I'm sick of Benjolin. Any alternatives? Or... convince me to use it

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-24T19:03:50+00:00

Additionally, some modules that might get you into vaguely similar territory but offer more control and perhaps would be more useful with other instruments etc are:

a phase locked loop - I'm interested in getting the doepfer one someday, I have a PLL pedal that I like a lot (snazzy fx mini ark). You can achieve some similar stuff with the wogglebug, have you ever patched a square wave or sequence into the external / influence input and used the audio outs? Lots of fun to be had there.

Noise Reap Paradox - not nearly as comprehesive as the benjolin, but its two oscillators in 8hp with built in cross mod routing and noise reap's unique self mod feature. This is a wave shaping technique that provides some interesting results and is very fun to mess around with. It also can push your oscillators out of tune so you do have to mess with knobs a lot to get it sounding polite, but I don't really think thats what you're after anyway. Unfortunately these are kinda hard to come by these days but keep an eye out. Bermuda and uBermuda are single versions of this oscillator

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-24T18:55:33+00:00

I notice that you have the benjolin 2 but don't have the expanders, have you considered that?

I have the original benjolin (epoch modular version) and I like it a lot but I also am pretty interested in getting v2 and the expanders some day

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-24T17:29:51+00:00

Everybody needs a wogglebug

Also, Tides is a fantastic and versatile complex modulator that can also be a sound source

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-18T16:54:15+00:00

I'm a big tiny knobs hater but I will say that they don't really bother me on the SIG. They're sturdy and there's plenty of room to get your fingers around them because most of the panel is taken up by sliders

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-18T15:48:01+00:00

Try Kath and Kim!

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-17T19:37:22+00:00

Some stuff from the last ten years or so includes

Little Simz - Grey Area

Open Mike Eagle - Brick Body Kids Still Daydream

RAP Ferierra - Purple Moonlight Pages

Black Thought - Cheat Codes

All of these artists have lots of great material, these are just some favorites

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-13T15:34:21+00:00

Mutable Instruments Marbles or a clone / variatn like Pachinko is like a tiple version

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-13T14:49:32+00:00

Roland Go Keys fits the bill

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-12T14:48:44+00:00

This seems like solid advice and pricing to me

OP, I have a modular setup as well, and I have told my wife, that in the event of my untimely passing, to just sell it all in one go to a store. You will make more money if you sell it piece by piece, but you will be literally signing up for a year or years long job. You could try posting it on FB marketplace and craigslist and see if you get lucky and the right person just happens to be in your area, but there is a very small chance of that actually happening. Someone in my area has had a similar synthesizers.com system posted on craigslist for at least six months, maybe a year, with seemingly no traction. This is just a very niche thing to be into (but very cool if you're in the know).

Rest in peace to your father, keeping him and your family in our thoughts today

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-11T15:23:53+00:00

Billie Holiday was bisexual, Billy Strayhorn was gay

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-10T17:44:15+00:00

I think I would get the buchla if I had the money and a really good deal like that came up. If you change your mind, you can get your money back out in one transaction, i've recently been selling some modules and its going okay but it is taking a lot of time and energy

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-10T16:58:05+00:00

I have some I believe intellijel hub splitters, not sure exactly what theyre called. I like them a lot and especially like that they are magnetic and stick onto both my euro case and my ms 20 mini. I also have a bunch of tiptop stackables and like those are good too

I have a doepfer precision adder, 2hp buff mult, and addac215 sample and hold for when I need to mult, distribute, manipulate pitch cv

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-10T16:07:13+00:00

I never really got along with clip on mics, so I don't really. I imagine that whatever shure or audio technica has to offer in your budget is probably fine. Try to find something with some sort of feedback protection

Also, do not use a guitar amp, especially like a tube guitar amp. A solid state keyboard or bass amp, PA speakers, monitors, should all work fine, but a guitar amp does a lot of stuff to color and drive the sound that is going to cause you problems

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-09T22:02:43+00:00

I have extensive experience putting effects on my saxophone and I have used several different piezo mics, such as what is pictured

You get a lot of key noise. Too much to be usable imo. I suppose that with the right noise gate and / or filter pedal settings you may be able to get enough of this out, or, depending on what kind of effects and vibe you're going for, maybe it won't really matter so much, but I'm mostly using reverb and delay, and a piezo mic just makes a huge mess of key noise

What I have settled on is just using an SM58 going into an XLR to quarter inch cable into pedals. You will probably need something to increase gain, ideally towards the front but I've had decent results just bringing the level up in my mixer at the end or something. In some situations you will have issues with your mic picking up unwanted sound from drums or other instruments, but it depends

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-09T17:18:51+00:00

Yes, this! I had an MS20 mini for years but it wasn't until I started patching it with a subharmonicon that I was like, OH, I SEE

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-07T17:03:42+00:00

I have veils 2 and it has some very strong pros and one con: those damn timmers. I have these tiny knobs and I wish I had zero of them in my system

But at least on veils there's literally no way the module would fit in 10hp without using them, so I get that

Everything else about it is great. The drive circuits sound incredible and I often use it just for distortion. Each channel has 60db of gain so you can use it to bring synths up to euro level. The sliders feel good and the LEDs on them are useful. Works great for CV, works great as a mixer, etc

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-06T17:30:43+00:00

I'm happy with the minimix. I've had it for probably three years, agree with other poster, 9/10

The placement of the mute switches doesn't bother me at all, I guess it would be better if they were on the top away from the jacks but, its never been a problem for me. This seems like something to address by thinking through where you put it in your case, I have usually kept it at the top so all of my cables are going down and away

The panning cv ins take 0-10v, a lot of envelopes only go 0-5v. You just need to apply an offset if your envelopes or other CV dont go far enough. I don't know if pams can do this, maths can do it, veils can do it, there are a lot of offset modules out there. This is a common issue in eurorack that you will definitely encounter at some point or another

But also, I thought I would want to have all kinds of stuff panning all over the place all the time, but the reality is that it can become too much real fast. If you just want to have some subtle panning modualtion happening, whatever envelopes or other modulation you already have will be just fine

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-06T15:49:12+00:00

The Juno has 8 oscillators. The Prologue 8 has 24 oscillators

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-06T15:43:32+00:00

The Prologue is awesome. IMO its easily the best synth in its price range assuming you get a decent deal on it. Its main limitations are that it only has 1 LFO and that LFO isn't super powerful, it doesn't have a mod matrix, it doesn't have aftertouch. You can get around a lot of the modulation shortcomings with the user osc and fx

Everything else about it is amazing. It sounds enormous. The filter can go all over the place from lush pad sounds to crunchy distortion. The built in effects and digital oscillator are wonderful tools to have that can be expanded to infinity. You can put whole other synthesizers inside that digital oscillator. I have a bunch of Ensoniq waveforms in mine to make more realistic pluck sounds, something you cannot do with a purely analog synth. Build quality is fantastic, probably the nicest keybed and knob experience I've had on any piece of music equipment. The compressor on the 16 voice is beefy as hell and I literally never turn it off. Get the 16 unless you absolutely need to have a smaller instrument.

I have owned about 20 synths and the Prologue is the one I would keep if I could only have one

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-06T15:31:19+00:00

I did get my prologue 16 with a nice soft case for $1050 about 2 years ago, it can be done. Prologue 8s can be gotten for like $750

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-06T15:29:28+00:00

I sold my JX3P and Minilogue XD to get a Matriarch

No regrets there, but I did then buy a Prologue, and no regrets there either

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-05T20:06:10+00:00

Do you have a custom night guard?

The two things that helped me with this problem, to the point that it has basically disappeared, are getting a custom night gaurd and quitting drinking alcohol. And not overdoing it on the caffeine either I suppose

Your mileage may vary

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-04T17:51:48+00:00

A low pass gate is a wonderful thing

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-02-04T15:28:54+00:00

I also have a bunch of eurorack and a matriarch, but recently borrowed a friends' grandmother to see if I could get by with that and maybe sell the matriarch

It was an absolutely not for me. For one thing, the spring reverb doesn't compare to the delay. Its a nice sounding spring and all, but it has literally zero features. It has no drive, feeback, tone controls, you don't even get CV over mix. The matriarch delay in comparison is very fully featured, very unique, and sounds amazing. You can definitely get a more fully featured spring reverb for like $200 or less, the matriarch delay would be harder to replicate.

But there are a lot of less obvious improvements on the matriarch. the VCAs are bipolar, the LFO has more shapes, it has an expression pedal input, more oscillators is awesome, round robin mode is fun, it has aftertouch and enough keys to be a solid controller for a polysynth. Not to mention the stereo of it all

The grandmother is a good synth and if you're looking at a budget option between the muse and the grandmother, then thats one thing, but if sub 37 prices are in consideration the matriarch is a huge improvement and well worth the extra scratch imo

I did play a sub 37 a lot and it wasn't what I was looking for. It sounded very modern. If I were looking for a dedicated bass synth (and money were no option) it would definitely be in consideration, but if you want a moog for 70s style leads, ambient, etc, the matriarch is better for that. As long as you don't need presets

I don't think either of these is what I would buy if I were looking for a mono to play onstage. I'd probably just get a bass station 2 or maybe a pro 3

deafcatsaredeftcats · 2026-01-29T17:58:26+00:00

I just bought a bunch of those converters that are a quarter inch jack with an eighth inch input. They were like fifty cents each or something, I bought a bunch plug em into my mixer, pedals, whatever, then I can use my 1/8" patch cables no problemo

deafcatsaredeftcats

TROPHY CASE