Polyend’s latest instrument focuses on the interaction between synth sounds and hands-on control. Greg Scarth finds out more.
Over the last few years, Polyend have carved out a popular niche for themselves. Broadly speaking, the Polish brand specialises in grooveboxes, instruments with built-in sequencers that let you create patterns and tracks all in one unit. The new Polyend Synth is a bit different: an instrument which focusses exclusively on synth sounds, no samples or drums. It’s also very much focussed on real-time live performance and hands-on control rather than sequencing.
The Synth is certainly recognisable as a Polyend instrument, with a similar overall appearance and design to the Tracker and Play grooveboxes. Polyend’s build quality is always impressive, and the Synth feels suitably high class, with a lovely smooth feel to the controls, bright and clear screen, plus solid response to all the buttons.
There are elements derived from other Polyend instruments here, particularly in terms of synth engines borrowed from the Play+ and Tracker+, but the Synth feels quite different thanks to the sheer expanse of front panel real estate which is dedicated to hands-on control. The 12×5 grid of touch-sensitive pads is the main focus in terms of playing the Synth, which is a three-part, eight-voice instrument.
There are two key aspects of the Synth which work together in harmony: the synth engine itself, and the control interface. In terms of synthesis, the versatility on offer here is immediately impressive when you start dialling through the eight engines, offering everything from authentic virtual analogue with VAP, ACD and FAT to physical modelling and phase distortion options. Your choice of synth sounds can be allocated to a Scene, which is effectively a preset containing three different synth settings, mixer settings and effects, macros and grid mappings (i.e. which sections of the grid control which synth). All of this ties in with the Synth’s Smart Grid and macro features, for single-button chords and note followers with intuitive visual feedback.
A pleasantly curious feature of the Synth is that it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what the main focus is. You could start with an individual synth preset and then work your way out from there, adding other sounds to make a Scene and then setting up the grid to give you full control over everything. Alternatively, you could start by programming a sound from scratch. You could start from the performance aspect. Or you could start with a preset Scene from the excellent built-in collection, then tweak it to become something custom and personal… You probably understand the versatility.
The Synth is intuitive enough that you can just switch it on and start to play without any prior experience, but the excellent documentation is well worth exploring in order to get the most out of it and approach it from a direction which makes the most sense for your own creative process, whether that be bashing out demo ideas, performing solo or playing with other musicians.
At £422, the Synth feels like good value. Not only are you getting an excellent synth engine here, but the integration with the control system has been carefully thought out to offer something quite unique. Nothing else really offers such a straightforward, intuitive and effective approach to multi-part synth performance. Perhaps the biggest rival to the Synth actually comes from Polyend’s own Play+, which comes from a similar ethos but focuses on sequencing and programming rather than hands-on control. Whichever approach you prefer, Polyend continue to offer interesting creative instruments at very reasonable price points.
Greg Scarth
https://www.juno.co.uk/products/polyend-synth-multi-engine-polyphonic-synthesiser/1053893-01/