Through trade of some old roland gear, I ended up with both a used syntakt and analog rytm mk2, my impulse is to keep the syntakt for its cheaper price, smaller footprint, more voices, and midi options, HOWEVER, the effects section to me pales in comparison to the rytm, no compressor? no distortion? I love to pummel my beats granted, but even with the syntakt drive cranked, its barely noticeable.
So my main question, are those compressor/distortion effects on the analog heat? I may have a trade at local shop for it, which would for me make the duo of syntakt/heat more powerful than rhytm, my akai will handle the samples.
There’s plenty of ways to get decent distortion on the Syntakt, but nothing like the compression/distortion on the AR, the Heat neither (though it does do a wider range of distortions and such).
The master compressor and distortion on the AR are awesome and pretty much unique in the Elektronverse. If you like the Rytm’s sound, keep it.
There are several different distortion circuits on the Heat with far greater control than the Overdrive on the AR. I have both. The Heat also has filter and two band EQ, envelope control, etc. Much much more than just distortion. It also can be integrated into other workflows; I use mine for mastering for clients.
Think @maymind_trax is referring to the OG AH and AHmk2. The new AH+ has a compressor and other digital effects. Keep in mind the comp would be much more similar to the one on the Digitakt as opposed to the analog compressor on AR.
Keep in mind it’s pretty early on in the Syntakt’s life cycle, I would not be surprised to see them add one eventually via update like what happened to the Digitakt.
Ah that’s interesting to know. I pretty much assumed most Elektron boxes have similar, but surprised that’s not the case. Nice. Goad i have the Rytm then.
I use Boum with my ST, I personally love it and find the combo better than AR soundwise, but that might be a personal preference.
Boum is a sure shot imo. Both as a compressor and distorsion + filter + master level combo, from crunch to wild.
This said, you can use the AFX bus to get some pseudo compression on the ST, don’t hesitate to play with Amp Env on this bus track, it’s much fun.
Interesting, thank you, I guess I’ve been using lots of makeup gain in the compression, didnt give much thought for using the envelope to drive the syntakts drive circuit being a similar idea. once my syntakt is back I’ll give this a shot.
@anthonyreyn you might dig this video, like how he conceptualizes the Effects track as having an extra stereo filter and distortion pedal. One of my favorite videos for for more conventional use of the effects track, my other being @Humanprogram 's advanced turn the effects track into cue effects!
… and everytime I turn on my ST, I get something harder out of it
Edit: Two recent sketches …
But I wonder, isn’t distortion the thing everybody wants but nobody ever uses except slightly turning it up, nodding it’s there and then quickly turn it down as if it would burn the fingers …
thanks Jeanne, not to dork out but I’m a huge fan, your videos are why I bought syntakt (then sold it, then bought it again) lol, HOW DO YOU GET THESE BEAUTIFUL, CRUNCHY KICKS??? this is coming from the distortion circuit (not the drive effect?)? Fm drums mainly? I know you did a video recently on analog only .
Wow, thank you <3 I have to look it up in the projects, but if I remember correctly it’s some analog kick, and sometimes layered with a digital click. Of course always using all there is (LFOs*, Filter, …).
A key of /my/ workflow is to decide what to throw into the analog drive, and what not. If carefuly placed in the spectrum, it can be almost all tracks together
All my videos are just the direct-out with an unbalanced cable (recently upgraded to balanced #fancy ).
*Edit: For example, you can design the pitch envelope further if you use one of the lfos (-> tune, exp) … that can get really explosive …
