Orchestron 🧻🧻
Let’s just start with the Orchestron. A shitty optical disc based sample playback machine that went nowhere EXCEPT that Kraftwerk bought one and lathered it all over their best known music. Early teen me (just one of many) heard that choir sound on Radioactivity and Trans Europe Express etc. etc. and wanted some of that action. Here it is, on a discount. Push that key!
Usually I wouldn’t spend money on this sort of thing but sales make you buy shit. I already have a Mellotron from Arturia, but nope, had to have the Orchestron. It looks like GForce licensed it all properly so that feels better than just stealing it. Like New Order just stole it for Blue Monday. Hell I could have stolen it years ago but I’m classy. Also too classy to ever use this on anything.
(I wonder how many people bought a V-Synth just so they could have the Meteor patch that Kraftwerk lathered all over Tour De France Soundtracks?)
ImpOSCar2 🧻🧻🧻🧻 ImpOSCar3 🧻🧻🧻 (updated)
Now to the ImpOSCar2 and 3. I must first remind you I owned OSCar number 77 back in 1985 (“this belonged to John Foxx” sales pitch), disassembled the rubber baby bumpers to get it to a gig in Canada, then to Australia and sold it for a small amount. Do I regret selling it? Not much, it didn’t seem very versatile at the time. This seems more versatile. Have I become more adept? Is the software far easier to use? Have my standards fallen since I was a pompous young person? Did I need some rent money?
I remember it took much fussing to get results, particularly creating the harmonic waveforms which required a lot of tapping blindly on keys. Plus it weighted a tonne. This VST seems streamlined and the digital features make for interesting sounds. The filter is better than I remember. Plus it’s polyphonic, and I’ve never been impressed by useless monophonicisms.
ImpOSCar2 was a bit vintage, it still works OK but my 64bit plugin installed in the 32bit folder for some reason. The file management on the PC is horrible. There’s a button marked save – that’s easy enough. What you’re missing is a button marked load and that is giving me endless grief trying to recall the patches I make myself which don’t seem to appear in the browser.
ImpOSCar3 has just arrived to fix the antiquities of the previous model. The browser is much easier to use and leads to my browsing original OSCar sounds (just as grumpy and flat as remembered), V2 sounds (generally the best of the lot) and V3 sounds … well here’s the thing:
When recreating a hardware synthesiser it makes sense to remove barriers to creativity. Mono to Poly – fine. Some more effects, better patching etc. all fine. But in adding wavetables to the OSCar3 the machine takes on a very different identity. It’s now a wavetable synth with added OSCar elements and that puts it in comparison with other more powerful wavetable synthesisers. (Note you cannot load third party wavetables, only morph harmonics over time). Character is partly in limitation – which requires me to try to ignore this feature as a distraction from the main point of the thing.
M-Tron Pro 🧻🧻🧻
To have the Orchestron you have to have the M-Tron Pro. This includes a good sweep of tape samples but if you want the fully re-mastered versions that’ll cost you a lot more. Some people hate any augmentation of the sound and features – buy this. If you want to be able to create new sounds, then choose Arturia’s version.
Tom, you might want to watch videos of the PWM Mantis, which is a duophonic joining of Wasp and OSCar designs, and it’s Chris Huggett’s last synth.
I’ll give it a listen but I’m back into sampling and additive synthesis again. It’s a cycle, I know.