Looking for recommendations for drone boxes. Anything that folks have found success with for evoking emotions and tones. Looking for control over speed of vibrations and nothing ultra weird sounding all noisy that is just for chaos. rather something controllable for hitting and it sends a signal ala death industrial-ish.
Just curious what is out there that folks have actually used.
or.
how have folks set up equipment and found success in getting tones that can be manipulated.
thanks everyone.
http://www.special-interests.net/forum/index.php?topic=6429.0
Im selling my DRONELAB, the last one made.
I have used sleepdrone (3?). It was pretty decent, but as I do have synthesizers, it felt like I can't do almost anything I couldn't do with synths. It had simple functions. 3 oscillators with each having pitch, volume and on/of switch. Adjusting those levels, it will start interact different kind of oscillations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVlx9ERp8MA
having many of them, certainly creates massive drone one could listen from albums...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMsGaLC9sJE
Yes, these boxes are very limited. You just need a polyphonic synth, and some effects.
a drone box that is also a synth that I will never get bored of and is definitely not limited is exagonal DRART!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Y1LfhRh71w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=753SLwsDM4g
Quote from: tiny_tove on December 16, 2015, 04:35:10 PM
a drone box that is also a synth that I will never get bored of and is definitely not limited is exagonal DRART!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Y1LfhRh71w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=753SLwsDM4g
I prefere put $500 in a "real" synth :)
http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/ (http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/)
http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/maximal-drone/ (http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/maximal-drone/)
Cheap, simple, nice. Personally I prefer the Minimal Drone, as one can get interesting variations between the two oscillations. With Maximal, the more oscillators you switch on, the more blurred the sound gets.
I just got this and I really really like it, considering also the price.
another nice drone generator I own an evolved version of this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS1owfyzFdI
Nice gear! Wouldn't mind having one of them.
THANK YOU FOR THE HELPFUL REMARKS. KEEP EM COMING.
i have a Trogotronic 676 and a 679
Trogs are great in general, if you want drones throw some reverb/delay on them and you're good to go.
if you can find one, my opinion/experience is that the 666 model is easily the best one, especially for drone like sounds.
Quote from: Andrew McIntosh on December 17, 2015, 01:00:10 AM
http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/ (http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/)
Ordered!! Can't wait to try it!
I saw videos for both pedals but minimal drone sounds better to my ears.
Quote from: woundfucker on December 26, 2015, 10:00:53 AM
i have a Trogotronic 676 and a 679
Trogs are great in general, if you want drones throw some reverb/delay on them and you're good to go.
if you can find one, my opinion/experience is that the 666 model is easily the best one, especially for drone like sounds.
yes!!
I have many trogo pieces and they never disappoint. modular versions are even better.
Marco, thanx a lot for letting me know about minimal drone pedal! Can't wait to put my filthy hands on it!!
Quote from: Dr Alex on December 26, 2015, 06:52:48 PM
Quote from: Andrew McIntosh on December 17, 2015, 01:00:10 AM
http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/ (http://www.handmadeelectronicinstruments.com/store/product/minimal-drone/)
Ordered!! Can't wait to try it!
I saw videos for both pedals but minimal drone sounds better to my ears.
Cool, hope you dig it. I recently ordered a few other synths from that fellow and have been enjoying them too. In a way, they're toy synths, but no less enjoyable for all that, and properly used with effects can come up with some reasonable sounds.
Got my Minimal Drone recently. Test file at:
http://ikuinen-kaamos.blogspot.com/2016/01/gear-holic-part-15.html
New drone box, sounds nice!!! http://phantomchips.bigcartel.com/product/lerango-drone
Heh, I notice Handmade has run out of drone boxes for the time being. Hopefully Mr Rucci can make some more for the drone hungry masses.
I really don't understand the logic behind investment in this kind of "synths". They are extremely expensive, though very limited. Yesterday I got an argument with some kind of hand-made synths guru (heard of him for a first time) on FB. His arguments was "they are expensive because people put their time into production and they are not produced by children-slaves..bla bla..we care about how sound is produced bla bla.." at that point I understood that I can't accept these things more then form of fetishism for expensive hand-made gadgets.
Though things like BabyBox are nice, but they only are useful as small sound or loop production units, but not synths.
Expensive? A lot of them are remarkably cheap. There's a lot of new "mini synths" coming out now that are very affordable, comparatively. Shit, even Roland have put out a few new synths that emulate the old Juno but at less than half the price. It looks to me that this is a good time for mini synths that give good sound for a decent price, at fucking last!
If there are people doing "bestoke" synths for inflated prices, fuck them. Go for the cheaper and better options. A few have been mentioned on this thread already.
Quote from: Andrew McIntosh on February 15, 2016, 04:05:29 PM
Expensive? A lot of them are remarkably cheap. There's a lot of new "mini synths" coming out now that are very affordable, comparatively. Shit, even Roland have put out a few new synths that emulate the old Juno but at less than half the price. It looks to me that this is a good time for mini synths that give good sound for a decent price, at fucking last!
If there are people doing "bestoke" synths for inflated prices, fuck them. Go for the cheaper and better options. A few have been mentioned on this thread already.
As I checked today, yeah. Some really cheap and remarkable things mentioned in this thread.
MFOS Sound Labs are incredible.
Not technically a drone box, but acts like one! Just avoid hooking it up to a keyboard. ;)
Quote from: Pax Chetyorka on February 16, 2016, 08:55:30 PM
MFOS Sound Labs are incredible.
Not technically a drone box, but acts like one! Just avoid hooking it up to a keyboard. ;)
Yeah, they are. But assembled units are extremely pricy and process of assemble is really difficult. Thinking about this for years. Logical step would be to buy a kit and find someone experienced enough to construct it locally.
True. The whole point of Soundlab is to build it yourself. I brought an assembled one second hand a few years ago, and either Soundlab synths are crap or this one was badly put together. I found it very unpredictable in live performances, and this particular one doesn't have pan pots (something I could always do something about myself I realise). The sound itself was somewhat thin to my ears, but mind you I haven't used it for a while.
Arturia minibrute for $200 on eBay > any drone box guys
Yesterday I have received the new module from the guys who did Black Death Synth
it is called erd/erd and I really like it.
this is a first out of the box test with sounds from the lep loop 808 CY drone generator, a little module that is far from being aggressive.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Auqm1aSXfQk
Has anyone got the "Dark Matter" pedal by TC? Does it handle the low frequencies as good as it says it does, or is it just full distortion blast like the "Death Metal"?
I've got a few things that do drones.
I built one of the Dronelab kits from Casper labs. Cost me about $150 on CL from some guy who bought it but realized it required actual soldering skill.
It is very useful for being able to generate multiple waves at the same time, but mine has problems getting the levels of the various waves into a relative ballpark with each other.
What I use instead of that often is a pair of Doepfer Dark Energy modules. You can find these used for $400-500 or so.
It has PWM which can be controlled by one or both LFOs. There are also a number of ways to get really weird with the filter, but it is only low pass on the MK 1 units.
I used to make drones with a tape loop in a cassette deck. I could go on about that forever, so I wont.
I also have garnered some of the best results simply making feedback loops with a handful of guitar stompboxes.
Incorporating digital pitch shifters and analog filter pedals along with ordinary modulation pedals is very rewarding.
I've especially enjoyed using 3 or 4 modulation pedals set on very mild amounts of effect. Together there is no easily identified periodicity to the modulation, but it is audibly changing constantly.
Quote from: vomitgore on April 09, 2016, 12:56:40 PM
Has anyone got the "Dark Matter" pedal by TC? Does it handle the low frequencies as good as it says it does, or is it just full distortion blast like the "Death Metal"?
Sorry to dig this old post up but im new here and just looking for stuff that interests me.
I recently picked up one of these TC pedals, it does seem to handle bass tones quite nicely. You only have lo/hi EQ and the hi seems more responsive from what i've heard so far. The gain is a fairly huge range, and for the price of the pedal it seems to do the job.
In terms of drone boxes, Electro Faustus now make Drone Thing which looks pretty impressive.