Meris Enzo Synth Pedal

[AngelCrusher]

The different modes changes what level the input signal will clip the converters. Gain is always unity regardless of the headroom mode. If you are not clipping either mode, then I would recommend the instrument level mode. Terry listed the maximum input before clipping in both modes is in our online manuals.

Glad you are getting sounds that you love out of it. There are endless sounds in each mode, so it takes a week or two to full get a handle on how all the controls work together. And even after all that, you will keep surprising yourself with new sounds.

This may help myself and others learn the pedal. Here is a quick guide to making a classic synth bass sound with Sine waves. Is there way you can guide us to getting close using the Enzo knobs? Main issue I deal with is trying to keep the tone fairly clean without rolling too many highs out with the filter. Here is an example of something I’d like to get close to. I think this may be able to do done in a similar way, but it would probably require a little deeper knowledge of the filters than I have been able to dial up so far.

Seems like the best filter modes for bass are the 2 LPF, which makes sense. The others are more for dramatic effects. I may be wrong though.

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[AngelCrusher]

I am on the fence with this pedal. On one hand it will definitely provide a lot of great sounds. On the other, some of the best sounds for me are ones that it struggles with for some reason. Tracking gets pretty bad in one of the envelope modes. I can not figure out why, but I have sent an email to Meris to see if I can figure it out.

It’s definitely a step up from the octaver/fuzz pedal combo. There is no doubt about that. The question is if it works on a record as a bass synth-type sound for me. That’s where it matters most. If I can make that work, than I am not worried about how it will sound live.

As for the knobs, I think getting something like MIDIDesigner really helps. It is pain to buy all that stuff, but what you get is the ability to see all the knobs and to even control things like the expression slider, which you can think of as a mod-wheel.

If you don’t have the funds for all that, the main thing to focus on is the filter knobs. Master all 4 (2 +2 alts). I’m still working on it. An issue I am having is the 5th alt - the triggered envelope and the followed. You can get such a tight sound out of it, but 25% of the notes dont track in that mode. It kills me, because it sounds so good if you dial up the right sound, but what is the point if you drop out randomly? I am not having that issue in the other mode.

Honestly, as cool as delay is, I think it is a waste on this pedal if you play bass. I’d much rather have more oscillator and filter control on those sub-knobs. I simply don’t need delay that much, and on a bass synth, it’s really an afterthought. The facts are that you are probably going to want to add chorus or reverb after this pedal sometimes anyway.

I am hoping someone figures out how to mod this thing and make it more of a bass synth, since I think Meris is done with updating it. Maybe just take out poly and arp mode and just focus on making mono and dry sounding as great as possible. Take the delay out and give us more control over the filter and oscillators. That is the stuff that really matters for bass players who want a bass synth sound. Not even sure if modding digital pedals like this is possible, but someone could really make this into a beast if it is. It is VERY close to getting there. If you just want atmosphere and layers, I think the Enzo is already there, but I am playing bass and I leave those sounds to the axemen and keyboards 99% of the time.

For solos and leads - tons of promise here. I have not gotten to the point of designing those sounds yet, but the pedal shines for upper octave work every time I mess with it. It’s miles ahead of what something like a POG would give you.

Guitar - I have not even gone there yet, but I can imagine it will be pretty fun. Just not my focus right now.

 

[Alien8]

I am on the fence with this pedal. On one hand it will definitely provide a lot of great sounds. On the other, some of the best sounds for me are ones that it struggles with for some reason. Tracking gets pretty bad in one of the envelope modes. I can not figure out why, but I have sent an email to Meris to see if I can figure it out.

It’s definitely a step up from the octaver/fuzz pedal combo. There is no doubt about that. The question is if it works on a record as a bass synth-type sound for me. That’s where it matters most. If I can make that work, than I am not worried about how it will sound live.

As for the knobs, I think getting something like MIDIDesigner really helps. It is pain to buy all that stuff, but what you get is the ability to see all the knobs and to even control things like the expression slider, which you can think of as a mod-wheel.

If you don’t have the funds for all that, the main thing to focus on is the filter knobs. Master all 4 (2 +2 alts). I’m still working on it. An issue I am having is the 5th alt - the triggered envelope and the followed. You can get such a tight sound out of it, but 25% of the notes dont track in that mode. It kills me, because it sounds so good if you dial up the right sound, but what is the point if you drop out randomly? I am not having that issue in the other mode.

Honestly, as cool as delay is, I think it is a waste on this pedal if you play bass. I’d much rather have more oscillator and filter control on those sub-knobs. I simply don’t need delay that much, and on a bass synth, it’s really an afterthought. The facts are that you are probably going to want to add chorus or reverb after this pedal sometimes anyway.

I am hoping someone figures out how to mod this thing and make it more of a bass synth, since I think Meris is done with updating it. Maybe just take out poly and arp mode and just focus on making mono and dry sounding as great as possible. Take the delay out and give us more control over the filter and oscillators. That is the stuff that really matters for bass players who want a bass synth sound. Not even sure if modding digital pedals like this is possible, but someone could really make this into a beast if it is. It is VERY close to getting there. If you just want atmosphere and layers, I think the Enzo is already there, but I am playing bass and I leave those sounds to the axemen and keyboards 99% of the time.

For solos and leads - tons of promise here. I have not gotten to the point of designing those sounds yet, but the pedal shines for upper octave work every time I mess with it. It’s miles ahead of what something like a POG would give you.

Guitar - I have not even gone there yet, but I can imagine it will be pretty fun. Just not my focus right now.

Filters are key for a subtractive synth of any type. Mine is waiting at the post office and for a project at home to be completed, but I will try to recreate your issue and see what can be done to handle it - hopefully its not like the swell on the Mercury7 where it creates a zap noise (which reverberates) when the swell gets overloaded - meaning it is what it is at this point.

What were the settings you are struggling with?

Edit: I should also mention that Meris pedals will likely each have an A-ha! moment. If you are patient you will likely get there, but sometimes products just aren't what you want, or don't tick all the boxes.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Filters are key for a subtractive synth of any type. Mine is waiting at the post office and for a project at home to be completed, but I will try to recreate your issue and see what can be done to handle it - hopefully its not like the swell on the Mercury7 where it creates a zap noise (which reverberates) when the swell gets overloaded - meaning it is what it is at this point.

What were the settings you are struggling with?

Just spent another hour with it and I just crafted a really, really good Saw sound. All I do after the pedal is throw it through a Juno Chorus and it pretty much nails one of the synth bass sounds I have been going for. The main issue I have is that for some reason on this setting, the tracking just is not nearly as good as normal. So I really cant play as expressively without missing notes. If I can figure out how to fix it, I am close to mastering this thing and getting some great sounds out of it. I think the filter envelope may be closing quickly and “choking” (more like high passing everything) the subsequent note if it is played too fast, it is really tough to tell. No zap noise or anything like that though.

I am hoping to get an update for a MIDIDesigner template tonight. It is the best way I can share it with you because I am not entirely sure what it looks like yet. When I can look at the settings, I should be able to get a screenshot so you can basically copy what I did.

Can say with confidence that the top knobs are Saw, and the filter is close to 12 o clock (basically cutting off at 1k) and the envelope is around 11 o’clock. That is very key. I then dialed the resonance in a way that gets it to sound like an analogue 80’s synth, but I can’t tell what it is without redialing it and possibly losing the sound. It will make sense when you get it. The MIDIDesigner template will make it so that you can recreate what I am doing a lot easier.

 

[Alien8]

Don't forget about that magic sustain knob - that is a great feature on this box that may just need a hint of an adjustment to get you there - this coming from a guy who doesbt have it yet.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Don't forget about that magic sustain knob - that is a great feature on this box that may just need a hint of an adjustment to get you there - this coming from a guy who doesbt have it yet.

Yeah I have been messing with that a lot. It does not seem to do it. It will be nice to see others get deep into this pedal so we can hopefully figure out these little issues.

Been using a Pbass with flats. My global settings are Mono in, dry active, Midi mode, instrument level, relay bypass, MIDI out, preset tempo, trails on & split off.

Also will go back to my Sadowsky P with flats, but everything responds about the same. I also tried a Pbass with rounds. Good news is they all seem to generate the same tone.

 

[ole Jason]

I think the filter envelope may be closing quickly and “choking” (more like high passing everything) the subsequent note if it is played too fast, it is really tough to tell.

I've experienced the exact same issue and I think you're right. Also of note, it will do the same thing with a guitar. It will basically just skip a whole bunch of notes until the envelope recovers. Which filter type are you using? I've had the most luck with ladder lowpass on bass.

 

[AngelCrusher]

I've experienced the exact same issue and I think you're right. Also of note, it will do the same thing with a guitar. It will basically just skip a whole bunch of notes until the envelope recovers. Which filter type are you using? I've had the most luck with ladder lowpass on bass.

Yep ladder lowpass is the one i prefer of the two LPs. Ok so im not crazy. You must be close to getting that 80s saw wave bass sound im getting then too. Its so good. Thats whats killing me. And the response is so much better on other settings, so its frustrating.

 

[Quatschmacher]

Are you able to build a touchosc template by chance?

If I get an Enzo, I’ll knock one up. I’ve just got TouchOSC and made a template which allows control over all parameters and a page to access the presets on my SA Manta:

 

[AngelCrusher]

Ok guys, as promised here is the potentially awesome synth sound I have worked on for way too long. Unfortunately due to what I would imagine is some sort of filter issue, the reponsiveness just is not there compared to other settings. It really stinks because this is a pretty legit bass synth tone compared to any pedal I have used before. We are getting closer to the goal, but unless Meris either shows me the error of my ways or continues to work on and improve the Enzo with some updates, we are not quite there yet.

This is still a very usable pedal for me, but its quite an investment. We need someone to mod this thing and take it to another level, or I am simply doing something wrong and apologize in advance. Go ahead and try to dial it up, the below should be a big help. Also this is a pretty simple sound. Notice I have a lot set to zero. Also the tempo is not a factor in this tone, so you can ignore that unless you want to slide in some delay.

Run this through a chorus pedal or studio plugin for the full effect.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Don't forget about that magic sustain knob - that is a great feature on this box that may just need a hint of an adjustment to get you there - this coming from a guy who doesbt have it yet.

Id REALLY like to hear how this compares to the future impact for you. Specifically tracking of notes and being able to get a big fat analogue synth tone out of it, similar to the tutorial example i posted a page back.

I have no problem with making sounds on a computer editor. I am pretty much doing that now with the Enzo anyway.

 

[Eadger]

I hadn't heard of this thing until I stumbled upon this thread yesterday.....and now I have to have one and am already figuring out a plan to gut my pedalboard to put this in place.

Reading the manual and looking at the controls are a bit overwhelming for me (haven't messed with synth stuff directly - been trying to get there with octave/fuzz)...but searching for more videos, I just ran across one of this lady playing violin through it. I know it's certainly not a bass specific video or anything...but watching her go through the settings and change things on the fly was actually really helpful in seeing how the controls interact and how to change alt functions, etc. It's made me feel like the pedal is more approachable now.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Long detailed post ahead, apologies in advance.

My thoughts on this pedal after 8 hours of time with it in the studio. I make this as feedback to my fellow bassists and also to Meris who I believe have the capability to one day deliver a special product to bass players if they choose to.

This is a really, REALLY nice pedal but it’s not cost effective for a bass player like myself. What I mean by this is that if I drop $300 plus on a synth pedal, I need it to be a great synth pedal for synth bass.

The Enzo is better, IMO as a poly or arp or bass effects pedal. It is simply, IMO, made for guitar players with synth bass as an a secondary thought. A great bass synth pedal should be a mono pedal only. I say this just because it is hard enough to get that right, no need to try and do more with it than that. I understand why Meris is not a mono pedal only, and I do not hold that against them. I simply say that as a preface to my issues below:

My favorite synth to program is the Juno. It sounds amazing, and it’s easy to use, yet complex in what it does. If you get a synth pedal and want simplicity, you are going to have a bad time. It is not the nature of a synth to be 4 knobs and go. The Enzo, imo is not that hard if you invest the time AND money. Unfortunately that last part is important. If you look at my template above, you can see all the controls of the pedal. This is what I used to dial in sounds. Doing it on the pedal is much more difficult since you can not see all the parameters you need to see. So in my opinion, if you have a basic knowledge of synthesis and know what sounds you want to go for, you need to invest in a way to program the pedal outside of just knob tweaking. This will mean that you need some sort of MIDI interface. The Meris one is best, so now you are dropping another $90.

For a synth, the Meris rather simple. For a synth bass, it is too simple. Only 2 oscillators that I can not control independently means that I can never get the core sound as big as I want. You can make amazing sounds with oscillators, but you need to able to control the tuning of each of them. Maybe one is a Saw and one is a square..simple stuff like that. Or two saws, but one is -1 below and the top is slightly detuned..things like this are the core of getting a huge bass sound that fills a mix even with simple settings.

In terms of the filter, the attack and decay are on the same knob. I need 4 things after I choose my Oscillators - A, D, S, and R. The R (release) part is negotiable since the nature of a bass is not to sustain forever. So I am ok without that because it eliminates artifacts. The Enzo has a sustain knob which is very cool, and one of the reasons this pedal is still very viable as a bass effects pedal, but you will still get artifacts if you are not holding long notes, so I didn’t dial it up too much. Additionally, we lose filter ands osc controls for what - delay? I don’t understand why this pedal needs delay when most guys have their own box for that. How many bass players will use delay outside of some intros and leads? It just enforces my opinion that this is really not an great match for bass players.

Another issue is there is no real volume control. Just a blend. What that means is that you will be adding around 3db on average to your sound when you engage this pedal. A non issue for the studio, but for live it could be a thing. You can always slap a limiter on at the end of your chain, but if you don’t have one now, you are looking at another $100ish investment.

Simply put, the Enzo filter is limited in what it can do for bass players who want a synth bass sound. I have shown that with my template photo above as one example. When I A/B it to real synth bass in the studio (both with no post EQ or compression), it is a much smaller sound than I can accept. I don’t need to sound JUST like a synth bass, I like the tonality of a bass guitar, but I need it to at least fill a mix better. The lack of oscillator and deeper filter controls really hurts there. The good news - these guys are close, and they are very talented. Let me throw out some positives on this box.

As an ambient sound box, this thing is hands down freaking awesome. If you want something like that, you will love this pedal. A great usage for this pedal as a bass player would be dry mode and using the filters. You can truly get some nice sounds there. Additionally in mono mode, If you want that modern EDM saw filtered bass sound to throw into a drop - it’s there. It won’t slam as hard as a synth, but it sounds much better than any OC2 into fuzz combo you will come up with. Since this is a poly box you can make some atmospheric pads if that is your thing, but it’s not going to strike fear into your Oberheim wielding keyboard player.

If you want to take a solo with an octave up sound, you will love this thing. It is far better than a POG since you can add delay and also turn on the synth engine to generate some really interesting lead tones. Great pedal for leads, maybe one of the best all in one options out there that I have used for that application.

Will the octave down replace your OC2? Nah. Not for me. I love analogue octave down too much, but as for octave up, it’s top notch.

Anyway, the short story is that I personally should have just bought a Future Impact. That’s much more what I am looking for and it’s my fault for not understanding what I was buying. The Future Impact just needs a simple USB MIDI cable and free software to program and I don’t mind doing that kind of work. Because like I said - if you want a real synth bass pedal, you need to think like a synth player. And those guys know how to build sounds because that is part of the gig.

But if you want ambience, lead tones, atmosphere and the occasional rad synth bass type sound to put in. This pedal will deliver in spades. It is amazing at all of those things.

I can only hope that Meris decides one day to make a dedicated mono synth bass pedal and that maybe my feedback helps them with that. If they do, I will buy it, as I am sure it will be really good. But for now, I am moving on because I have a record to make.

 

[ole Jason]

Pretty much agree that it is amazing for ambient sounds and the arp is unlike anything other pedals can do. My opinion that if you're serious about synth bass you should play keys hasn't changed. For the same price something like the Korg Monologue would be better IMO.

Are there some seriously cool sounds in the Enzo? Yep. Is it worth $400 (presets are a necessity)? Not really. It doesn't hold up to similarly priced hardware synths or higher quality software based plugins. It's still the best polyphonic synth that can be driven by guitar though.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Pretty much agree that it is amazing for ambient sounds and the arp is unlike anything other pedals can do. My opinion that if you're serious about synth bass you should play keys hasn't changed. For the same price something like the Korg Monologue would be better IMO.

Are there some seriously cool sounds in the Enzo? Yep. Is it worth $400 (presets are a necessity)? Not really. It doesn't hold up to similarly priced hardware synths or higher quality software based plugins. It's still the best polyphonic synth that can be driven by guitar though.

What are your thoughts on the FI? To my ears it is the best option outside of playing keys.

 

[ole Jason]

What are your thoughts on the FI? To my ears it is the best option outside of playing keys.

Agreed. I had one for awhile and I think it is still the best option for synth bass. It just sounds so fat and the support of the community has been fantastic. I found the GUI editor to be a little lackluster but I think they've updated it quite a bit since I had the pedal. I think you can also download presets from other people which is nice for people unfamiliar with working on real synths.

All that aside I'm getting some pretty fun tones out of the Enzo running it into an Electronic Audio Experiments Beholder.

 

[AngelCrusher]

Agreed. I had one for awhile and I think it is still the best option for synth bass. It just sounds so fat and the support of the community has been fantastic. I found the GUI editor to be a little lackluster but I think they've updated it quite a bit since I had the pedal. I think you can also download presets from other people which is nice for people unfamiliar with working on real synths.

All that aside I'm getting some pretty fun tones out of the Enzo running it into an Electronic Audio Experiments Beholder.

That’s good to hear about the FI because it sounds like that to me as well (that fat sound is what I need). I also agree that the best synth bass is a keyboard, but the sound I go for is funk based, so having that element of real bass playing in is what makes it work for me. Of course you can funk it up on a keyboard too, but it’s not what I am going for.

I just checked out the Beholder demo. Sounds amazing. Wet dream for a Doom style player.

 

[smeet]

I have to admit I'm sad. My perspective is as a bassist who plays live and wants to add some synth sounds to my arsenal. At home I'm happy with my plugins.

I really love how organic and synthy some of the Enzo demos sound. Sadly, on reflection I cancelled my Enzo order before it arrived. I realized it was too much money and too much work for how much use I could make of it. As @AngelCrusher said, Meris is really close to a stellar out-of-the-box product for bassists. I know bass players who want a high quality synth pedal are not a huge market, but I'll be eagerly awaiting what they do next.

As I've said before, the Future Impact doesn't sound "authentic" to me, although it IS a product that is fully usable right out of the box. I don't think I'll be going for that because although the sounds seem really good, they don't feel "alive", and it just doesn't captivate me like the Enzo did.

For now, for bass I'll stick with my only effect (a Line 6 HX FX), and maybe invest in something small but good like a Mini Brute 2 or something like that.

 

[AngelCrusher]

I have to admit I'm sad. My perspective is as a bassist who plays live and wants to add some synth sounds to my arsenal. At home I'm happy with my plugins.

I really love how organic and synthy some of the Enzo demos sound. Sadly, on reflection I cancelled my Enzo order before it arrived. I realized it was too much money and too much work for how much use I could make of it. As @AngelCrusher said, Meris is really close to a stellar out-of-the-box product for bassists. I know bass players who want a high quality synth pedal are not a huge market, but I'll be eagerly awaiting what they do next.

As I've said before, the Future Impact doesn't sound "authentic" to me, although it IS a product that is fully usable right out of the box. I don't think I'll be going for that because although the sounds seem really good, they don't feel "alive", and it just doesn't captivate me like the Enzo did.

For now, for bass I'll stick with my only effect (a Line 6 HX FX), and maybe invest in something small but good like a Mini Brute 2 or something like that.

I know what you mean about the Enzo feeling alive, but I think that is really just due to the tweakability of the knobs on the pedal. The future impact is more of an interface that you program on your pc before going out in the wild to gig but it has far more potential to feel alive due to the way you can map lfos and control filters.

Another thing that pushed me to the fi is that a new update is coming to it soon which adds even more lfo mapping and apparently even better tracking.

The fact that meris said they were not doing firmware updates for this pedal was another big reason i decided to move on. Imo you cant make a softsynth box and never offer firmware updates.

 

[Bassheart365]

What are your thoughts on the FI? To my ears it is the best option outside of playing keys.

I've been using my Future Impact (FI) in my funk/r&b band for a couple of years. I use it live for synth bass lines that I can't emulate using my analog pedal combinations (Cog T65, Wonderlove, Broughton germanium fuzz). Anyway I ordered the Enzo and gave it a brief test run at home a couple of days ago and I was unable to emulate a classic analog synth bassline. Not saying it can't be done. I'm all ears if someone shares some settings here. But as you pointed out, there are a lot you can do with the Enzo on bass outside of that context. Ironically, the most inspiring sounds for me so far is in the "dry" mode. The arpeggiator is also enticing - but I need to spend a lot more time with this pedal. There is a lot under the hood!