Industrial Music Electronics

Notes: Argos Bleak is a control voltage processor and oscillator driver with two inputs and four (count 'em, four) outputs. Its per-channel octave, detune, vibrato, and slew controls facilitate full performance control of four oscillators at once, with minimum patch cords required. It excels at bringing multiple oscillators from different manufacturers into full cooperation, with the flexibility to quickly switch between multiple performance setups. Processed control voltages are quantized to the scale of your choice, with the slew limiting able to be routed pre- or post-quantizer. A common vibrato control distributes the internal modulation signal to any of the outputs. A set of performance gate inputs allow instant modification of the fundamental channel settings (input selection/mixing, slew enable, quantizer track-and-hold), and a quantizer trigger output automatically fires when channel 1 quantizes a new note. Each channel may receive its data from either (or a sum or difference) of the CV inputs, so you may run two completely independent CV processing streams, or combine the input data and switch it around using the external gate input.

Each output may be offset (positive or negative) by up to 12 semitones. These semitone shifts occur pre-quantizer, effectively enabling chord construction from a single monophonic CV input. 2 banks of 16 chord presets may be stored, and instantly switched or sequenced by an external cv signal. A bonus CV mode rotates the output semitone shift data among all 4 outputs.

Argos Bleak satisfies many common performance situations that require a series of oscillators to respond to tuned control voltages. CV sequences are easily and precisely transposed. FM carrier/modulator ratios are quickly and effortlessly defined, and changed with the dedicated octave knobs and chord selection. Dedicate an output to managing oscillator sync frequency, apply vibrato, and your modular system is suddenly playing pinch harmonics. The calibration routine is simple, and your attached oscillators can be easily calibrated to each other by ear using the channel controls.

Notes: The Piston Honda Mark III is a dual morphing wavetable oscillator with waveshaping audio inputs and unison detune. The three sliders create a waveform for each oscillator to play from the internal "cube" of 16-bit waveforms (8 waveforms across each axis for a total of 512), morphed at full resolution in all three dimensions with full CV control of each dimension (positive and negative voltages accepted). Each of the oscillators may play a different morphed waveform, with selectable response to the slider controls and CV inputs. The voltage-controlled preset manager stores 8 presets to be recalled at any time, under manual or CV control. The preset manager has a morphing mode that smoothly fades from one preset to another, selectable for "just" the waveform settings, or all knobs on the panel. An orange 128x32 OLED display shows the current waveform for the selected oscillator in realtime, its frequency, and the current preset and wave selection. It also provides menu editing for less frequently used parameters with the nearby rotary encoder.

The infamous aggressive character of the Piston Honda is fully present. Both oscillators boast full user controls for frequency and modulation. The second oscillator's frequency controls can be slaved to the first (and an output mix is provided for the largest sounds possible with the fewest patch cords). Each oscillator also has its own slaved unison detune oscillator. Each oscillator can alternatively run as a nonlinear waveshaper, processing a dedicated audio input through the selected wavetable with voltage-controlled drive. When running in its normal oscillator mode, this audio input instead provides thru-zero frequency modulation. Waveforms are selected from the internal memory of 8 collections: additive harmonic structures, harsh LFSR progressions, and restored waveforms inspired by classic synthesizers. You can load user wave data (16-bit WAV format) using the front-panel microSD card slot, compatible with files created by the Synthesis Technology WaveEdit program.

Notes: A combination module of two essential building blocks from the classic Polivoks synthesizer: the envelope generator and a high-quality audio VCA. The envelope features the four traditional ADSR parameters, as well as additional controls for manual trigger, extended time range, envelope repeat, and a delay function for the attack and release phases. The VCA has several attenuated modulation inputs and a manual "drone" level control. The output of the envelope is normalled to the VCA control input, for compact and convenient integration into the end of a subtractive synthesizer patch with a minimum amount of patch cables required.

Note that the original Polivoks keyboard design includes two VCAs in series for independent control of the keyboard envelope and amplitude modulation. You would need two of these modules to completely recreate the functional specification of the original.

This device is part of the IRON CURTAIN ELECTRONICS system and is created in collaboration with Vladimir Kuzmin, the designer of the original POLIVOKS synthesizer. The module uses original USSR integrated circuits in the differential amplifier section of the VCA circuit to preserve the character of the Polivoks design.