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PLEASE HELP A SYNTHLOVER: Mothership or FreqBox?

D

DonKartofflo

Jul 19, 2011
43
0
Stuttgart/Germany
#1
So basically the title says it all. Christmas time is coming and I sure gonna have a wish or two to make but the thing is that I desperately want a Bass Synth. I already have the BMS but its not a true "triggered" VCO. I like it but I really want to buy a real Synth ;)
So after a long time of searching and hours of reading through talkbass and other forums I've arrived with these two lil monsters:

The Pigtronix Mothership:
-Intelligent RingMod
-Massive SubOctave
-Saw/Square Wave
-Octave Up

The Moog MF-107 "FreqBox:"
-Plain RingMod
-No SubOctave
-Saw/Square/Sine/Pulse Wave
-No Octave stuff

So where I need help is in deciding which of them both I should get... i like the massive SubOct on the Mothership but I also like the Moogy sound of the Mf-107 and i love how many waves you can select... but then again the intelligent ringmod is an awesome thing and on and on and on...
Discussing with my self won't help, i need you, my fellow synthmaniacs :D
 
#2
I own a Mothership. It's pretty cool in some ways, sorta disappointing in others. You've mentioned most of what I love about, but there are a few other things worth noting:

1) 'Clean signal level' actually controls the amount of extra-compressed signal, not a true clean signal. Mind you, I typically run off of an active bass, but this gave me the closest thing I've heard to a Justice-style compressor in a pedal -- totally squashed. Sounds awesome, but does not cut in a mix.

2) The note attack is very distinctive, somewhat unique, and always present. I have a hard time describing it, but you hear it in all the demo vids.

3) Analog whammy!

4) Pitch-tracking drifts a few cents per octave. Let's say you tune the VCO to unison on an open G. On the twelfth fret, you'll hear a 'beat' if you've got the subs or clean mixed in. Not horrible, but annoying at times.

5) 48v power supply. It gets warm pretty fast, but I've never had it get hot.

There are a bunch of other quirks, but I feel like they're nit-picky and probably won't be a deal breaker. If you get one used ($150 cheaper), make sure you get one with a recent model number -- the original run needs to be modded to track bass decently.

Here are some clips of the Mothership, sometimes by itself, sometimes in various combos.
 
#4
You're better investing in an actual synth pedal over a Freqbox IMO as it will be instantly more usable. Whether or not it's a real VCO shouldn't be relevant as long as it sounds good. Korg G5 is a waveshaper much like the EHX Microsynth and it sounds great.
 
#5
Swimming Bird said:
I own a Mothership. It's pretty cool in some ways, sorta disappointing in others. You've mentioned most of what I love about, but there are a few other things worth noting:

1) 'Clean signal level' actually controls the amount of extra-compressed signal, not a true clean signal. Mind you, I typically run off of an active bass, but this gave me the closest thing I've heard to a Justice-style compressor in a pedal -- totally squashed. Sounds awesome, but does not cut in a mix.

2) The note attack is very distinctive, somewhat unique, and always present. I have a hard time describing it, but you hear it in all the demo vids.

3) Analog whammy!

4) Pitch-tracking drifts a few cents per octave. Let's say you tune the VCO to unison on an open G. On the twelfth fret, you'll hear a 'beat' if you've got the subs or clean mixed in. Not horrible, but annoying at times.

5) 48v power supply. It gets warm pretty fast, but I've never had it get hot.

There are a bunch of other quirks, but I feel like they're nit-picky and probably won't be a deal breaker. If you get one used ($150 cheaper), make sure you get one with a recent model number -- the original run needs to be modded to track bass decently.

Here are some clips of the Mothership, sometimes by itself, sometimes in various combos.
Click to expand...

First of all: thanks for the quick resume and thank you very much for clearing me up on why everybody on talkbass seems to be disappointed by the motherships tracking for bass.. the thing with the old models explains it :)
you said something about the pedal not cutting the mix, does this mean the whole vco stuff doesnt cut the mix or does the vco cut but the compressed signal gets lost? :)
 
#6
DonKartofflo said:
First of all: thanks for the quick resume and thank you very much for clearing me up on why everybody on talkbass seems to be disappointed by the motherships tracking for bass.. the thing with the old models explains it :)
you said something about the pedal not cutting the mix, does this mean the whole vco stuff doesnt cut the mix or does the vco cut but the compressed signal gets lost? :)
Click to expand...

That isn't the only tracking issue, but later runs do track much much better than earlier (I had an early run and Pigtronix modded it to be the same as the later). Tracking still isn't perfect (better than say, a Boss SYB-5) and you have to play very clean. You'll hear weird flubs in the demos -- that's string buzz or a ghost note or something it disliked.

Depends on settings and depends on the mix. I find heavy compression gets me buried live, pretty much always. The VCO set at unison will only get you as buried as a heavy fuzz, maybe a little less depending. Would I use it in my band? Yes, we have drums, alto sax, DJ, guqin, etc. Would I use in a situation with a distorted guitar? Probably not.

One thing to keep in mind, is that you hit max volume on this unit very quickly in some settings. The square wave is waaay louder than the sine wave (might be an ear physics thing, dunno).

My overall impression: great concept, okay execution.

Keep in mind that 'bass synth' is much more than waveshape/VCO. If you want a full sounding bass synth, you may want a different unit than either the Mothership or the Freqbox. The Mothership is a very good (not great) base for a complete bass synth setup.
 
#7
Swimming Bird said:
That isn't the only tracking issue, but later runs do track much much better than earlier (I had an early run and Pigtronix modded it to be the same as the later). Tracking still isn't perfect (better than say, a Boss SYB-5) and you have to play very clean. You'll hear weird flubs in the demos -- that's string buzz or a ghost note or something it disliked.

Depends on settings and depends on the mix. I find heavy compression gets me buried live, pretty much always. The VCO set at unison will only get you as buried as a heavy fuzz, maybe a little less depending. Would I use it in my band? Yes, we have drums, alto sax, DJ, guqin, etc. Would I use in a situation with a distorted guitar? Probably not.

One thing to keep in mind, is that you hit max volume on this unit very quickly in some settings. The square wave is waaay louder than the sine wave (might be an ear physics thing, dunno).

My overall impression: great concept, okay execution.

Keep in mind that 'bass synth' is much more than waveshape/VCO. If you want a full sounding bass synth, you may want a different unit than either the Mothership or the Freqbox. The Mothership is a very good (not great) base for a complete bass synth setup.
Click to expand...

okay well thinking about it i'm playing in a band with two guitars... not my favourite setup gonna switch to a friends synth/clean guitar/drums/singer band which is why i want a bass synth cause im gonna do stuff like the bass synths on justice songs like waters of nazareth while the actual synth is playing pads and polyphonic stuff, its a digital one...
so if id want to get these nasty sawwave sounds like in waters of nazareth, which one would be the best bass synth for me? (i really really really dont want a keyboard synth, already have an alesis micron, like it okay but i HATE playing keys live :P)
 
#9
Honestly, you'd be much happier with an actual keyboard synthesizer. I messed around for a couple of years playing with various bass synth pedals, and/or combinations of different effects stacked up, and though there were many awesome sounds, and plenty of good times, NOTHING you play through triggered by the strings on a bass guitar will ever come close to an analog monosynth. A really good, and fairly inexpensive synth is the DSI MoPho keyboard, and for even le$$, a Korg MicroKorg. Trust me.
 
#11
RickenBoogie said:
Honestly, you'd be much happier with an actual keyboard synthesizer. I messed around for a couple of years playing with various bass synth pedals, and/or combinations of different effects stacked up, and though there were many awesome sounds, and plenty of good times, NOTHING you play through triggered by the strings on a bass guitar will ever come close to an analog monosynth. A really good, and fairly inexpensive synth is the DSI MoPho keyboard, and for even le$$, a Korg MicroKorg. Trust me.
Click to expand...

I know there is a reason why there are bassists and keyboard players with bass synths. but i have an alesis micron and it makes some decent synth sounds and i would be totally happy if i didn't HATE playing keys in live situations. And to be honest i like the sound of triggered synths pretty muchi i sure do know they will never be as huge as a lil phatty for example but still... as long as i can have some decent sawtooth wave to do some justice style synthing with my bass im satisfied :)
but before buying a gr-55, id definitely get an axon bass to midi and a slim phatty and control the phatty with my bass to blow y'all away :D :D
In the end I'd just be happy to know what is the best bass-triggered synth pedal on the market :) :help:
 
#12
I concur with others. You're trying to do what's been attempted here many times, with varying degrees of success.

My opinion is that the mothership will not give you what you're after. They tried to shove many of the functions that are required to synthify bass into that box, but it falls short.

Freqbox is a waveshaper, for sure, but alone it comes off as a really adjustable fuzz pedal or something. I don't think it will do what you're after.

Others have also tried the axon bass to midi - and though I haven't (yet) the reports are, that like every other bass to midi it doesn't quite do it. Works sometimes.....

Believe me, I'd like nothing more than to control my Little Phatty with my bass but I read all these threads and those doing it are having minimal success.

The Roland pickups are the closest thing to success getting to MIDI and they are really expensive when you consider what you'll spend just to get to midi and then you need a synth on top of it.

I have not completely ruled this out yet - as the basslines I'd play with my synth would be slow and plodding with alot of filter work but I read here that NOTHING available will track fast playing.

Those that have success in the synth realm are using several effects to shape the tone. Compressors, Octavers, Fuzz, Filters, etc. I don't remember where, but I have heard some pretty good sounds, and I'm impressed just how far some have been willing to go trying EVERYTHING to get their bass tone to sound like a synth. I have not gone down this road but you should be able to find someone here that can help you.

It's worth mentioning, that I have most all the MoogerFooger effects (cluster flux on the way) and in my opinion even with all of them there is not one magic arrow in that quiver that will cause a bass to sound like a synth.

Luckily, I did not buy them for that purpose. I acquired them for the purpose of having modular synthesis at hand via my little phatty and other oscillator sources, and hopefully a sequencer soon-ish. That is not to say that they don't sound amazing with a bass though - the filter, the freqbox, the ring mod, the delay, are all kickass with ANY source. As others have mentioned the Phaser seems not to affect bass frequencies very much.

So where does that leave you? If you want it to be simple I highly suggest that you go digital and buy a box that is purpose-built for this. There are a few Akai Deep Impacts for sale right now, and though I haven't tried one they are supposedly the sh!t and though you'll spend $800 USD for one, that will probably be less than you'll spend trying to do this with a combination of available pedals. Or like was said, try the Korg G5 or Roland Vbass or something.

The other way? There lies madness.....

out
 
#13
Colonel Monk said:
I concur with others. You're trying to do what's been attempted here many times, with varying degrees of success.

My opinion is that the mothership will not give you what you're after. They tried to shove many of the functions that are required to synthify bass into that box, but it falls short.

Freqbox is a waveshaper, for sure, but alone it comes off as a really adjustable fuzz pedal or something. I don't think it will do what you're after.

Others have also tried the axon bass to midi - and though I haven't (yet) the reports are, that like every other bass to midi it doesn't quite do it. Works sometimes.....

Believe me, I'd like nothing more than to control my Little Phatty with my bass but I read all these threads and those doing it are having minimal success.

The Roland pickups are the closest thing to success getting to MIDI and they are really expensive when you consider what you'll spend just to get to midi and then you need a synth on top of it.

I have not completely ruled this out yet - as the basslines I'd play with my synth would be slow and plodding with alot of filter work but I read here that NOTHING available will track fast playing.

Those that have success in the synth realm are using several effects to shape the tone. Compressors, Octavers, Fuzz, Filters, etc. I don't remember where, but I have heard some pretty good sounds, and I'm impressed just how far some have been willing to go trying EVERYTHING to get their bass tone to sound like a synth. I have not gone down this road but you should be able to find someone here that can help you.

It's worth mentioning, that I have most all the MoogerFooger effects (cluster flux on the way) and in my opinion even with all of them there is not one magic arrow in that quiver that will cause a bass to sound like a synth.

Luckily, I did not buy them for that purpose. I acquired them for the purpose of having modular synthesis at hand via my little phatty and other oscillator sources, and hopefully a sequencer soon-ish. That is not to say that they don't sound amazing with a bass though - the filter, the freqbox, the ring mod, the delay, are all kickass with ANY source. As others have mentioned the Phaser seems not to affect bass frequencies very much.

So where does that leave you? If you want it to be simple I highly suggest that you go digital and buy a box that is purpose-built for this. There are a few Akai Deep Impacts for sale right now, and though I haven't tried one they are supposedly the sh!t and though you'll spend $800 USD for one, that will probably be less than you'll spend trying to do this with a combination of available pedals. Or like was said, try the Korg G5 or Roland Vbass or something.

The other way? There lies madness.....

out
Click to expand...

I wish this would have been written one year ago. It would have saved me a lot of time and money.
 
#16
gastric said:
Seriously, GR-55 will make you sound exactly like a synth. It's literally two PCM synth engines for your synth goodness. Plus all the multieffects like the craaaaazzzy good hexachorus.

Scroll down the to end of the page to hear the better clips I've uploaded: Roland GR-55 sound samples and patches - cgraham.com
Click to expand...

Tried the GR-55. A Roland rep told me that it has the lowest (fastest) latency of all their bass products and he was right. About 1/8 of a second as long as you play above the fifth fret. Still drove me mad when I tried to play anything faster than quarter notes. I'd recommend to purchasing one until you've tried it and know what you're getting into.
 
#17
gastric said:
Seriously, GR-55 will make you sound exactly like a synth. It's literally two PCM synth engines for your synth goodness. Plus all the multieffects like the craaaaazzzy good hexachorus.

Scroll down the to end of the page to hear the better clips I've uploaded: Roland GR-55 sound samples and patches - cgraham.com
Click to expand...

Yeah sorry Gastric wasn't meaning to discount your input on the GR-55, it fits in there with the other purpose-built units, and is probably better than any of them that use the analog signal.

I'm listening to your track as I write this and there is a ******** number of good presets there.

Many sound similar to my phatty - but the phatty can pretty much make ANY sound you like, it's not limited in any way by presets - it just happens to have many....

CM
 
#18
gastric said:
Seriously, GR-55 will make you sound exactly like a synth. It's literally two PCM synth engines for your synth goodness. Plus all the multieffects like the craaaaazzzy good hexachorus.

Scroll down the to end of the page to hear the better clips I've uploaded: Roland GR-55 sound samples and patches - cgraham.com
Click to expand...

omfg it sounds so synthy :O
thank you fella I'm really impressed! now this is what I'm gonna do: borrow my band fellas snazzy fx mini ark and use its cv out to control a pals slim phatty :) if it works I'll buy a mini ark and a phatty and since the equips only borrowed it's no big deal if I'm not successful :D
btw before I get the mini ark: any experiences on the arks tracking?
 
#19
EHX Q-Tron+ with an Octaver (Octave Multiplexor) and a Fuzz (Big Muff) pedal in the effect loop of the envelope filter. My favorite synth set up currently. Fat and functional.
 
#20
jbednarski said:
Tried the GR-55. A Roland rep told me that it has the lowest (fastest) latency of all their bass products and he was right. About 1/8 of a second as long as you play above the fifth fret. Still drove me mad when I tried to play anything faster than quarter notes. I'd recommend to purchasing one until you've tried it and know what you're getting into.
Click to expand...

I ended up putting a GK-3B on a piccolo strung bass and running the GR-55 in guitar mode for best latency. After working with it for a while it feels very natural, and for whatever reason guitar mode provides faster retriggering of consecutive notes than bass mode.

But I've also modded my box to accept mono input so I can run my non-GK instruments into it for monophonic triggering and it works well as long as you play higher on the neck, not unlike you normally have to do with other mono-tracking gear like an OC-2.

I'm not saying it's the best thing ever, the best tracking, or the easiest to use. But it provides a TON of excellent functionality. And though it cost a lot, it's not any more expensive than a modular system, and even possibly less expensive if you're stacking Moog boxes.
 

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