Soma Laboratory
Eowave
Pittsburgh Modular
Make Noise
I appreciate that we can buy new gear, which is recreated from or inspired by concepts of the 60/70/80/90ies. Some concepts have been improved or taken to the next level. For me this is very interesting, but I wouldn’t call it innovative.
IMO innovative products should bring new concepts or combine concepts in a new way, like :
- Subharmonicon (Moog)
- the entire Brute series (Arturia), which even integrated concepts of modular systems
- MicroFreak (Arturia)
- Quantum and Iridium (Waldorf)
- instruments from SOMA, where a particular philosophy for electronic instruments has been developed by Vlad Kreimer etal
- and many more out of the Eurorack/modular ecosystem, which have already been mentioned.
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Good point, a lot of REALLY interesting pedals have been coming out. I’m scared of exploring that world. Seems like a slippery slope. I have the OTO delay and reverb pedals and the Specular Tempus, but that’s as far as I’ve gone. I’m always salivating after the Erica Synths Fusion Box.
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Agreed. I wish Korg would come out with something cool. I’ve liked their stuff in the past.
Nice list by the way. Make me realize how much the creative center of the hardware universe is east of the Urals.
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I forgot about Dreadbox. There’s some sort of secret sauce in their UX that makes an otherwise traditional setup special. And those Greek God-like oscillators. I’m excited for anything they come out with.
I also forgot about ASM. With the talent on their roster, they could be brewing up something cool as well.
We all live our lives on slippery slopes around here.
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Game changer Audio seem to be making a name for off kilter stuff:
Plasma pedals/motor synth/light spring reverb are all original concepts.
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Noise enginering
Make noise
Mutable instruments
Ssf
I would say precisely not sequential. They follow the money, add the features people want, not obsessed with innovation. Are their synths are all basically the same.
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My point exactly! 
But innovation is hard these days, because the tech to do pretty much whatever we can dream up is there. We are limited by our creativity.
The biggest hit products are those that everyone wants (whether they know it or not), then the tech finally makes it possible and boom there’s a burst of innovation. Ableton, MPC, MD (plocks) let’s not forget bucket brigades and all the ensuing delays and modulations that haven’t been massively upstaged in 40 years. iPhone falls into this category too. I don’t even really call it innovative because form factor is obvious, if you are idealistic.
What does everyone want to do that isn’t currently possible? This is where the scope for innovation lies.
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Chase Bliss Audio. They’ve changed the face of what people expect in a pedal effect.
MIDI - Yes
Analog - Yes
Digital control - Yes
Small footprint - Yes
Innovative sounds/designs - Yes
CV input - Yes
Cool dude running the company - Yes
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Yes indeed the microbrute 2S is underrated. But it is a real good bass machine🚀.
Elektron so far was my absolute favorite especially because of the Octatrack. But with the Model cycle and sample they loose credits.
Soma is fascinating and I use the Pulsar 23 beast. They show us new innovative way of instruments and not only the 100 all similar devices.
Jomox is also good but I think too small to set new standards.
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I know my response here will get some rolled eyes, and might be grounds for removal from the forum (kidding), but I am going to say it anyway: Korg.
Yes. Korg. My three favorite synths right now (and for the past year) have been my Kronos, Minilogue, and (again at the top of the list), Wavestate. HUGE shout out to Dan Phillips and his team for coming out with the new 2.0 Firmware and more importantly, the Editor/Librarian and new Sampler Builder (utility for adding up to 4 GB of your own samples) that work with it. The complexity, vast potential, and usability with the Editor and Hardware in combination blows away, imho, Overbridge and the A4. If Korg had come out with both hardware and the Editor/Librarian/Sampler Builder combo out of the gate, I think Wavestate would have been a much, much more successful product.
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Why do you like the Ensoniq VFX over the ASR-10s? Just curious. I’ve been jonesing for some vintage Ensoniq synths… so dreamy.
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At that time (maybe 10 years ago) I wasn’t a huge fan of samplers. I ended up with two ASR-10s by accident. I was a huge fan of big keyboard synths and I had a bunch of them (Juno-6, Juno-106, Polysix, Mono/Poly etc.) and in that context the VFX offered something completely different soundwise. Beautiful digital pads but with a user friendly interface unlike my DX7 back then.
I still hold the Ensoniq line of synths, especially ESQ-1, SQ-80 and VFX in high regard but wouldn’t buy any of them back. Those days are in the past. I have a software rendition of the VFX on my Mac and that’s enough.
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The Korg *-logue family is a wonderful step forward. Anyone can create new oscillator types. Amazing! The whole mutable suite has been ported. Casio CZ emulation, complete DX7 emulation. All sorts of unusual wave generation. Plus you can create your own effects as well. Awesome distortion, chorus and reverbs have been created.
Some are free and some are modestly priced.
The only downside that I can see is that it adds complexity for sharing patches. And there is a possible fix for that…
Plus the new Korg Familiy: WaveState, OpSix, and ModWave…
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I think techwise that the synths that are using FPGA are actually kind of the hidden innovators currently, even if they are using it to make hybrid synths. FPGA just has a lot of potential in the future to change the industry. I think Novation, Udo, and Waldorf all have products using fpga out currently. Lots of little guys doing really creative things with old tech though.
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What is FPGA?
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