Current Launch v2 - A new instrument platform by Minimal Audio

[zerocrossing]

I don't think a synth like Phase Plant will ever be as intuitive as a fixed architecture synth like Current. I remember not being able to figure out why I couldn't get the generators to modulate the filters. It's not intuitive that you can put filters in the effects slots and in the generator lanes... but not all the filters. Why? Unclear. Anyway, I've used it enough to know my way around it, and the flexibility is awesome, but I don't always want or need that.

I'm not a Phase Plant expert, but one main difference between the generator and effects section is, that the generator section allows audio rate modulation between all modules.

https://kilohearts.com/docs/phase_plant ... modulation


filter-fm.jpg

That's my point. Why are filters and effects in the "Generator" area? It's fine once you figure it out, but it's far from intuitive. Zebra has a similar paradigm, but is laid out in a much more logical way.

Because they give you the option to add per-voice filters or output (global) filters.

Oh, I get why, but it makes no sense to put them in a lane marked "generator."

It has to! The generator is being filtered at the generation step! There is no other way to filter an oscillator in a modular enviroment.
Not only that, Kilohearts offers you the possiblity to use FX Lanes as a per-voice output effect...It gives you a lot of flexibility (Poly button)!

Zebra has entered the chat.

[Rastkovic]

The FX stuff looks good to me, but other than that, it seems to be, that Phase Plant is by far the better choice.

I changed my mind. Yes. I watched on the last two fridays the live production streams by (he utilised in the last stream mainly Current), and I also started making more sounds with Phase Plant again.

The most obvious thing for me, are the differences in sound. Phase Plant has in my opinion a distinctive sound, either you like it or not. There are a lot of options, distortion, non-linear filters, many types of FM, but the basic sound character stays the same.

Current on the other hand, builds his sound character (again in my opinion), from the synth and FX. Yes, I can hear, there is something special going on. Not necessarily something I need, but I can (now) understand, if someone likes Current and likes to work with it.

Just wanted to add this, to my original post.

[Touch The Universe]

[trevdog]

I read somewhere that Current doesn't have good FM. Is that true?

[swilow11]

I read somewhere that Current doesn't have good FM. Is that true?

You can fm (and AM) basically all the oscillators to each other and themselves and it sounds like...FM (of the modern distorted sort). There is a category of operators which are wavetables pretty perfect for FM with restricted harmonic content. It's not better or worse than any other synth doing FM.

You can't do filter FM or any other audio rate modulation in Current beyond using the oscillators to FM each other but plenty of synths do that so may not really be an issue...

[nanostream]

It’s on sale right now for €100, so I jumped on it, mostly for the spectral features and fx. It certainly delivers on these fronts, it’s a good sounding and user friendly synth. All in all it’s what I’ve expected, so that’s nice.

At the same time, owning Serum 2 and Pigments, I suspected I don’t really need it, which most likely turned out to be true, I guess. Still too early for me to make a definitive call, and I think they’ll continue to develop it further, being a flagship product after all. But most likely the gains will be marginal, and S2 certainly upped the ante, as did P6.

There are a number of improvements they could make, starting with this one:

I read somewhere that Current doesn't have good FM. Is that true?

FM is fine, but Current lacks PM, which is far more useful, imho. Also, no audio rate modulation of random parameters is a bit of a bummer. I also miss more or unlimited fx slots, more routing options, analog modeled filters including drive and feedback (no big deal, this shouldn’t be too hard to implement, right?! ), better LFOs, more modulation source slots, just off the top of my head. I’m confident we‘ll get at least a few of these things at some point.

But what worries me just a tiny bit is that there doesn’t seem to be much buzz around this synth. It’s been on sale for at least a few weeks, and nobody’s posting about it, and their Discord server and feedback section is rather quiet. Doesn’t have to mean anything, of course, but I’d love to see a bit more activity.

In other words: buy now

[SLiC]

But what worries me just a tiny bit is that there doesn’t seem to be much buzz around this synth.

I bought it last time it was on sale (maybe 6 months ago) and it has quickly become one of my go to synths (over Avenger, Pigments, Serum2 and even Phase Plant.)

I think it has a really good overall sound and as you say, its very easy to use..the simplest of all the uber synths perhaps the best FX.

Not sure about the popularity thing, there is just so much choice (the market is really saturated with low cost 'Uber' synths) and it didn't get off to a great start with subscription only etc but it seems to have found its price point now. The pre-sets packs can all be demoed in situ which is pretty cool- I have bought a couple (again in sale) and they were definitely worth it.

[nanostream]

Not sure about the popularity thing, there is just so much choice (the market is really saturated with low cost 'Uber' synths) and it didn't get off to a great start with subscription only etc but it seems to have found its price point now.

I’m relatively new to this whole Uber synth game, having mostly been a Reaktor (instruments and Blocks) and M4L head for a long time. But NI products are crashing my M4 Mac (different topic), so I was forced to venture out. I’m still not settled, I think. Phase Plant on sale looks like an interesting option, and now, thanks to you, Avenger 2 is on my radar as well

I’ll keep exploring Current and Serum for now, both are new to me and more than enough. It’s mostly about finding their strengths and weaknesses respectively — and in regard to UX Current wins, hands down. Too bad they have to compete with S2, feature wise, and look how long it took them to develop the latest update.

But yeah, the market seems oversaturated. I just hope Current isn’t left behind because they botched its launch. It’s a really lovely synth with lots of room to grow still.

[swilow11]

It’s on sale right now for €100, so I jumped on it, mostly for the spectral features and fx. It certainly delivers on these fronts, it’s a good sounding and user friendly synth. All in all it’s what I’ve expected, so that’s nice.

At the same time, owning Serum 2 and Pigments, I suspected I don’t really need it, which most likely turned out to be true, I guess. Still too early for me to make a definitive call, and I think they’ll continue to develop it further, being a flagship product after all. But most likely the gains will be marginal, and S2 certainly upped the ante, as did P6.

There are a number of improvements they could make, starting with this one:

I read somewhere that Current doesn't have good FM. Is that true?

FM is fine, but Current lacks PM, which is far more useful, imho. Also, no audio rate modulation of random parameters is a bit of a bummer. I also miss more or unlimited fx slots, more routing options, analog modeled filters including drive and feedback (no big deal, this shouldn’t be too hard to implement, right?! ), better LFOs, more modulation source slots, just off the top of my head. I’m confident we‘ll get at least a few of these things at some point.

But what worries me just a tiny bit is that there doesn’t seem to be much buzz around this synth. It’s been on sale for at least a few weeks, and nobody’s posting about it, and their Discord server and feedback section is rather quiet. Doesn’t have to mean anything, of course, but I’d love to see a bit more activity.

In other words: buy now

Not quite following why the lack of "buzz" around Current is an issue. In many ways, it is basically just a standard wavetable synth. No real new ground broken (maybe the chord sequencer?), does what many other wavetable synths do. Personally, I love it- I use Serum maybe 60% of the time, but Current is a close second. It has limitations in comparison to Serum or other similar synths but I like it's fixed architecture. Less clicking needlessly, less getting sidetracked into abstraction, more music made. Although I've never quite figured out how to reliably view the arp/sequencer. It appears when I click on, say, the amp envelope but not sure why it can't just be accessible all the time. But I think it sounds excellent, is easy to use, and looks really nice to me. I hope they put a convolution reverb in there because the current reverb is almost always getting turned off.

Other things I'd like to see- a better reverb as mentioned, filter drive (you can set up distortion in the oscillators which is per voice but its not quite the same and it also takes up one warp mode slot), a better random (LFOS can be set up to generate random values but it's a bit convoluted), a sequencer like Pigments, and an expansion of the additive sub oscillator. Bonus features which would be cool but not essential- a wavetable editor, and a resynthesis option like Serum or Vital.

You mentioned PM as being better than FM- in what sense? To my ears, they basically sound the same. I like the FM in Current- it has a very wide sweet spot and really only devolves into noise at very extreme values especially when feeding back into itsself) It's not going to do much in the way of DX7 style FM but for modern gritty, bubbly, zappy stuff, it's great.

[nanostream]

You mentioned PM as being better than FM- in what sense? To my ears, they basically sound the same. I like the FM in Current- it has a very wide sweet spot and really only devolves into noise at very extreme values especially when feeding back into itsself) It's not going to do much in the way of DX7 style FM but for modern gritty, bubbly, zappy stuff, it's great.

PM, or what Serum 2 is calling PD, isn’t necessarily better, but more pleasing to the ear, and sometimes I want that. The world should really come together and settle the terminology once and for all.

[Tj Shredder]

There is a fundamental difference between phase modulation (PM) and phase distortion (PD). Phase distortion is a universal kind of PWM for any waveform…

The difference between PM and FM is marginal, because its mathematically the same result. The reason why analog FM sounds different than the digital one is mainly because of a logarithmic versus a linear modulation…

[spektralisk]

It’s on sale right now for €100, so I jumped on it, mostly for the spectral features and fx. It certainly delivers on these fronts, it’s a good sounding and user friendly synth. All in all it’s what I’ve expected, so that’s nice.

At the same time, owning Serum 2 and Pigments, I suspected I don’t really need it, which most likely turned out to be true, I guess. Still too early for me to make a definitive call, and I think they’ll continue to develop it further, being a flagship product after all. But most likely the gains will be marginal, and S2 certainly upped the ante, as did P6.

There are a number of improvements they could make, starting with this one:

I read somewhere that Current doesn't have good FM. Is that true?

FM is fine, but Current lacks PM, which is far more useful, imho. Also, no audio rate modulation of random parameters is a bit of a bummer. I also miss more or unlimited fx slots, more routing options, analog modeled filters including drive and feedback (no big deal, this shouldn’t be too hard to implement, right?! ), better LFOs, more modulation source slots, just off the top of my head. I’m confident we‘ll get at least a few of these things at some point.

But what worries me just a tiny bit is that there doesn’t seem to be much buzz around this synth. It’s been on sale for at least a few weeks, and nobody’s posting about it, and their Discord server and feedback section is rather quiet. Doesn’t have to mean anything, of course, but I’d love to see a bit more activity.

In other words: buy now

You can kind of fake audio rate modulation using Env Follower with Attack and Release both set to 0ms and choose the point in the signal path that you want to follow. Of course not the same but gives interesting instability in sound.

[nanostream]

There is a fundamental difference between phase modulation (PM) and phase distortion (PD). Phase distortion is a universal kind of PWM for any waveform…

The difference between PM and FM is marginal, because its mathematically the same result. The reason why analog FM sounds different than the digital one is mainly because of a logarithmic versus a linear modulation…

Thanks for the explanation. I kind of gave up trying to remember what’s what because seemingly every other synth is calling it differently. FM, PM, PD … I try not to worry too much and go by ear.

Current seems to be doing what Serum 2 is calling Thru-Zero FM, which is quite aggressive. I’d love to see a PD (as in S2) option as well, that’s what I’m trying to say.

Funnily enough I just tried to match the sound, and S2 PD can sound exactly like S2 and Current FM with the right, i.e. slightly different, modulation settings, which is confusing. I thought there is a „fundamental difference“ between PD and PM/FM?

Anyway, it behaves differently when modulated with envelopes, and that’s what I’m after, regardless of what it’s called.

[nanostream]

You can kind of fake audio rate modulation using Env Follower with Attack and Release both set to 0ms and choose the point in the signal path that you want to follow. Of course not the same but gives interesting instability in sound.

Thanks, that’s an interesting technique. Never thought of that!

[tumface]

There is a fundamental difference between phase modulation (PM) and phase distortion (PD). Phase distortion is a universal kind of PWM for any waveform…

The difference between PM and FM is marginal, because its mathematically the same result. The reason why analog FM sounds different than the digital one is mainly because of a logarithmic versus a linear modulation…

In a tragic turn of events, Serum 2 is calling its phase modulation by the name phase distortion/PD. It's not the Casio phase distortion, which is what everyone reserved the name phase distortion/PD to mean in the past. No, it's Yamaha-style phase modulation.

So, now there are 3 ways to name phase modulation floating in the industry, 2 of which, PD and FM, are also used to refer to things which aren't phase modulation.

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