I have been a VCV Rack junkie for about six weeks now (feels like years though, and not getting much sleep since), so I thought it was about time to start sharing some patches and jams.
To start off, here is a video showing some of the many sonic capabilities I found as I tried to build a VCV version of the EMS Synthi VCS3.
I have some iterations of this idea, some of which I will upload to Patchstorage soon. It’s a very inspiring setup like this, makes it very quick to test sounds, concepts, ideas, techniques, etc.
I was surprised I couldn’t find any videos or patches implementing this idea, so if anyone knows of one or some, please let me know!
Of course there is @Omri_Cohen 's very inspiring video on Pink Floyd’s “On the Run” (the original of which was actually made on a Synthi), going of course for the sounds of the track but not so much looking into the actual machine that made it.
I tried how close I can get the patch to sound like “On the Run” and it seems to be able to pull it off (as far as my skills go of course), so I am looking forward to sharing these sound creation power machines!
Definitely hoping to play an original Synthi one day…
I’ve been having quite some fun with this module, feeding it phased signals from several Bogaudio 8FO modules, getting really hooked on the visual aspect of sound, or is the aural aspect of shapes?
Okay, I got a bit carried away today as I was investigating how to shape a sine as described in the EMS VCS3 manual:
Thusfar I am really pleased with the result, as it’s proving to be more difficult than I thought, especially how to get all the individual parts hard synced in phase. I keep having the feeling I’m missing something obvious, it seems to be no problem to get one of the shapes, but to get both on either side of a dial uses up a lot of rackspace
Next I will try to get the triangle to do its Synthi ramp up/down thing:
Here is just a quick link to something I made earlier this week.
The synth track was made with Rack a few weeks ago, then I felt the need to put on the rest.
I got asked if I could upload the sine waveshaping patch so I arranged it a bit clearer and added another find in my search for the Synthi waveshaping properties: Phase Distortion Synthesis! The Bidoo TiARE is pulling this shape off without syncing issues and should be able to do more of what I want!
Here is a video of me playing a Telecaster into my VCV Synthi. Using the ring modulator I got a kind of sitar sound out of the bridge pickup and an octave fuzz out of the neck The Synthi takes care of the droney chords.
A quick playthrough of an older patch, in which I used Vult’s Leakage module to slightly attenuate the range and offset the tuning of the oscillators, to try and get a bit of drift and imperfection like you can get in the tuning of some analog synths.
I really like the effect this gives, although I may have overdone it a bit on the bass. I guess it reminds me a bit of Tycho.
I had some trouble following my own train of thought from a few weeks back, tried to change some things around to maybe get a bit more variation and structure going, but in the end I decided on leaving most things as is, just swapping out the mixer and tweaking some parameters.
Happy New Year! I wish everyone a lot of love and I’m looking forward to what this year has to bring to this community!
To kick things off, here is the first of probably many videos of playing my recently bought Behringer Crave through some guitar pedals into Rack! I can not recommend the Crave enough, it’s such an awesome synth with so many awesome sounds! Stay tuned for more examples!
In this video I am using Crave’s arpeggiator in mode 4 for some random melodies, modulating its tempo with noise. The oscillator is modulating itself and both the saw and the pulse are heard through the VC Mix. The filter is first being modulated by the KB CV output, later by the VCA output.
The signal flow being:
Behringer Crave Phones Out > Blackout Effectors Twosome Fuzz > Electro Harmonix POG2 > PSK Flanger > Mr. Black Gilamondo Phaser > Strymon El Capistan Tape Echo > Electro Harmonix Pulsar Stereo Tremolo > Hardwire RV-7 Stereo Reverb > Tascam 16x08 USB Audio Interface > VCV Rack
In Rack I built a simple beat using Vult’s Trummor2 for the kick and hihat and a sampled snare from the Autodafe Drumkit collection, then the Fundamental modules for some bass and keys. The Crave was not yet synced to or controlled by Rack, that’s definitely something I want to experiment with next!
I have been making some improvements to my setup and started doing some more editing to my videos, filming some jams in order to give a better view of what I’m doing, found a nice camera angle and I hooked up my midi keyboard again for more control. If you have any suggestions on what I could improve to get a nicer viewing experience, please let me know!
Here are two videos showing a bit of the progress I’ve been making. Enjoy!
This is the first jam I recorded with the Behringer Crave synced up to VCV Rack. I was hesitant to try it at first but in the end it’s really easy to get going, although there are some minor confusing issues which I’m still trying to wrap my head around.
To sync Crave to Rack I connected a MIDI cable from my audio interface’s MIDI out to Crave’s MIDI in. Then in the settings menu (Shift+Hold+8) on the Crave I chose DIN Sync mode (option 3) which seemed to work better than Single Clock Advance Mode. In Rack I sent a multipied by 24 clock to the CV-MIDI module’s Clock in, since that was the only way I could get usable time divisions on the Crave.
Rack is driving Crave’s arpeggiator, alternating between polyphonic chords from an array of Bogaudio’s ADDR sequencer, and a randomly noodling melody line from Bogaudio’s Walk, using Computerscare’s Father & Son to toggle between them. I am sending an LFO from Rack to MIDI Channel 1 (Shift+Hold+8 for Settings menu, Step for Page 2, Shift+5 for option 13) to modulate Crave’s LFO Rate via the Assign output, which makes for a nice glitchy effect when it’s modulating the oscillator frequency and filter cutoff.
I’m also playing some small instruments live into Rack with the usual Valley Plateau Reverb and Chronoblob Delay for some extra atmosphere.
Enjoy!
Hardware signal flow:
Behringer Crave Phones out - Electro Harmonix Soul Preacher Compressor - Blackout Effectors Twosome Fuzz - PSK Flanger - Electro Harmonix Memory Toy Analog Delay - Tascam 16x08 USB Audio Interface (MIDI out to Behringer Crave, Shure SM58 coming in on channel 5) - VCV Rack (with M-Audio Oxygen49 USB MIDI Keyboard connected)
This is a jam demonstrating how I use VCV Rack to play the Behringer Crave paraphonically!
To achieve a relatively steady two octaves on Crave’s LFO, I’m slightly scaling up note information (between x1.0492 and x1,0517) with Bogaudio’s OFFSET and sending it to the LFO Rate via MIDI CC1 through the Assign Out, then patching the LFO into the VC Mix to have it go through the filter.
The Crave has to warm up for about half an hour for this to work properly though, since the LFO doesn’t seem to be as stable in tuning as the VCO. I think this time I even had to wait for a full hour for it to properly react to the slew limiter.
You can see me use the Mix knob to choose one or both voices to be heard, I sometimes switch back and forth between PWM and FM on the VCO and in some parts I introduce some glide, which, with the Keyboard CV controlling the filter cutoff frequency, makes for a smooth sweep that is especially nice when only hearing the LFO, since it is independent from the VCO melody.
Bogaudio’s S&H is taking care of the melody for the VCO, its range being modulated by some Fundamental LFOs and VCAs, after which another S&H gets rid of unwanted glitches and note jumps. Bogaudio’s ADDR sequencer provides the simple line for the LFO.
Computerscare’s Father & Son Patch Matrix is used to switch between sources for gates and note information, although in this jam I didn’t utilize all possible combinations, like for instance having both the VCO and the LFO play the same melody for some decent FM sounds.
This jam is in 5/8 with sequences of 7 notes in length, making for some interesting patterns that take quite long to resolve while still retaining some predictability.
Enjoy!
Hardware signal flow:
Behringer Crave Phones out - Electro Harmonix Soul Preacher Compressor - Blackout Effectors Twosome Fuzz - PSK Flanger - Electro Harmonix Memory Toy Analog Delay - Tascam 16x08 USB Audio Interface (MIDI out to Behringer Crave) - VCV Rack (with M-Audio Oxygen49 USB MIDI Keyboard connected)
I’ve been working on this patch for some days now, jamming with it, exporting sketches and sometimes capturing more than a sketch. A few days ago I had one of the most intense fits of laughter ever as I was tweaking some sounds, somehow finding a whistle or flute that changes into a brassy chicken which in turn morphs into a nylon guitar. I just had to turn the music off for half an hour or so before I got myself together enough to continue working on it. It’s turning into a very versatile patch, which most likely means it will be showing up in future videos.
This time I am sending a VCO from VCV Rack to Crave’s multiple, from there it is patched into the VC Mix, Osc FM and Osc Mod. Both oscillators are receiving the same pitch information from Bogaudio’s S+H, with my MIDI keyboard controlling the octave dials on the quantizer and there are some Bogaudio CV Delays where needed to compensate for any latency along the line.
I also solved the issue I had where the Crave would play an accent with every Rack gate it receives. By patching the Velocity Out from the MIDI-CV module to the Velocity In on the CV-MIDI module, then playing a quiet note to tell the Crave not to play accents, it was finally possible to fully use the envelope section so I can have those long slow attacks and nice short snappy decays. There are probably many other ways to achieve this, like sending a constant voltage using for instance an attenuator, but the patch was already so full (and perfectly rectangular) that I didn’t want to add any more modules.
All melody lines are generated using Brown noise that’s being sampled by several gates. Computerscare’s Father & Son Patch Sequencer is once again used to facilitate quick changes in patching. Three instances of Clocked are providing many rhythmic possibilities, in this case arriving at a quintuplety 5/8.
Here is a sketch (audio only) from a couple of days ago and two videos of jamming with it today :
Enjoy!
Hardware signal flow:
Behringer Crave Phones out - Electro Harmonix POG2 - Blackout Effectors Twosome Fuzz - Electro Harmonix Pulsar Tremolo - PSK Flanger - Electro Harmonix Bass Big Muff - Strymon El Capistan Tape Delay - Hardwire RV-7 Digital Reverb - Tascam 16x08 USB Audio Interface (MIDI Out and Line Out 5 to Behringer Crave) - VCV Rack (with M-Audio Oxygen49 USB MIDI Keyboard connected)
Another upgrade to my setup with my girlfriend’s huge office desk offering enough space to start using my old Yamaha PS-30 again!
For this one, I taped down two keys to get a nice droning power chord to improvise over, then in VCV Rack it’s going through a Laika Filter by Lindenbergh Research.
The Behringer Crave has an arpeggio picking its notes at random, synced to VCV Rack.
With my USB Midi Keyboard I’m playing an additional voice in VCV Rack, its filter frequency being modulated by 4 different sources.
I’m looking forward to hooking up my reel to reel tape decks again for some nice tape delay and looping.
The other day I was reading about the first dog that went into space and I can’t seem to get this tragic story out of my head, so this one is kind of an homage to Laika.
I have a lot more MIDI control now, borrowing a friend’s Behringer BCF2000 with motorized faders to control the MindMeld Mixer and using my Behringer FCB1010 floorboard (out of frame) to control the filter cutoff on the Yamaha PS-30 coming into VCV.
I am also using PDArray as a looper, controlling record and playback with the Behringer MIDI floorboard. The loop in this jam was recorded in a soundcheck before recording.
Of course for this one I am only using Lindenbergh Research Laika filters, which not only sound good, but also have a nice visual reference for the modulation.
I have the feeling the MIDI sync was slowly drifting, making the Crave be ever so slightly too late near the end, but it didn’t bother me enough to not upload this jam.
Enjoy!
Hardware signal flow:
Behringer Crave Phones out - Electro Harmonix POG2 - Blackout Effectors Twosome Fuzz - Electro Harmonix Pulsar Tremolo - PSK Flanger - Electro Harmonix Bass Big Muff - Strymon El Capistan Tape Delay - Hardwire RV-7 Digital Reverb - Tascam 16x08 USB Audio Interface (with Behringer FCB1010 to MIDI in and MIDI Out to Behringer Crave, Yamaha PS-30 into Channel 10) - VCV Rack (with Behringer BCF2000 and M-Audio Oxygen49 USB MIDI Keyboard connected)
There’s some really nice sounds in there Deev, well done! I’m not a big fan of the kick drum here, I don’t think it’s necessary, but a nice piece nevertheless.
Of course there is @Omri_Cohen 's very inspiring video on Pink Floyd’s “On the Run” (the original of which was actually made on a Synthi), going of course for the sounds of the track but not so much looking into the actual machine that made it.
I tried how close I can get the patch to sound like “On the Run” and it seems to be able to pull it off (as far as my skills go of course), so I am looking forward to sharing these sound creation power machines!
