...Ok but what about the Analog Four? Is it still competitive with the newer generation of elektron?

Elektron Gear Analog Keys/Four
#1

Can anyone tell me a Quick rundown on if there are any signifcant downsides of owning an analog four vs the other, non-octatrack elektron?

Man, I dunno what is it about older Elektron designs that just entices me so… this one girl tells me my instagram makes her have doubts about selling her OT, we talk a bit and she tells me the one thing she’d never ever sello is her analog four.

I have friends with digitone, digitakt, model;cycles… and I see them in action and think “yeah that looks and sounds professional”. But someone just mentions her love for analog four and I flashback to Magna Pía of Cassergrain using one with a Rytm and I’m immediately thinking of what gear I could sell to get one… lol.

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#2

Who is this girl, because she sounds like a keeper.

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#3

Analog Eight would be cooler

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#4

Probably just GAS, but that’s no reason not to get an A4. The downsides of the A4 are the large size of the mk2 units and slightly old school UI, the upsides are everything else. If you have a bunch of synths gathering dust, why not trade them in for a used A4 and see if you don’t like it?

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#5

Every single thing Elektron has made will still be in demand 20 years from now.

Even the A4:

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#6

Yeah, A4 sits in a weird spot in my mind, sounds great and in many ways it is the most featured of the elektron synth boxes as far as the raw synth engine goes… but I feel like it leads itself to get directly compared to other full featured synths with more knobs that you then sequence from OT or whatever. I really loved the A4 but once I got deeper knobbier synths it was harder for me to spend the time designing sounds with it… there are some cool tricks with it and how deeply the elektron sequencer interacts with it though.

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#7

Older synths are hot

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#8

it is

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#9

Soundwise- it sounds fine. Sweet spots are narrow, but the sound engine still manages to be be pretty inventive- like having PWM on every soundwave it generates along with the other elektron feature that gets taken for granted- LFOs to every parameter. Even envelopes to every parameter

P-locks- honestly they feel like a gimmick to me, the architecture allows for more significant things like using it as an analog drum machine- which, that approach makes it significantly easier to use.

For me, its the performance macros that make it most valuable to me. Soundwise I can make some pretty cool(to me) if I’m willing to invest the time. Taking a little bit of time to twiddle some knobs and then map them to macros makes it invaluable to me(on top of its solid sound engine)

Overbridge is awesome too. My personal style is that I record the initial jam and the composition work is only 10% done- i do a LOT of manipulating of the resulting audio files in Ableton- mixing and matching parts from patterns. Its good to have so many sources to work from with the freedom to twiddle endlessly and then- just not using it if the twiddling is bad, but mostly- its the perf macros. Nothing is as convenient as them if thats the sound you’re going for. Doing the same on a digitone would be a lot of mouse work and reclrecording tracks

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#10

Is competitive the new relevant in 2023?

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#11

New is the new analog

After I quit trying to make the A4 sound like other synths it really opened up for me.
It also keeps offering things I never got around to full integrating.
The architecture is not simplified synthesis, it’s 4 deep monos.
That architecture with signature Elektron stuff makes it a real monster.
P-locks, soundlocks, conditional trigs, note slides, parameter slides, microtiming, 2 inputs 3 great send fx, simple project management, pseudo polyphony, performance macros and external sequencing. Plus the feedback circuitry is really fun to harness.

Took me a bit to figure out it’s sweet spots, but they are bountiful.

It alone is enough to make solid tracks and explore the possibilities for decades.

The AKMKI offers even more.

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#12

totally in love with mine but it has been the slowest box for me to get on with so far.
I often have my other elektrons on that distract me from going deep but when I do I am rewarded which is pretty much the only I real thing I desire out of hardware

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#13

I have no friends. I have an Analog Four.

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#14

Analog 4 is the best drum machine that Elektron has ever made, and I’ve had them all.

It’s a pretty good synth too.

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#15

The A4 is quite capable and still worth the price of entry.

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#16

Your post sounds like a case of GAS and you probably should wait two weeks and see if you still feel like you could really need A4.

As ha been mentioned, it’s probably the deepest Elektron when it comes to sound design. And performance macros make it really good for, well, performing. BUT, you need to be thoughtful and invest time for both aspects to pay off. Imo it’s not a machine that gives you fast results in live jams, like the digis do. I’ve sold mine after two years of not getting anything really good out of it, like the digis give me constantly.

That being said, the form factor and design of MK II is the perfect solo table top/lap synth, although it’s a bit too big to implement in setups with several machines.

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#17

totally agree. its size is its only “problem”. it’s an amazing sound design machine but also an amazing performance one, but it’s a bit big and heavy and that makes it less “transportable” than the new machines.

btw I think I will never will get rid of mine.

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#18

Maybe it’s not only about “older designs”, it’s about the features, which made all of the Elektron boxes special. IMO it’s about a specialised sound-engine combined with this deep and flexible sequencer (nowadays copied by some of their competitors).

The A4 synth-machine is very versatile and provides a couple of features and modulations many standard analogue machines don’t have. The DCOs are more versatile and give us more different timbres, there are two filters, and enough LFO and envelope power, and even X-modulations.

IIRC this analogue synth allows in one track that each single note has it’s own patch. Try this with a 15-20k Grand expensive Jupiter-8 :wink:

Basically the A4 is four independent monophonic synths with independant sequences, which we also could use as a 4-voice polyphonic instrument.

This combined with a sequencer, which can in parallel and per note modulate so many parameters at once and can be operated quite intuitively makes, what IMO is the spirit of most Elektron devices and makes them so desireable :smiley:

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#19

Was there any thread with sound comparison of Rytms & Syntakt analog oscillators and filters to A4? Are they identical (at least to Analog Rytm/Four MKII)? Or tuned differently…

#20

A4 was my first Elektron, I bought it second hand from a friend on a whim. At first I found it quite a challenge to create things with but that was also quite fun.
I made some stuff with it I’d never create on other gear, but ultimately I don’t think the sounds I got from it were very me, was super dubby spacey stuff I was really channeling out of it. I had it hooked up to overbridge and ableton for a while almost as a hardware VST and then after buying a syntakt and a Prophet 5, I decided I could get a lot of what I was trying to get from the A4 with them so sold it.
I backed up all my sounds and jams though, at the back of my mind though because it had a charm and I wouldn’t be surprised if one day I get another if I see an opportunity to make a slightly different style of music to what I’m making now.

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