Hydra synth: first impressions

[deeplfo]

 Nice, thanks for the info Jay.
Mine is coming tomorrow :-)
cheers,mohsen


    On Tuesday, June 2, 2020, 07:49:09 AM PDT, Jay Vaughan <ibisum at gmail.com> wrote:  
 
 
Well, it rocked up at Sky Studio today, and Phil kept it wrapped until I arrived so we could OOBE together.

First impressions: its a very, very nice synthesiser.  Beautiful and elegant, even.  Perfect “first synth” UI, but hiding a lot of power.

Polyphonic after-pressure is a feature all synths should have, as is the case with the ribbon controller.  I didn’t really realize it has MIDI/CV, so that was a treat (Neutron+Hydra scheduled for next jam session) .. the ribbon controller is very fun and right away becomes ’normal’ to reach-for.  The knob layout passes the ‘fumble fingers’ test (can turn knobs without touching others).

It seems to me to be missing a patch bank selector - but I’m never happy unless there are dedicated patch keys anyway.  

Factory presets are all very, very reminiscent of another ‘analog modelling synthesiser’ I’ve got in the room.  All very paddy and some shockers, but not a lot of stable ‘keyboard player’ style patches, out of the box.. couldn’t find a good hammond or e-piano patch, at least not yet, but there are a lot of patches to go through. 

A few minutes with an INIT patch, and I was able to make the sounds I wanted.  The UI is pretty intuitive after a few minutes, and doesn’t get in the way, although you do have to pay attention to what’s selected.  I guess the modes-knowledge will grow easier with use.

There’s both 3.5mm and phono headphone jacks, FFS.  That’s smart.

OSC models and Mutators are a fascinating set of tools.  Just tweaking them around, I could feel there was a lot of territory to be explored with the engine.  

Arpeggiator is sweet, “RATCHET” mode, lol.  Bit disappointed its not rendered in the UI, though.

For sure, a multi-timbral expander would be a nice thing to have - 8 hydra’s in a box, a la TX816, would be amazing.

Anyway - it feels so classy that I would love to see proper keyboardists play it, so I’ll be sure to turn up some Sky Studio sessions as they happen in the near future..

j.
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