Motas-6 Synth

The Lounge Other Gear
#21

Been playing around with the new firmware, opens up the Motas to a huuge range of new sounds, the audio rate lfo’s are implemented really well, they do begin to alias quite a bit around the 5th/6th octave and up but it sounds really cool even when it does. Very interesting trying things like audio rate PWM or fming an oscillator that’s synced to another etc.

The full control over envelope curves is really handy too, there’s so many nice sweet spots that can be had now which weren’t possible before.

I’ve almost completely filled this thing with patches, need to get round to actually making a demo now that the new firmware is here.

#22

This thing is insanely powerful and awesome sounding. Favorite analog mono ever!

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#23

I did a bunch of recordings last night of me tweaking some of the filter settings to try and show how flexible they are.

I mainly messed around with different resonance settings, feedback and filter drive via the mixer section, and mainly used filter 1 in 4 pole mode with 4 pole resonance, later in the recording I brought in the second filter for some dual filter sounds and also did a little filter FM towards the end.

Overall this demo probably isn’t that great as it doesn’t show a huge range of sounds but there’s definitely a bunch of sounds / timbres I was hoping the Motas could do that I didn’t hear in any of the demos prior to buying it.

Here it is:

I’m going to be doing some more demos but I’ve just had barely any time for music and generally when I do get a chance, I’m really eager to work on some of my own music ideas.

Next demo I’ll do some pads / drones showing how textural / evolving sounds can be with all the modulation options on the Motas.

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#24

I made one quick pattern and patch to go with it earlier showing some of the more extreme things it can do with all it’s lfo’s I’m using the Bounce / boing lfo on the filters, oscillator pitch, the levels of sq / saw and a whole bunch of other parameters, all the lfo speeds are set at different settings but they’re all in a ratio to each other so you get some interesting rhythmic stuff going on.

The two drones at the end (they’re not hugely different sounding so it might just sound like one haha) Are also very complex patches using lots of lfo’s and various tricks I’ve learned so far with the Motas… I love making drones on this thing!

Drones start around 2:30

I’ll do some demos of some more usable sounds at some point, I’ve mostly filled up the patch slots on this thing and I’m very happy with some of the sounds I’ve got out of this thing but I just need to get around to making some patterns that do them justice.

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#25

Here’s a patch I made for a song I was working on yesterday, It’s a single triangle wave being Phase modulated by another oscillator that is being FM’d by an audio rate LFO at 2:1 ratio, I’ve then used a bit of overdrive from the mixer section and a bit of feedback with 100% resonance on the filter which is being modulated by a CC sequence from my pyramid. It’s cool how with the particular feedback / overdrive settings I’ve got on this patch you can set the filter to 100% res without it becoming a deafening scream and also that it retains its bass while the filter res is in 4-pole mode (6-pole res tends to be a better option when you don’t want the res to thin out the sound)

It starts out as the basic patch and I think I randomly start tweaking some of the settings around 1:30 in

I don’t know how many people actually care for these kinds of sounds but I love the noisier side of things which the Motas is amazing for with all its modulation options.

I’ve been trying to finish a track a day as an exercise for myself so I’ll be sure to record a bit from the motas in isolation when I do.

Jon of Motas confirmed with me that the digital whine you hear in his demo’s came from the USB of his keystep and a strange midi cable he had that was causing a grounding issue, he’s since changed the cable out for a standard midi cable and the noise is now gone. I personally have been nothing but surprised at how quiet a synth this is in regards to background noise and if you ever hear any noise in my demo’s it’s coming from some USB noise issue with my pyramid that I’m currently trying to figure out.

So there should be another firmware update coming out soon, boy does that man work fast!

There’s some improvements being made to the sequencer in regards to additional features but also some interface stuff that’s definitely made it more inviting for me to start using the sequencer more, it’s a very powerful modulation source so that’s definitely going to be interesting.

There’s also some other improvements and new features coming, one very interesting one worth highlighting is custom lfo shapes

I’m not sure on the specifics on how these custom lfo’s will work and how many you’ll have access to per patch but it should be something like: “able to do 4 custom LFOs per patch with 32 ‘vertices’ in each LFO shape (i.e. points to adjust, with linear in the gaps, or steps) with 256 resolution at each vertex.”

You could essentially use these custom LFO’s as sequencers in themselves, I know that custom lfo’s have been a powerful feature of other gear in the past (rs7000 is one that comes to mind) so I’m very interested in the potential that lies here.

EDIT:

The new update is out with the following features:

  • NEW user-defined custom LFO waveforms. 4 custom waveforms per patch. Each waveform can have up to 32 steps and each step can be set to hold or glide. For synced LFOs the start-position of the waveform can be set at any of the 32 steps.
  • new LFO waveform: sample+hold with slew
  • added ‘sequence tempo divide’ option to allow patterns to play over more than 1 bar
  • increased pattern maximum notes from 30 to 36
  • option to edit pattern note parameters using the potentiometer knobs
  • new ‘copy-to-all’ parameter pages for EG, LFO and modulations
  • And more! …

I’ve been having a lot of fun with this thing and have actually decided to sell some gear to buy a second as it’s become such an integral part of my music making.

I’ve also got a few new demo recordings of the thing for anyone who’s interested:



EDIT 2: I’ve got a few more demos again but will now be taking a break for a while until my USB isolator arrives:




A lot of noisy stuff in there but thought I’d include them as it shows how extreme the modulation potential with this thing is… The modulation can get extreme to the point of turning sound waves to white noise! In the last demo there I didn’t use any white noise in the later part of the demo.

EDIT: I’ve got another demo here for you all here, someone on another forum asked for some filter sweeps so I tried to capture a bunch with as many different variations on the settings as I could manage without time dragging on too much. Hope you all get as much enjoyment out of it as that one guy did!

EDIT: (I have to keep editing as I’ve posted too many times in a row lol)

Jon now posts himself over on GS but I thought I’d share what he just posted over there:

" New Motas-6 firmware v0113 is now released!

Get it from https://www.motas-synth.uk/downloads.html
Be sure to check out the updated user guide too.
I’ve added full patch editing during vector-morphing and those expanded modulation options (via M1–M4)… and quite a few other features and tweaks (full listing in README.txt file with the firmware).

Also MotasEdit is updated to v1.08, adding PC keyboard control of slider values and recognises latest new Motas-6 LFO waveforms (from previous firmware release)

Find out more at https://www.motas-synth.uk/news.html"

Pretty huge update in! A pretty interesting one is the ability to randomise the panel (by varying degree) which can now be triggered via a midi message. Some cool generative stuff could be had pretty easy via this.

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#26

I had an opportunity to speak to the guy who designed this synth. If memory serves well he mentioned that he did several iterations of this synth and it took him 10+ years to develop it to this stage. He also showed me how the synth works etc. To be fair I was hugely impressed by the sound and UI. Excellent synth with lots of thought put into it.

#27

Yeah it’s the 6th iteration of this synth so he’s had a good bit of practise in getting things right and it really shows, I don’t think I’ve come across a single bug in the whole time I’ve had this and the UI is very well designed so it’s all very intuitive to program. He’s a great guy too who is very passionate about his creation and is constantly looking to improve this as much as he can.

He’s just released the firmware mentioned above and he’s already talking about feature ideas for the next one!

I do wish more people took a leap of faith with this thing, so far every person who’s bought one on my recommendation has loved it and is very happy with their choice. I know one person who returned their Pro 3 to buy this and they were very happy they did. It’s too good a synth to go unnoticed!

Got a new pic from Jon the other day of the main PCB of my second Motas that’s in the process of being built, very neat.

1328×747

Very excited for the second one! The Motas is constantly inspiring me to try things in music that’ve until now been impossible for me thanks to all the unique modulation possibilities.

Really enjoying the updates to the vector morphing, very nice being able to tweak the patches while you’re morphing between them and it’s also so nice being able to use the internal LFO’s as a modulation source for the vector morping. I’ve got an idea to try with this when I next get time to start working on a track.

How’re you other Motas users getting on?

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#28

Your boundless enthusiasm for it has me considering it :laughing:

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#29

Haha do iiiit!

It’s honestly the best thing I own and my music is pretty much built around it. Doesn’t seem like Jon’s slowing down with the updates either but ofc there will come a day where there won’t be any capacity for more.

Let me know if you have any questions!

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#30

@petajaja is there some Sonic State review of this synth? I haven’t seen any YT influencer with their hands on it.
You might suggest the developer to lend a synth to Nick Batt, and another one to Richard Devine, that would help boost the sales I guess ^^

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#31

No there hasn’t been yet, I think the biggest exposure it’s has a review from sound on sound. But yeah I agree that it’d benefit massively from something like this, I’ll ask Jon to see what he thinks of the idea.

#32

I think the Motas definitely leans towards vintage in terms of character and if I was going to compare it to any one companies sound, I’d say it leans towards Roland in character, it can sound modern too but it never gets that ultra polished / plastic sound that a lot of modern analog synths have which I personally can’t get along with. The Motas has the iconic characteristics that’re at least to me, the appeal of analog over digital…

I find it difficult to stay brief about it but also just wanted to emphasise how flexible it is in terms of character, gain staging at many points, a mixer that can be overdriven, filters that respond very differently depending on how hard you hit them, the feedback can be create for subtle changes in character and the clipping options at the end of the signal path. I’ve been able to get the filter to sound like the 101, 303 (of course) and even those classic ms20 screams.

I’m going to be doing some more demos of it soon, just need to finish re wiring my studio… Are there any particular sounds you’d like to hear that’d help in making your decision?"

your demos have certainly hooked me in, i especially loved the filter demonstration. would be great to hear more demos showing off how extreme the modulation can get. my understanding is, each parameter already has an LFO page, so there’s no need to set up any routing?

I’m drawn towards plucky rhythmic demos, the weirder the better, for pads i’d rather go the digital route, so any further demos of these types of sounds would be much appreciated.

another question I wanted to ask was, how intuitive would you say the workflow of this synth is? menu diving is always a factor I have to consider

with regards to the Roland comparison, the sound of the Motas does remind me of the CEM3340 that we’re seeing in lots of synths atm

#33

Glad you liked some of the demos, I’ve got a few more bits I’ve recorded but wasn’t sure how useful they were but I guess they’re still better than nothing. I’ll upload them soon and will get some more things recorded soon.

Each encoder on the front panel has its own modulation page which you access via the buttons on the right hand side and so each encoder has access to 1x local LFO, 1x local envelope, 1 of the four global LFO’s or envelopes. These all have a second page where you can get deeper with them, for example the LFO’s can be set to track pitch well into the audio rate or the envelopes can be set to loop or you can change their curve shape. On top of these you also have Note, Velocity and 4 custom sources available as mod sources (cc / aftertouch / cv etc) and these can also target other aspects of the mod page (local lfo speed or envelope time for example) Sorry if this explanation is bad but basically you have a ton of modulation available per parameter and you can get very deep with it.

It’s very intuitive imo, despite being pretty overwhelmed by the idea of all that modulation potential, I was able to get stuck in pretty quickly and after reading the manual a few times (which is well written and not too long) I quickly got the hang of it and at that point your imagination is pretty much your only limitation.

The UI is very fast to use, it quickly becomes second nature and at this point my hands are just flying about never really having to stop to think where a particular setting is etc. In regards to menu diving, there’s generally a second page to each encoder and part of the modulation section so for example, if I want to sync osc 1, I select osc 1 by touching the encoder for it (you can prevent values changing by turning on value lock) and then you just hit one button and you’re on the second page where all relevant settings are found (pitch tracking options sync options etc) One thing that makes a huge difference to the speed of making patches on this thing is the ability to copy modulations from one encoder to another by touching the encoder you want to copy, pressing copy and then touching the encoder of where you want to copy to, with this I can quickly have some degree of modulation on everything if I wanted to.

I quite frequently email Jon as I’ve suggested a lot of features to him, I asked him out of curiosity if he’d had any inspirations for the various parts of this synth and any info on the designs and he told me a few things… The oscillators are a design of his own and don’t use any custom chips but if he had to compare them, the closest thing would be the oscillators of the Jupiter 8. Filter 1 and the hi pass his own design using LM13700 OTA chips, and filter 2 is based on the 303 filter but still his own design to get it sounding how he wanted for this synth.

There was a recent post over on GS about a blind user who’d bought a Motas and through communicating with Jon was able to get certain features added to make it possible for them to use and they made some pretty incredible stuff from multi tracking it but I think this speaks for how well set out the UI is… It seems like it’d be complicated but it really quickly becomes second nature and not much different from a knob per function synth.

Anyway… I honestly could go on forever but do let me know if you’ve got any more questions :slight_smile:

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#34

I can see myself buying this synth, gas is increasing daily. Going to read the manual first though. How is the build quality? Does it feel nice? I must admit i’m not particularly enticed by the look of the front panel, the feeling of the encoders is more important than looks though

#35

It feels really nice, the pots all feels really nice, I kept calling them encoders but they are analog pots that are also read digitally. I don’t think any corners have been cut in the quality of this thing, it’s definitely a solid, quality synth.

I quite like the look of it but can understand its not for everyone, it does look better in person though. It has a kind of industrial look to it that reminds me of an old CNC machine or something.

I’m sure you’ll love it if you get it but definitely wait to hear from other users (there’s more on GS than here) people generally seem to love it. As is obvious from how much I go on about it, this is by far my favourite musical instrument I own, so much so that I’m getting a second one soon.

The designer is a real nice guy too, I recommend reaching out to him if you ever have any questions, he’s very helpful and also so responsive to suggestions, so far 5he following features have been added after I suggested them: microtuning, adjustable sequence length for polymeter, audio rate pitch tracking lfo’s, patch randomization triggered by cc / cv and some others I’ve forgotten now haha…

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#36

I’ve not recorded anything new yet but here’s one I did the other day which is using osc 3 as the sound source, no filter and basically I’m just phase modulating osc 2 from osc 1 which is then in turn modulating osc 3 so it’s kind of like 3 op fm synthesis. I also put two out of sync lfo’s on the phase modulation amounts so the sequence kind of gradually runs through all the sound possibilities of the ratio I have set up. I also change the osc tunings at various points in the demo.

I’ve got some other stuff I need to edit down and upload but I’m finding it difficult to have time for demos much atm.

Sorry for the triple post!

I’ve not had a lot time for music due to work and also I’ve been re doing my studio furniture which has taken a while so when I’ve had a little time for music I try and just sketch out little ideas on the Motas and the Polyend Tracker I recently bought and am currently learning. I’ve got a few of these sketches here to share and all of them except one just use the Motas, Tracker and a BBD delay pedal.

The second one from the top used the Microvolt for the plucky thing.

None of these are anything that special but I quite liked some of the patches, the Motas is always very quick to inspire me.

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#37

killer, can’t wait to check these out over a good pair of cans tomorrow. thanks for taking the time to do this!

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#38

These were just some recordings I’ve done when I’ve had a little spare time over the last few weeks, I’ll try and get some more demos done over the next few days though. I’ve been meaning to make a video at some point showing what it looks like to make a complex patch on it but it’s not something I’d normally do so I keep putting it off…

#39

I’m just reading the SOS article on the Motas 6 and there’s a bit about the Motas LFOs being bipolar. this type of thing goes right past my head, thought i’d post it here fyi.

Here’s something we don’t often have
to think about with the average synth
review: the subject of bipolar and unipolar
modulation. There has been, for as long as
I care to remember, a standard adhered to
whereby LFOs are bipolar, meaning they
oscillate around a ‘zero voltage’, and all other
modulation sources are unipolar, meaning they
rise positively from a zero voltage, but never
go below it.
The reasoning behind this is that LFOs
were most often used for vibrato. In this case it
is desirable to have the pitch fluctuating around
the base value, so the LFO oscillates equally
into positive and negative values.
Envelopes, on the other hand, are generally
used for amplitude or filter modulation, where
the base value needs to be added to. With
amplitude, that base value would normally
be silence, and the envelope would open the
amplifier from there. In this case, a bipolar
envelope makes little sense.
I was therefore rather surprised to find
that all modulation sources in the Motas-6
are bipolar, with no option for unipolar. This
presents an interesting challenge. For example,
to get a basic amplitude envelope working, one
must set the base output volume (which Motas
call an ‘offset’) to 50 percent and then apply the
envelope 100 percent. This will give a ‘proper’
result. If, as you might normally do, you apply
the envelope with the output amplifier fully
closed (zero percent), the envelope will only
start working (ie. generate a sound) once the
attack phase is 50-percent through. Worse still,
if you have the sustain value set to less than 50
percent it will result in a sustain which is silent,
because the envelope is in fact at a negative
value and trying to further close an amplifier
which is already at silence.
I did ask Dr Hayes, the synth’s designer,
about this apparent anomaly. He offered the
following justification: “My thinking was
that one modulation type should not behave
differently to another — all sources should
behave in the same way to modulate the current
level around that value (bipolar).” He went
on to give the example of vibrato. If you set
oscillator pitch LFO depth to a non-zero value,
then use a modulation wheel to affect the LFO
depth, then the mod wheel at setting zero will
reduce the effective LFO depth to zero.
In practice, it does take some getting
used to, but everything you can do on
a ‘normal’ synth is still possible, it just requires
a mental shift which might take even the odd
experienced synth geek by surprise.
B

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#40

After that article Jon (the designer) updated so that you can select whether any modulation is unipolar or bipolar which is very useful. That’s one of the great things about this synth, if there’s a feature that should be in there but isn’t, suggest it to him and he’ll almost definitely add it so long as it’s physically possible (there’s a lot of potential within the digital brain of this thing)

By features that should be in there I mean things like bipolar/unipolar modulations… The more exotic feature suggestions get added to a list to be weighed up against all other suggestions I think.

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