Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Grand Prairie Synth Meet, Solaris and Solina

Still nothing to report on a title and artwork for the finished album. Soon hopefully.

The Synth Meet this past weekend in Grand Prairie was fantastic. Video to come soon, still editing. Got to test drive the John Bowen Solaris, I'm very impressed. It's got some of the dna of the more mind-expanding wavetable digital synths like the PPG stuff and the classic Roland D-50. It has the classic analog waveforms and Moog filters too. With features like Rotary it can transcend the usual sounds. More on the synth meet coming soon.

Also, I just had to snap-up Brandon's ARP Solina project. I'm a real sucker for string synthesizers, and just realized I had sellers remorse for parting ways with the Solina back in 2010. The synth is complete, chorus circuit is working properly, and the electronics issues of droning notes and a couple of dead keys should be something I can handle. But 75% of the work is likely to be cosmetics.

There are broken keys and the sides and back of the cabinet have been replaced with oak. The refurb job is not high quality and will need to be done right. After taking the case apart, the original bottom and tops are particle board and chipped badly. So a trip to the lumber warehouse and full cabinet rebuild is in order.