i recently revived my rack as part of the process of recording a test of the Stylophone Drone Synthesizer. as currently configured i have a Yamaha SPX900, Alesis MidiVerb II, Rane MC22 stereo compressor, and Rane SP15 5-band parametric EQ, all run through the excellent Roland M-120 ten-channel mixer. i plan to upgrade to an 8u rack adding a Lexicon reverb and a second Rane parametric so i can run in stereo for recording purposes.
i used to run a GEP50 with a SPX90 in its effects loop, but when i got the rack out to add the mixer the SPX90 was irreparably fucked up and the GEP’s memory battery is dead; i haven’t opened it up yet because i really don’t want to fuck with it.
this is the aforementioned synth test, with the SDS augmented by a Behringer RD-6 copy of the Roland 606, with reverbs from the SPX900 and MV II.
i'm after a cheapo stereo preamp to distort/compress well... just about anything but mainly samplers and drum machines. i was thinking do i just build two red llamas and use dual gang pots? or is there something out there in the rack/modular world already i just don't know about? ideal world would be like... two hudson broadcasts @ 24v in parallel with one set of controls
friendship wrote: ↑Tue May 13, 2025 11:29 am
It never occurred to me to put a rack unit in the fx loop of another rack unit. You must have gotten some bonkers shit out of that.
i used them to combine Early Reflections and Reverse Reverb, running one on each. i think the SPX900 has a patch where you can apply both. i've barely gotten into it...it's very complicated and has a jillion parameters to adjust for each patch. the manual is like 70 pages without the 20 or 25 pages of MIDI implementation. eventually i'll go through it and tune versions of all my favorite sounds like i did with my Line6 Pod XT, the Casio keyboard, and the Yamahas. one of my life rules is to never, ever use an unaltered preset.
i like combining multiple reverbs. you can hear that on the SDS demo, and when i'm using the full board setup it's not unusual for 3 or 4 reverbs to be going at once, each adding its personal brand of weird.
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
FIFTY YEARS OF SCARING THE CHILDREN 1970-2020--and i'm not done yet
I had an Eventide Eclipse for a few years, wish I hadn't got rid of it, though I can do anything I need to do with plug ins.
The only rack piece I have now is a DBX 163X, which is a half rack space compressor. It's very simple, but sounds great. I use it if I want to compress when tracking.
MechaGodzilla wrote: ↑Tue May 13, 2025 12:05 pm
i'm after a cheapo stereo preamp to distort/compress well... just about anything but mainly samplers and drum machines. i was thinking do i just build two red llamas and use dual gang pots? or is there something out there in the rack/modular world already i just don't know about? ideal world would be like... two hudson broadcasts @ 24v in parallel with one set of controls
I'm a big fan of the Behringer "Vintage" series stuff. There's an 8-channel tubifyer, but my favorite is the T1953 dual channel tube preamp. I've used it as a stereo guitar preamp and it's crisp when clean and sounds good when overdriven. I like the adjustable highpass filters, and the analog meters are fun. 1/4" and XLR ins and outs, phase switching, really there's nothing missing except the nameplate of a better brand. People say the tubes are gimmicky since they're illuminated by a small bulb, but they do light up on their own when in use and as far as I know they get real tube voltage.
