CatSynth Pic: Hydrasynth

Our beautiful Maine Coon friend is big, this time with a brand new ASM Hydrasynth! I am sure she will have a lot of fun with it. From lwxbeats on Instagram.

#hydrasynth has just arrived and she can’t wait to play those awesome pads 😃

We at CatSynth are also quite interested in the Hydrasynth, as it brings novel synthesis features along with polyphonic aftertouch. You can see our demo with the lead engineer from ASM in this video from NAMM 2020.

Lola and Roland MC-202 Rhythm Composer

Lola (the calico cat) is inspecting a Roland MC-202 rhythm composer. From exfade_electronics via Instagram.

More accent? Lola (the cat) probably has a better grasp of the sequencer than I do!

The MC-202 was among Roland’s first grooveboxes. It has a synthesizer architecture (and visual look) similar to the original SH-101, but also looked ahead to the TB-303.

White Cat with Nerdseq and Massive Modular

A beautiful white friend returns, longing behind a Nerdseq tracker-sequencer and in front of the same massive modular system from this post. We also see modules on the vertical section from Rossum Electro-music, Make Noise, Mutable Instruments, Intellijel, TipTop Audio, SSF, Random Source “EuroSerge”, as well as Catalyst Audio, Ciat Lombarde, and Mystic Circuits.

From blush_response via Instagram.

The Nerdseq is an intriguing instrument, essentially an old 90s-style “tracker” sequencer in Eurorack form. The boxes on the screen would be familiar to anyone who worked with trackers and MOD files, but the flexibility and possibilities of CV input and output.

Drone Recording: Red Panda, IdiotBox, Elektron, and more

Cat on guitar pedals

Our feline friend Charlie is ready for a drone recording session. Antoine Marronclɘs via Facebook.

We see some pedals from Red Panda, IdiotBox, and others. Zooming out, we also see an Elektron Digitakt box, a vintage portable cassette recorder, as well as more pedals.

Guitar pedals, Elektron Digitakt, cassette recorder, laptop with Ableton Live.

And zooming back in to that cat on the Red Panda Tensor pedal.

Cat paw on Red Panda Tensor pedal.

This Tensor pedal is quite intriguing, as I have a longstanding interest in tape effects. From the official website:

The Tensor™ gives you live reverse and tape stop effects, pitch shifting, time stretching and hold functions that you can combine in creative ways. Slow down, speed up and rewind in real time. Stretch or compress time with no pitch change. Loop, overdub, and randomly slice phrases up to 9.4 seconds (4.7 seconds in stereo).

http://www.redpandalab.com/products/tensor

Cat on Covered Synths

Cats sitting on synths are a regular occurrence on this site – it’s kinda what we do. But our cat today is sitting on synth covers. Some beautiful covers, actually. There is the ARP Odyssey with classic lettering, and the more oblique “Synthesizers” with future-retro lettering. What actual synth lies beneath the cover and the cat is left as an exercise to the reader.

Submitted by Barry Whyte via our Facebook page.

Behringer RD-8 and Modular

This cat is singing to accompaniment from a Behringer RD-8 Rhythm Composer and a modular system housed in Arturia RackBrute 6U case. We see offerings from Mutable Instruments, Dopfer, TipTop Audio, Behringer (again), Endorphines, and more.

Submitted by Michael Caves via our Facebook page.

Borat the kitten and Yamaha EZ 200 Keyboard

Borat, an adorable black kitten, jumps up on a Yamaha keyboard (which we at CatSynth identified as the EZ 200) and plays us a song. Found via Borat’s Twitter feed.