I have owned a lot of synths over the years and I wanted to write a comprehensive list of them along with a few words of how I felt about it. More for future me when buying gear than for public consumption but I thought maybe someone may be interested, This is not in depth reviews and there are probably a lot of typos. This is more of a synth list + stream of consciousness. I just wrote this in one sitting so it’s whatever I thought or felt about each synth, I wasn’t very descriptive about the sounds of each synth just more of a yay or nay and why. It was supposed to be just one line reviews but many of them (most?) are more than one line.
EDIT: I guess this post exceeds the character limit so I’ll split it into two, the main post and a reply
THE SYNTH LIST 2005-Present (with one line reviews)
Eurorack modular (could be a whole other list, currently my Eurorack is 9U 90hp x 3)
Incredible and addictive, Too god damn expensive but nothing beats it in terms of both sound quality and flexibility.
ASM hydrasynth explorer
Phenomenal synth, very flexible, Very fun to program, Brilliant “signal flow” style editing that makes it an absolute joy to program. effects sound wonderful, A little disappointed in how the FM/Crossmod sound when compared to the Nord lead 2 and access virus TI but still a TOP tier synth.
Casio CZ5000
Weird, Interesting and a pain in the balls to program because of the incremental controls.
Casio SK-1 (circuit bent)
Very interesting, very niche, Wish I still had it, I still use bits from random recordings I did of it.
Oberhiem Matrix 6
Sounds absolutely beautiful, Quintessential analog poly sound, robust and flexible architecture, Impossible to program due to horrible one parameter at a time editing.
Kawai K3
Digital waves + Analog filter, made for some very nice bass and chord sounds but very limited.
Novation Bass station 2
Excellent sounding analog mono with some programming tricks up it’s sleeve.
Novation K station
Very nice ‘liquid analog’ sound, flexible enough to make a wide variety of sounds with decent onboard effects, two octave keyboard isn’t enough but over all great synth.
Novation KS4
Same as the K station only with a 49 key keyboard.
Novation Ultra nova
Surprisingly powerful synth very flexible and capable, Awesome sounding vocoder , underpowered DSP lead to some weirdness with complex patches, Editing system is very usable though not as nice as having full knobs. Virus synths render these useless.
Novation MiniNova
Same as the Ultranova only this synth makes more sense in this smaller package with a gooseneck microphone. Weirdly did not run into the DSP issues as I did in the ultranova, great alternitive to the Microkorg (or could play well together), Much less powerful than the virus but still sounds great.
Twisted Elektron Acid 8
Fantastic take on the TB303 sound, not a good emulation of it but I don’t think it was trying to be.
Nord lead 2 rack
Great sounding bare bones synth, Not flexible enough, Would have been better with FX but the pure Saw wave is ballsy as hell and the FM is gnarly and didn’t sound like any other FM I’ve heard before. Very easy access to multi timbre
Nord lead 3
My Favorite synth visually, but did not sound nearly as ballsy as the Nord lead 3 in terms of raw osc power though with stacking and unison and detune it get there. Still pretty barebones overall though the FM+VA engine was fun and nothing beats the LED ring knobs and watching the LEDs change with assaigned modulation. very easy access to multi-timbral aspects
Nord drum 2 + Nord Pad
Nord pad is very responsive (sometimes too responsive) but triggers very quickly. The drum synth engines CAN sound excellent but it does require a lot of tweaking (not a bad thing) programming is also very intiutive and easy.
Alesis Ion
Really deep and comprehensive VA not only for it’s time but even by today’s standards. I loved the big list of analog emulation filters, the large green screen is cool, very easy to access multi-timber lots of knobs very fun to program, can sometimes sound a little plastic-y but overall sounded great, excels at analog emulation, FM and long evolving pads. Only flaw is that they seem to be dying at an alarming rate as of now (2024)
Alesis Micron
Same as the Ion EXCEPT everything is done with ONE knob when programming, You can access shortcuts though the keyboard and the programming was very liner, Not really a joy to program, Great multi-track seqencer.
Moog Prodigy
Easily the simplest, most basic, most bare bones synth I have ever come across. very very very boring however it sounds beautiful the raw osc and filter are pure vintage moog bliss and the sync is unlike anything I’ve ever heard.
Moog little phatty
Very nice looking synth, but stale and lacked the vintage moog sound that I was looking for, Pretty basic, the One knob per section editing wasn’t bad to program and it could sound okay but didn’t sound like a moog to me.
Moog Etherwave Theremin
Extremely fun to play, I picked it up really quick after watching Clara rockmore (SP?) and how she played it. Having CV out was essential, I used it to control my Modular and my MS20 mini and other things. I love that it does not have built in quantizer or any way to cheat (who the hell would want that!?)
Moog Grandmother
Phenomenal sounding and very flexible, it has the tone of the vintage Moogs like the Prodigy but is flexible enough to be interesting. Build quality and over all feel is very solid. it felt and sounded like a vintage analog made today.
Dave smith instruments Mopho
Extremely flexible and extremely sterile sounding. Not the most fun to program with the four knob interface but not a nightmare like the Micron was. It could sound good sometimes but did was way to stable and sterile as an analog for my taste.
Dave smith instruments Mopho Keyboard
Same as the Mopho module only very easy and enjoyable to program.
Dave smith instruments Mono evolver keyboard
I would like to revisit this one one day, At the time I was looking for more analog than digital so I had a weird relationship with it but it did sound really good when you were going for analog digital hybrid, it was very flexible and could sound both sweet and very trashy (the good kind of trashy), Very nice weirdo synth. Came out at a bad time though (in terms of marketing a synth like that)
Dave smith instruments Pro 2
When I bought this I was thinking it would sound “more analog”, and it was much much less sterile than the Mopho but the raw oscillators were too stable imo. HOWEVER the filters were outstanding the Prophet filter in the top and the Oberhiem filter in the bottom. they made patches that had a less than stellar osc selection sound VERY analog. The digital osc were decent, the super waves were a nice addition and the various ways to do FM and cross mod was outstanding, but I hated that the digital osc were single cycle waves that you could blend together rather than actual wavetables. All in all though the Pro 2 was extremely flexible and an absolute joy to program, the Sequencer was way too powerful basically it was like an elektron sequencer. also bonus the paraphonic mode was great.
Korg Electribe ER-1
Weirdly capable little drum synth, Not the most comprehensive or flexible but a lot of fun and can sound really good. Nowadays I use the Ipad Korg electribe er1 app when I want to revisit it.
Korg Electribe ESX-1
Pretty capable sampler for basic applications with some nice tricks up it’s sleeve, FX are fun on it, but the Sequencer was maddening for me, I used to write out (ON PAPER) how I’d want my sequences to go, huge pain in the ass.
Korg Polysix
Fantastic analog poly synth, fairly basic with a few little percs (like chord mode and Ensemble), a great competitor to the Juno with the one exception, the design flaw of using a battery that would eventually leak on to and burn though the circuit board. Most of the time when you find them now that issue has been resolved by catching it before it happens or before too much damage has been done and replacing it with a modern battery. unfortunately mine died because I wasn’t aware of it until it was too late.
Korg MS2000
Great synth. Pretty limited in terms of modulation but it has a little more than the basics. The core sound of the MS2000 is raw and powerful. The mini sequencer is a fun addition. overall very good straight forward synth.
Korg MS2000B
Same as the MS2000 only it’s Black(!) also it did have a pretty cool goose neck microphone which looked cool. Although the vocoder is kind of ass, it’s cool for messing around or external processing, not so great (clear) for classic robo-voice stuff (The Novation mininova/ultranova’s vocoder blows the ms2000’s out of the water in this respect)
Korg MS2000 Rack
Same as the MS2000 and MS2000B only no keys. It’s cool that you can use the buttons at the bottom as a mini-keyboard when programing it without a midi controller. In the early 2000s I used to take it with me on vacations etc.
Korg Microkorg
Same as the MS2000, MS2000B and MS2000R only in compact form factor and a menu based programming system, but it wasn’t bad to program at all. Battery powered is a nice bonus. the microkorg is a legendary synth because it sounds great because it came out at the perfect time (synth renaissance of the early 2000s) and it was the right price. still a worthy synth to have in your arsenal.
Korg Minilouge XD
Very fun synth. great core analog sound with some excellent digital tricks up it’s sleeve. the addition of a digital osc as the third osc is very welcome especially since it is capable of loading user made algorithms, there are a plethora of options out there both for free and that you can purchase that add anything from a mini FM synth to something that emulates chip tunes to physical modeling etc. very very very cool also can’t forget that the effects also has slots for user made effects, of which there are many and they sound great…I do wish the second envelope was a full ADSR env…no idea why korg made it ADR, Also can’t forget to mention the motion sequencer as it’s presence makes up for only having 1 LFO. It’s kind of like the Elektron sequencers where you can assign something and program it by step or live record though it is much much more limited that the Elektron or Pro2 sequencers. Even so the Minilouge XD is one of my current favorites, four voice poly analog plus lots of digital goodies in one inexpensive package is great. The core analog sound is very similar to the Polysix.
Korg R3
Hated it, Sounded like ass. very thin. I was hoping for a Microkorg 2 in the R3 and it very much was not. It had more features but I just hated the core sound of it. I only kept it for a few months, one of the quickest turnarounds with a synth I’ve ever had. I’m sure it’s capable of some cool sounds (the radius/R3 engine looks pretty good on paper) but I just couldn’t get past it’s thin and uninspiring raw sound.
Korg MS20 mini
The MS20 is one of the greatest analog monos of the 70s imo because of both it’s sound and flexibility. The ms20 mini doesn’t quite sound like the original but it is close enough for most applications. I would consider myself a purist, I can hear and very much dislike the differences between this and the original BUT at it’s price point and reliability factor it’s a win for sure.
Korg Volca Bass
Junk. Ass. kind of fun for a couple times then just boring. You can do some cool stuff with it but meh overall.
Korg Volca Drum
Also ass and junk but more fun than the rest of the volcas, not a bad little bleep bloop thing for it’s price but it didn’t stick around long.
Korg Volca Keys
Major ass super junk. it did have a little step recorder thing where you could do some sort of half assed parameter locking that made for a little bit of fun but overall not great.
Elektron Machinedrum UW
THE greatest drum machine ever created. If I had a choice between a mint original 808 AND 909 or Machinedrum UW I would pick the Machinedrum UW easily. (actually I’d take the 808+909, Sell them both and buy a Machinedrum UW and something else with the extra money. The MDUW can cover a LOT of ground sonically the lofi sampling sounds great it’s low end is unreal, the sequencer rules. I could go on and on and on with what I love about it but then this would turn into a full review.
Elektron Monomachine
The Monomachine was the underdog pretty much since it was released. It was my first Elektron in 2011 and it is the one that made me fall in love with Elektron for a decade. Surprisingly capable weirdo synth that can sound phenomenal IF you understand and implement basic gain staging (which apparently most people didn’t?) so many complaints of it sounding thin or lifeless but turn the volume of the track down and use a little of the built in EQ and like magic it sounds massive. I am a huge fan of having multiple (capable) synth engines in one box so this thing spoke to me on a major level. What sparked my interest sonically the most was the FM engine and the Vocal engine, A LOT of fun to be had there. Of course you can not bring up the monomachine with out bringing up Sophie. She used the Monomachine as it was intended to be used, a palate with various sonic colors. Of course her use of the Monomachine also drove up the prices to what they are now which is what led me to part with mine. In 2022 the Monomachine was going for $5000, which is what mine sold for. The monomachine is NOT worth $5000, Not even close. I loved it, it’s a very capable and fun box with a lot of sonic possibilities but uhhh I paid $800 for mine…that’s around what they are worth.
Elektron Analog four
Another fantastic offering from Elektron, The analog four is their most fully featured synth. (As in it’s an analog synth with access to all of the parameters as opposed to the Monomachine where it’s just some key synth engine parameters that are available) the core sound of the Analog four is pretty good. It’s not great but it’s pretty good. When you get in there and really program it along with the sequencer you can make damn near whatever you want, bending and tweaking any parameter of four full featured analog mono synths is very powerful. Also it does great as an analog drum machine if you know what you’re doing. The addition of Poly mode is very welcome and the effects section is icing on the cake though it’s limited.
Elektron Analog RYTM
This is a tough one because the sequencer is much more robust than that of the Machinedrum HOWEVER the core analog engines are just kinda meh. I owned my analog rytm for about 10 years and pushed it as far as one can and I did get a lot of great stuff out of it but it takes a lot to get it to sound good (versus the MDUW which can easily sound good) I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty with programming in the least but I often found the analog RYTM’s analog engines to just be uninspiring. The addition of a sort of mini synth engine was a great addition and added a fair to the sonic ability. I did find myself using the sample engine more than the core analog engine which made me kind question why I would keep it. If elektron had put more care into the core sound of the analog engine this easily could have been the new kind of drum machines.
Elektron Digitone
Love it, just like the analog four only FM instead of analog. Great and easy accessibility to FM synthesis. I very much enjoy programming it and it sounds fantastic. I should mention that Overbridge works great now (for the digitone and the Analog four) I never cared about overbridge but now it’s nice to be able to do midi and multi tracked audio out of one USB).
Elektron Octatrack
I love the Octatrack, It’s definitely the most cumbersome and initially confusing of all Elektron machines thus far BUT once you wrap your head around it you see that the OT can be used in a wide variety of ways, Anything from a straight sampler sort of MPC style beat making and sample chopping to taking a sample and mangling it beyond recognition (which the OT excels at) to using it as an FX box with a comprehensive sequencer which is something I do often, when it first came out people were saying it’s ableton in a box…It is not. When I was considering buying it someone told me you could sample a fart and turn it into a 303…they were not wrong. It’s a weirdo sampler that can be used in a wide variety of ways, I love that it’s so different in approach than anything else out there, it inspires me to do different things than I’d normally do.
Behringer CAT, Behringer MS20 and Behringer Wasp
Blah blah Behringer sucks, they make low quality entry level junk, they rip off ideas etc etc…all true. BUT the little analog clones they are pumping out are actually very impressive sonically.
I’ve never owned an original Octave Cat so I can’t do an A/B comparison but I have owned some vintage analogs and tons of analog stuff the modular realm and I can say without a doubt the Behringer Cat sounds like raw vintage analog, there is no way around it. it just sounds fucking good. and on top of that the build quality is pretty damn good especially for something so cheap.
Behringer sucks, that’s a fact but in this endeavor they are making some great sounding, cheap synthesizers and really, I can’t be mad at that. I bought the Cat, MS20 and Wasp at the same time and it still cost less than most decent synths, idk how to feel about that and frankly I’m not in a place financially where I can afford to shop purely ethically, neither are you…insert anti-capitalist statement here. idk who cares, at the end of the day if it sounds like a raw vintage analog and it’s dirt ass cheap I’m gonna buy it. I wouldn’t be surprised if over the next few years I’ve got a done of these little fuckers in my studio, I’m already eyeballing the PRO800 and 2600 yeeeeehaw
Roland SH101
My favorite SOUNDING analog mono synth of all time. I have owned 3 of them over the years (Weirdly all 3 happened to be red), The sh101 is fat and greasy and raw and analog. It’s a very simple synth though not as simple as the Prodigy, It sounds like the 303 to my ears only with more options. The 101 is a fantastic sounding simple analog synth but like literally all vintage synths it way way too expensive now and not at all worth what people are asking for, The vintage synth market is stupid and like all vintage things there are people out there that are willing to pay astronomical prices which then ruins it for everyone else…What can you do? Over all, unless you have stupid amounts of disposable income or you’re doing a project (band or solo project) and you absolutely NEED that specific sound from that specific synth other than that it is just not worth it, I would say that about all vintage synths at this point, unfortunately the market has gone mental, In the early 2000s a Juno would be $600 the 101 would be $400 the Moog prodigy $500, all those prices make sense when you think about what they do and how they sound, now those prices are tripled, sometimes even more. What the synth is worth in terms of sound and capabilities vs what the synth is worth in the market does not equal out anymore, which is why I don’t own any vintage gear anymore, the perceived value outweighed the actual value. (I’ll leave this little rant here but I’d apply it to every vintage synth on this list)
Roland Juno 106
The 106 is a great sounding but very simple analog poly. the DCOs sound huge and the filter is has that roland creaminess to it. On the surface it seems like the 106 and the 101 have a lot of overlap with the exception of the juno’s polyphony but having owned both at the same time I can say they sound very different…but that’s good. The juno excels at pads and big fat stacked square wave bass. Of course you can’t mention the Juno without mentioning the noisy weird chorus, Which I find very pleasant and charming. a nice chord being played with a slow attack and long release with subtle filter sweeping and the both chorus buttons pressed is pure 80s bliss.
Roland JU-06
a damn fine emulation of the Juno. To me it sounded pretty much the same as the original only tiny and with more features. Roland’s boutique line is actually pretty sick although I’ve seen some of the second hand prices get a little wonky lately. If you can get the JU-06 for like $400-600(max) then he’ll yea borther! otherwise pass.
Roland JP-08
I never owned a Jupiter 8 and likely never will since these days they are getting near Buchla prices which makes zero sense. I can’t compare it to the original but I can say it sounded pretty good, when comparing it to the JU-06 the Ju-06 actually sounded better weirdly, though the JU-08 has more features (like the Juno106 vs the Junipter8) but the raw osc sounded a little…weaker when directly comparing the two. but not comparing it to anything it does sound good, great for pads of course and the cross mod is fun
Roland SP404MK2
oh boy the SP404mk2…I equally love/hate this thing as of this writing. I love the simplicity of chopping up samples it’s very straight forward in that respect, I love the plethora of effects, Love the portability ,I really love that I can put my entire custom sample library on an SD card and just use it with the 404mk2 without changing anything in terms of file names or folder structure. I’ve owned the 404mk2 for a little less than a year at this point and I’ve contemplated selling it several times. I absolutely hate the way the sequencer works, overly complicated for what it does very cumbersome to use. also the pads suck when compared to an MPC or Maschine, what keeps me coming back to it is that it’s very different than how I would normally work (in Ableton or on an MPC or Maschine) It’s more of a sketch pad for me at the moment, I do like that you have to print everything, like if you want to apply more than two effects to something you’re going to have to resample and it’s going to be what it is, as an obsessive over editor (and chronic procrastinator) this approach is appealing to me since it forces me to make permanent choices when I’m writing that combined with the boom bap style of just punching things in like an old school MPC and it’s low price point and creative implantation of effects and it’s ability to very quickly sample and store anything keeps me coming back, also using it with an ipad pro and the Koala app implementation is really nice as is using as an audio interface and midi controller for the various synth and drum machine apps on the ipad, that allows me to control and sample VSTs from the ipad pro right into the SP404mk2…there’s something there that I need to delve into more that could end up being very productive. an interesting point to note is that I generally use the SP outside of my studio, more often than not it’s next to my bed or in the living room etc.
Roland SP606
Fucking hated it, it was so backwards and unintuitive and limited. I owned it maybe around 2005 or so I think and within a week I was ready to toss it.
Akai MPC 1000
I bought the MPC right after ditching the SP606 and I fell in love with it, It’s weird at first if you’re coming from another environment the way it handles “programs” etc but once you wrap your head around it’s file system and basic work flow it’s a great drum sampler and midi sequencer for external gear. It is critically lacking basic effects and for me these days that’s a deal breaker. But with it’s individual external outs you can process your stuff however you want provided you want to work that way. Still in 2024 the mpc1000 is a great unit.
Akai MPC renaissance
So this is a weird one for me to comment on because I worked at Akai professional from I around 2011 to 2014, I started as Beta tester and worked my way up to Project Manager. I worked on a lot of instruments at Akai but the MPC Renaissance was my main project the entire time. I lived and breathed the MPC for 3+ years, When I first came in it was in a VERY rough state but I, along with the team brought it up to something really worthy. My mission in my mind at the time was to bring the Renaissance up to the level of the Maschine, which I loved. I put my heart and soul and tons and tons of time into the MPC. Spent everyday in front of it and also spent a lot of time at home in my personal studio in front of it. Weirdly I was only 1 of 2 people on the team that had previous experience with the MPC. My goal was to do what I could in my role to take charge (as much as I could) and bring the MPC back from the grave and I think we accomplished that. I really wanted to make sure that the MPC got back to where it should be in the scope of electronic music and electronic music history. As of this writing the MPC renaissance isn’t really relevant anymore (that’s the major) downside of working on something that is software based is that I don’t have a physical piece of gear that I can hold in my hands and say “I helped make this!” since the ren is just a controller. BUT all of that hard work was brought into the current line of MPCs and MPCs are back on the map and are major contenders again. I am pretty proud of my involvement in such an iconic instrument and that I was able to contribute to music history in this way.
Akai MPC studio
Same as above. although I hated the flat knobs and really wanted to have it changed, but I did like the slim form factor.
Native instruments Maschine
I was an early adopter of the Machine and I loved it, It was the most straight forward sampler I’d ever used. Unfortunately it’s been over developed and it’s trying to be both a full featured DAW and full featured drum machine and that makes it much more cumbersome than it was in like 2009 but overall it’s still a great unit, pretty much every time I use maschine ideas happen and music happens, can’t say that about a lot of gear. unfortunately from what I hear it’s basically abandonware now. I was really excited about the Maschine plus stand alone BUT it seems as though it’s become a vessel for Native instruments to sell their sample packs…which I have zero interest in. Why the FUCK would I ever want a drum machine with wifi!? over all the core of maschine, it’s quick workflow, it’s implementation of effects and quick recording of automation, that ability to export individual groups etc is all awesome, but I think Native is going in another direction now and is just trying to cater to the drag and drop “producers” who buy sample packs, bang out a little beat and call it done, unfortunately I think thats where the money is…I could go on a whole rant about the major shift in a lot of companies that were formally to tier and creative instrument powerhouses buuuut
