Akai's turn for the cheap analog thing

They shoulda added a bunch of patch points on each voice, at least it could be a cool noise box.

from akairumors.com:

 

September 5th will be Akai's unannounced reveal for their new 12 note polyphony analog synth, Super Wolf. Rhythm Wolf's critically acclaimed and award winning analog synth engine has been multiplied TWELVE times, for super analog action. The keyboard will be a .5 octave HIGH QUALITY MINI KEYS. Despite the keyboard being only .5 octave, pressing one key will output a note that can have a variance of up to 6 octaves! One key press-- millions of potential tones. With an amazingly versatile sonic palette- from wet farts, to dry farts- Super Wolf is sure to please analog synth enthusiasts worldwide.

lol

they just need a matrix of pots inside that connects every component to every other component. that might be fun.

But there's nothing there... an out of tune oscillator, a filter, a very basic envelope and a decay per voice, there's not even an lfo.

Edited August 29, 2015 by Gocab

oh god. somebody put this company out of its misery please.

 

the sad thing is, if they released an updated mpc1000 they'd be drowning in money.

  On 8/29/2015 at 8:03 PM, Gocab said:

But there's nothing there... an out of tune oscillator, a filter, a very basic envelope and a decay per voice, there's not even an lfo.

if u got 4 out of tune oscs you can do harsh unharmonic fm sounds

How?

Well if you would have had patchpoints/mod matrix that is lol.

  On 8/29/2015 at 10:33 PM, digit said:

oh god. somebody put this company out of its misery please.

 

the sad thing is, if they released an updated mpc1000 they'd be drowning in money.

 

 

Well to be fair, even the popuarity of the MPC1000 was pretty contingent on the whole JJOS thing, the stock OS isn't that great from what I've heard (but I've never actually seen one with the stock OS). I do know they deliberately crippled some important OS features to try to force serious users to buy the 2500.

 

EDIT: I've heard the MPC Renaissance hardware is actually decent even though the software is shit, if they were willing to do something as simple as opening that up to third party software they would be taking a tiny step in the right direction, but nope.

Edited August 30, 2015 by RSP

Oh man, that demo vid is gruesome. Not a good sign when the guy demoing the gear has to keep apologising for the product's shiteness. Agree with those who say they should get back into doing decent hardware samplers, I'd be well into that.

  On 9/2/2015 at 8:24 PM, Leon Sumbitches said:

Oh man, that demo vid is gruesome. Not a good sign when the guy demoing the gear has to keep apologising for the product's shiteness. Agree with those who say they should get back into doing decent hardware samplers, I'd be well into that.

 

There is a lot of (silent) demand for an updated old-school sampler a la MPC60, MPC3K, SP-1200, Ensoniq, etc.

 

LIke, imagine a Volca Sample-sized sampler that had the grime of the MPC60, had analog filters (like the Mirage or some of the MPC2K add-ons), and a few of the beastly features of the MPC4K (e.g. tap-tempo timestretch). I would pay $300-400 for something like that (even though I already have more samplers than I can use).

 

Maybe it would have 4 'outs' each with their own filter like the SP1200 (which acounts for like 1/3 of its desirability, as stragetically assigning samplers to certain 'outs' is a great mixing tool/method).

 

Either way, Akai should really stick to what they're historically good at, which is samplers.

Edited September 2, 2015 by LimpyLoo

Hell yes, I would part with sweet cash loot for that. Plus if they did that, the Jay Dee/Madlib-style beatmaker market would buy that shit pretty much sight unseen. I have no idea what market the Timbre Wolf's aimed at- at that price point there are literally hundreds of better things to spend your money on. As someone else said, it kind of seems like they just design things by committee at this point. Maybe it's the EDM crowd that goes in for this sort of thing and Akai are happily raking in a fortune? Who knows.

  On 9/2/2015 at 11:25 PM, Leon Sumbitches said:

Hell yes, I would part with sweet cash loot for that. Plus if they did that, the Jay Dee/Madlib-style beatmaker market would buy that shit pretty much sight unseen. I have no idea what market the Timbre Wolf's aimed at- at that price point there are literally hundreds of better things to spend your money on. As someone else said, it kind of seems like they just design things by committee at this point. Maybe it's the EDM crowd that goes in for this sort of thing and Akai are happily raking in a fortune? Who knows.

 

I think it's aimed at dumb rich kids who cream their pants when they hear the word "analog"

regardless of the actual quality of the thing

 

when I was younger (and dumber)

I was at a music store

and I saw this:

 

 

...and I was like "oooh shit, a TUBE PREAMP!!!!"

and so obviously I bought it

(because it's a fucking TUBE PREAMP!!!!)

and it was a piece of shit

 

similarly, I see alot of people on forums asking "best analog poly under $300?"

(instead of the much more sensible "best poly under $300?")

because the analog obsession is rampant as fuck

so people will sooner buy a terrible-sounding analog poly

than a great-sounding digital poly

 

for instance, buying an Alpha Juno over something like a MicroKorg

(not that the Alpha Juno is a terrible synth or anything

but it's not gonna hit your analog G-spot...

...in fact, the MicroKorg can sound way more analog than the Alpha Juno)

 

So yeah, analog.

Edited September 2, 2015 by LimpyLoo

(buys cheapest analog poly ever to spite limpy)

 

"But it's analog"

 

(ends argument)

 

The volca keys is pretty nice. Jusssayin.

I love my Keys, it's an example of cheap analog shenanigans done right. And a fraction of the price of this abomination, lol.

actually, I take back my comments on the Alpha Juno

 

I just watched this vid and was actually impressed with the thing

  On 9/3/2015 at 12:25 AM, Gocab said:

The volca keys is pretty nice. Jusssayin.

 

totally

I had one for a month but sold it because I was poor

it sounded great and I loved the dirty analog delay it had

 

*adds Volca Keys to wish list*

  On 9/2/2015 at 11:54 PM, LimpyLoo said:

similarly, I see alot of people on forums asking "best analog poly under $300?"

(instead of the much more sensible "best poly under $300?")

because the analog obsession is rampant as fuck

so people will sooner buy a terrible-sounding analog poly

than a great-sounding digital poly

 

for sure

 

I did the analog thing for a while, I've still got my microbrute, volca keys and monotron, and still use them often (microbrute is amazing for super quick synth lines). But ever since I got the monomachine, I kinda switched back to digital (except hardware this time, before I got the analog gear I was writing almost everything on laptop). Hopefully some kind of digital revolution happens after this analog fetishism is over, and we start getting some compact, cheap digital synths—for me, the main drawback of all that 80s/90s digital stuff is the size (80s) and the horrible product design (90s) of most of the gear from those times. Imagine a volca-sized FM synth! I think Yamaha is actually on the right track with the Reface stuff, hopefully in a few years we see other manufacturers making small digital synths that can be run on batteries. (then again, you can probably ignore everything I just wrote, since I've spent the last few months writing music on a fkn gameboy micro)

  On 9/3/2015 at 6:00 AM, modey said:

Imagine a volca-sized FM synth!

 

Droopy drool

  On 9/3/2015 at 9:03 AM, psn said:

 

  On 9/3/2015 at 6:00 AM, modey said:

Imagine a volca-sized FM synth!

 

 

true. A standalone one would be good though!

Edited September 3, 2015 by modey

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I thought these were supposed to be quite decent considering they cost next to nothing, like £40 new? Obviously not as a 'tube amp' but what else can you even get in that price range?

 

Also this synth looks wack and they definitely need to get a new sales guy.

Edited September 3, 2015 by QQQ

  On 8/27/2015 at 10:43 PM, misc said:

http://www.retrothing.com/2015/01/akai-timbre-wolf-might-be-the-worst-analog-synth-ever.html

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And it also has, of course, real simulated wood grain sides

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REAL SIMULATED WOOD GRAIN SIDES