Complex Oscillators

[naxuu]

A preliminary version of the Frap Tools Brenso manual is now up on their unified manual for all of their modules. Lots of good stuff to chew on.

[clams]

My Brenso arrived yesterday. Seems like there are some known issues with the packaging leading to bent jumpers on the back PCB but so far it seems to be purely cosmetic.

The manual linked above is a great resource — Brenso is my first complex oscillator, and I’m blown away by how intuitive and clever it is. The panel markings reveal the behavior of each I/O point and knob — compared to the other complex oscillators, I find the Brenso UI immensely easier to “grok” (not a dig against the others, but more of a personal preference or respect for the abstraction offered).

The internal normalizations are super clear and can be substituted in delightful ways, such as the “modulation bus.” It’s basically a VCA whose output is routed to modulate a bunch of other parameters, but even those routings can be overridden by an external source.

And of course it sounds just lovely. Has anyone else played with one yet?

[Zacillac]

I’m actually dying to get one but can’t decide if I’d rather get this or a Fumana, when it’s available again. Frap Tools are one of those manufactures that I’ve yet to be disappointed in when I play with one of their modules so it makes it difficult to choose what should be next.

[909one]

I’ve had the CS-L for a while and I decided to give the Verbos CO a try. I’m so much more into the Verbos I’m finding, even though the CS-L has way more functionality and is less HP. The wavefolder on the Verbos is sublime, every setting sounds great. Whereas on the CS-L, the range is so extreme it’s difficult to dial in subtlety. The Verbos sounds so much more like a vintage Buchla imo, whereas the CS-L sounds more modern. I also find the Verbos way easier to play. The sounds are so rich and 3d that I’m finding it’s pushing me to use less voices because I like listening to the pure sound of unit more. Its a keeper.

[Joseph]

Yes, the Verbos has a dusty richness in the low mids, and bandlimited highs. It is more immediately musical (the interface too), and the wavefolder is all sweet-spot.

The only annoyances are the unipolar modulator (a trade off for the AM tremolo if I remember right) and that you can’t sync the oscillators externally.

I find the Furthrrrr is a good compromise between functionality and sound (has a lower shelf than Verbos rather than low mids but still bandlimited highs). As mritenburg at Muffs said, sounds similar to 259 [with a faster non-vactrol modulation response], whereas the Verbos sounds a lot like the CO in the Easel.

The CS-L is very full mids and hifi. I think better for sound design.
If I were comparing them to microphones, I’d say the CS-L is like a Sanken and the Verbos is like a KM-54, FG is like an 84.

[Hovercraft]

My Brenso arrived today—beautiful module! Good design and playability, plus the sound palette is fantastic. Super flexible with a lot of deep level osc circuits broken out for patching and playing. The voicing is clear and rich—sits somewhere nice between brighter Cs-L tone, and the fuzzier vintage tones of the Sputnik and Verbos. Super wide range of timbres-very easy to dial in.

[mdtz]

it’s hard to imagine a brighter cs-l!

[Whinger]

I’ve been VERY tempted by the Brenso, and am looking forward to the handful of videos that will make their way to YouTube. My heart says yes, my wallet says no way.

[mdtz]

thinking about swapping a cs-l for a verbos co. has anyone else made this jump, or auditioned it? i love the cs-l and how capable it is, especially in its small footprint, but the wavefolding gets so brash so quickly. and, i don’t love that the wavefolder has a vca in front of it. i’ll miss the ring mod and the space, but… the sound of the verbos co is so attractive.

this is in a drone rack.

[909one]

I don’t regret the switch one bit. The Verbos just sounds so great. I think the tones you get with the AM mod are pretty ring mod-like that I don’t foresee missing that, however ring mods are cheap and small so it wouldn’t take much to add back if needed. And fwiw I did quick scope of the raw waveforms between the two and actually they are pretty similar, it’s the wavefolding circuit that is so different. When you throw in the odd even harmonics and the other knob (it’s slipped my memory right now) the variance in useable tone is actually quite large with Verbos. I feel like there were about two zones I stuck with on the CS-l but with the Verbos there are no bad areas, and I’m constantly finding subtle variations. I also like patching the sine from main osc into the fm of the modulation osc, you can get some subtle fm happening which doesn’t pitch shift until about halfway up the dial.

[909one]

All I have in terms of filters is a Mutable Ripples. It sounds great through it, with the basic wave shapes, I don’t typically put the wave shaping section through it though as it seems counterintuitive because you are are adding harmonics with the wave shaper. All outputs sound great through the Optomix though!

[jlmitch5]

if you have max for live, plox is a really incredible (free!) complex oscillator. pairs great with the jo.Floating oscilloscope.

[gretchen]

Any other recommendations for traditional complex oscillators in software?

[ceedotgeedot]

Aalto is basically a Music Easel complete with complex oscillator.

On the free side, I’d just put one together out of modules in VCV Rack.

[hermbot]

The Reaktor Blocks version of the DPO is very, very good.

I will also second Aalto, brilliant plugin.

[naxuu]

There’s a bit on another forum about whether that Reaktor module is a direct take on the DPO:

Just wanted to chime in here as someone who worked on the DWG - it’s really not intended at all as a clone of the DPO. The shape knob is the only place it takes its cues directly from MakeNoise, the rest is closer in spirit to a 259. The actual wavefolder itself is a different topology to the one used by Buchla or MakeNoise - it’s probably closer to Serge or a Toppo TWF than anything else. The 2 osc + folder complex oscillator archetype is one that’s been done many times by many different manufacturers now. With the DWG, we wanted to try and bring together the best bits of all these designs, rather than clone one in particular.

If someone were to look for a direct clone of DPO, this VCV Rack module might do the trick.

[hermbot]

If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck…

In any case, it sounds great. One DWG is the only sound source in this track I made a while back:

[gretchen]

@ceedotgeedot

On the free side, I’d just put one together out of modules in VCV Rack.

I actually tried this but couldn’t find any standard modules with linear fm, which seems pretty important to the traditional complex oscillator sound. Or at least the Music Easel / 258 / 259 sounds, as far as I can tell?

That’s kind of what I meant by “traditional” — I’m pretty interested in exploring like what people find deep about complex oscillators and their parameters, not just wiring things up and making sounds.

(I looked in the vcvrack module library and it was pretty hard to search or even tell which modules were worth trying out unfortunately).

@naxuu

If someone were to look for a direct clone of DPO, this VCV Rack module might do the trick.

This does seem really useful though! Thanks!

Aalto seems really nice too, thanks! I’ll play around with the demo.

[mateo]

I use a combination of Mutable Instruments modules as complex oscillator (tides + plaits + warps), I’m sure the VCV Rack versions are up to the task!

[xidnpnlss]

Also in Reaktor is CloudLab

https://www.native-instruments.com/en/reaktor-community/reaktor-user-library/entry/show/11077/

Amazing user contribution inspired by Buchla 200.