Noink...

The Tweetscape was all abuzz today with the Moog Music announcement of Yet Another Two-Oscillator Monosynth. It is essentially a Source with Moar Knobs, because that’s what the kids want these days, apparently.

I look at it as a bridge device for when an indie band outgrows a microkorg, and can’t afford a Source. I’m sure they’ll sell a bunch. I understand the purpose of the product, of course, because (despite all evidence to the contrary) I’m not a fucking retard. But it’d be nice to see them take a risk on inventing something new for a change rather than re-hashing 35-year-old tech. Yet again.

The other big news today is that Korg officially said that yes, they’re showing a mini re-make of the MS20. Funny story, that. I used to be endorsed by Korg, and right after the Z1 was released, I wrote a lengthy letter to my artist rep explaining why they should release a new MS20. Okay, not that funny a story. But it only took 18 years!

This is cooler than the Moog announcement, for reasons that should be obvious, but only slightly. It is, in the pantheon of Raping Your Childhood In Search Of Products, far below Roland’s ridiculous Jupiter re-tooling, though. And neither of these can be reasonably used by wedding bands, so the Jupiter really schools them in that regard.

Now, when I bitch about these things, I know I come off as a bitter, jaded old man. That’s totally fine. I can dig it. But there’s a difference between making something new and cool, and just making a product because you can sell a lot. As you all know, I tend to frown on the latter, because it smacks of taking advantage of musicians. And both of these products exist because someone thought extensively about risk mitigation.

And that’s okay, too. Business is business. But the way we get inspiration to make new music is by getting new gear that makes sounds we haven’t heard yet. There’s no danger of that with these two articles.