making music with DAWs and spent more time just enjoying ambient/drone sound design with my Typhon synth. Perhaps not the intended purpose for a gnarly mono-synth but it works surprisingly well! I really love the sound and I can get lost in those digital FX and distortion options.
I wanted to try adding something else with more hands-on controls. I’ve gone back and forth about eurorack and I’m just not sure I want to fall down that particular hole. This led me back to thinking about semi-modular synths as they have flexibility and room to grow into but without the insane cost or option paralysis from eurorack. I’m tempted to add a second Dreadbox synth in the form of an Erebus so I have the pathchbay and 3 oscillators to play with, but I wonder if they perhaps have too much crossover.
I also find myself drawn back towards the Lyra-8. I know it’s a slightly contentious product. It’s clearly pretty weird and hard to control and also making some pretty aggressive sounds but I thought that the Typhon filter and FX might tame it and they could play nicely together. I’m leaning more towards pure synthesis for the sheer enjoyment of it and away from real music “production” which I get less and less out of these days. Anyway, I’d welcome any thoughts on these pairings - the Typhon plus one other - for the purposes of droning ambience and pure sound design enjoyment.
I use a Lyra 8, Erica Bassline and Quadraverb for drones, a setup which is broadly similar to what you could achieve with just the Lyra and Typhon. I love it.
Just be mindful with the Lyra that it will take a while to figure out what’s going on and even when you do, it’ll still do whatever it likes anyway.
Thanks for that. With the whole synthesis and sound design thing I think that exploration and the learning process is part of the fun. If I want to explore drones and ambient sound design then a little bit of “unknown territory” with the Lyra-8 probably isn’t a bad thing.
I think the modularity of the Erebus V3 (or similar semi-modulars) is definitely appealing and it’s clearly possible to get drones and otherworldly sounds out of it, although probably not as crazy and “out there” as the Lyra-8 sounds. I’m really enjoying the Typhon but one small drawback is the slight difficulty with the sliders and using a catch/takeover method to control different parameters and FX. It’s a minor complaint but I think adding something else with more knob-per-function interface would help alleviate this and even just used as an FX unit for another synth I reckon the Typhon would be really great.
As Fin25 and Struggle have mentioned, Dreadbox Nyx might be a better option than the Erebus for drones and ambience while still maintaining the ability to easily sound “musical” (considering the Lyra can fall away from traditional musicality quite quickly).
While the Erebus has one more oscillator and might be able to provide a bit more low end beef right out of the box without any special tricks or routing and the ability to play three note chords when tuned at intervals, the Nyx has these wild dual filters that can produce outrageous harmonics when routed properly.
For instance, in parallel mode (labeled “1/2”) and bandpass mode, you can have two separate resonant filter peaks (one for each oscillator) and when you offset them and tune the resonance and cutoff properly, you can play simple four note chords, or if you eventually get into CV routing, you can tune the cutoff and play more specific chords.
Another cool trick, when the filter is in highpass mode and you crank the resonance way up then tune the cutoff properly, you’re basically creating a sine wave sub oscillator that could rumble your house down.
On the other hand, if sheer droning and ambience is what you’re after, the Lyra is absolutely beautiful. Don’t let its difficulty in use dissuade you. It’s one of those “you get out what you put in” synths. The sounds you get will be a reflection of your state of mind.
You might also consider getting the Solar 50 by Elta Music. It has 50 independently tunable oscillators, 10 voices, 10 light sensors for modulation, and a little bit of semi-modular functionality. If you thought the Lyra was intimidating, check out the Solar 50!