It’s a fantastic time to be a synthesizer enthusiast, with a surplus of technological capability and an unprecedented level of public interest in new hardware. Like the depths of a healthy habitat, these favorable conditions have cultivated an explosion of diverse and curious lifeforms, appearing in compounding levels of strangeness, each bending our understanding and pushing our expectations a little further. What this means for you is wholly new avenues of creation, pure of any preconceived traps of routine. Taming these strange beasts is like returning to the primordial soup of your creative efforts—a way back to the potential of a genuinely blank slate.

Before venturing further, leave all assumptions here at the top of the scroll, as beyond this point, there are no guarantees. You may get 42 oscillators, or just one, or none at all. You might have to trade the familiar keybed for strange bits of metal or even chunks of wood. Some of the strangeness that follows, you can’t play at all, at least not in the way you’re thinking. Many forego your assumptions of the traditional signal path while asserting new procedures of tonal shaping. One offers nothing but a matrix of possibility; others give you no routing influence whatsoever, while demanding your attention elsewhere. Its communication by physical design: “look here,” … “don’t worry about that,”… “try this.”

Every one of these machines is its own glorious rabbit hole of intriguing research, and as such, we can only briefly touch on the capabilities of each. If you’re looking for a new musical experience, explore the vignettes below, but remember these are just starting points. Once you find one that feels right, keep digging into its conception; many hold insightful stories and lay the groundwork for inspiring experiments, even with your current gear.

Make Noise Strega

Built in collaboration with Alessandro Cortini, the Make Noise Strega excels at gritty dark sonic landscapes. Submerged drones, ominous textures, and thick notes saturated with glitchy interference are a few knob turns away. But don’t dare assume it’s limited to darker-themed music. In fact, major melodies in tandem with Strega’s gritty character produce a particularly beautiful contrast.

Bastl Softpop2

The Bastl Softpop2 is an experimental synth/groovebox teeming with possibility. The result of a collaboration with master circuit bender, Pete Edwards of Casper Electronics, and no doubt heavily inspired by the beloved avant garde hardware of Rob Hordjik, the Softpop2 defaults to realms that more commonplace instruments haven’t even heard off.

The groove box bit of Softpop2 comes in the form of the oscillator pitch quantization and an 8 step sequencer with more than a few tricks of its own, including motion recording, per-step slides, pattern chaining, and more. Last but not least are the Softpop2’s 37 modular patch points for interfacing with other semi-modulars, eurorack, and other CV friends.

Many more goodies await every Bastl Softpop2 owner, such as an original take on a distortion/saturation circuit, an external audio input complete with an envelope follower, and a sinister orb that serves as the player’s primary visual feedback. There’s simply too much to cover here.

Elta Solar-42F

Elta’s Solar-42F is a gorgeous-sounding instrument. It’s commonly referenced as a drone synthesizer, which is certainly true, but perhaps only half the story as the Solar-42 goes much further. It’s more of a portal to lush landscapes, a kind of fully-featured ambient symphony in a sturdy metallic form. Put more plainly, its primary sound generation sources are separated into three very different forms and designed to suit equally varying roles.

Ciat-Lonbarde Sidrax

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The Sidrax embraces purity and chaos within one special wooden box. In its initial state, pressing down on one or more of the seven wood bars evokes an ethereal and almost sine-like triangle wave. Piezo sensors translate finger pressure into amplitude modulation. Initial press and hold stages of each note are played out on one end of the sidrax’s stereo output, with the release stage sounding out the other side. It’s easy to imagine losing several tranquil hours exploring these gentle tones pop in and out at opposite ends of the stereo field, but of course, more asserting timbres lay just beneath the grain.

Each bar has its own tuning slider and dedicated banana cable patch points, which host FM, pressure, and “glitch” modulation. Rich saw waves are easily obtained by patching a bar back into itself. A chaos knob on the side of the device causes cascading descent into more saturated broken sounds as each oscillator modulates the one to the left of it. There are also global jacks for pitch and a modulation input for the chaos parameter itself.

Through use of Sidrax’s patch points, global chaos parameter, per-bar tuning sliders, and seven voices, the player can assemble a range of sonic pallets, all unique and capable of evoking performances that are exclusive to this interesting device. Crunchy crashes, sharp rings and sweeps, and fluttering clatters are all within reach to pair with variations of the device’s more gentle sounds. The contrast of which seems to evoke unique compositions.

SOMA Laboratory Terra

Beneath Terra’s alien panel sits a digital heart and mind capable of realizing this novel instrument’s full potential. With over 32 synthesis algorithms to explore, Terra encompasses a huge timbral range, though that isn’t to say there isn’t a kind of unifying character between its sounds. There’s definitely a tendency for organic sounds and modulations, and it’s hard to shake a certain preference for Sci-fi and otherworldly-esque timbres. What’s certain is that the thoughtfully curated algorithms combined with Terra’s unique control methods produce gorgeous results.

Analogue Solutions Ample

Although Ample’s controls and tactile differences are certainly unique, the star of the show is its super-rich character and juicy sound. Big fat oscillators, a squelchy 24Bd low-pass filter, its analog BBD delay, and basically every other part of the Ample’s analog modules come together to produce super organic timbres; simply put, this thing sounds warm and alive.

Landscape Stereo Field

Erica Synths Syntrx II

The Syntrx II is one of the most flexible instruments on this list. It’s a modular synthesizer with very few normalled connections, giving full control over the signal path. As the spiritual successor to the iconic Synthi of the 1970s, Syntryx II takes heavy inspiration from the Synthi but then pulls those ideas into the 21st century with some change-ups and additional features.

The player constructs a signal path through Syntrx’s many modules via an ominous red LED patch matrix. Much like the original Synthi, the experience amounts to modular synthesis minus the cables. Consequently, this opens up a truly massive range of possible sonic experiments within Syntrx’s practically infinite number of routing options.

A full rundown of the Syntrx II’s modules and features isn’t possible here, but here are some highlights:

Again, the simplest way to explain the Syntrx II is modular without the cables, but the character of the modules and with the refinements that show up in this glorious synth’s second iteration definitely go further than that general MO. The Syntrx II is something special.

Tasty Chips GR-1

If you’ve ever wanted to pull your granular synthesis VST out of the screen and plop it down on your desk, look no further than the Tasty Chips GR-1. This texture and cinematic timbre dream machine delivers the functionality of a powerful granular synthesizer in a tactile and gratifying piece of tabletop hardware.

The GR-1 is four part multi-timbral and packs 11 voices with up to a 128 grains per voice. You get two external CV inputs, a fully featured mod matrix, full midi implementation, and that’s far from all the GR-1 has to offer. This is easily the most elegant and tasteful hardware solution to granular synthesis we’ve seen yet.

Buchla USA Music Easel

The Buchla USA Music Easel is one of the finest alternative synthesizers ever made. It’s original debut dates back to the 1970s, but we’re lucky enough to have an expanded reissue, adapted with many modern conveniences. The mind behind the Easel, Donald Buchla, was after much more than a new synthesizer or even a new type of synthesizer. Buchla’s goal was to branch off into an entirely new way of creating music, and the Music Easel is dense with the fruits of that labor.

The Easel is a unique experience from start to finish, starting with its oscillators. The Buchla has a complex oscillator and a modulation oscillator. The complex oscillator has the renowned Buchla timbre control, which produces the famous effect of wavefolding. That feeds into another Buchla special: dual low pass gates. They simultaneously modulate frequency and amplitude in a way that loosely approximates the behavior of real-world sounds. These two elements in particular, come together in a brilliant way that is a big part of the Easel sound. However, this barely scratches the surface of the Easel's feature set.

Beyond the above, the Easel’s touch capacitive keyboard, banana jack semi-modular functionality, one-of-a-kind sequencing capabilities afforded by the 5-step voltage sequencer, looping envelope, and tons more squeeze an enormous amount of capability into this exquisite briefcase-encapsulated wonder.

Made with Care

None of these gloriously unique machines would exist without the persistence and strong will of their creators, as they were all certainly risky endeavors as novel instruments. But from these questionable origins comes the necessary component of passion.

Each one of these beautiful oddballs was certainly made with love, and for me, that absolutely comes through in the sound. The designs are purposeful and often so different that the playing experience may feel like a conversation with the creator. Hopefully one of these brief expositions piqued your interest for further investigation. When it comes to musical inspiration, a little strangeness goes a long way.