Pigtronix Mothership 2 Analog Synthesizer

[TrevorG]

Anyone tried/have one? Very interested if I can get one for a good price.

[Al Krow]

@GisserD and me came pretty close to getting one, but both of us got bored waiting as delivery kept being pushed back. A couple of 'just ok' reviews on Talkbass which has put me off taking it forward, and Gisser has a new favourite fruit pedal on his board...

So I suspect you may be the very FIRST person in the UK to get one! If you do, then do let us know how you get on!

 

[TrevorG]

Oddly someone on Talkbass has one in Cambridgeshire and is open to a sale or a swap as he's not using it much. Surprised. Sounds great on the demos but owners are not over excited. I'm not keen on alternatives.

[Al Krow]

Are there some decent demo's up now? Was very limited pre Christmas. If he's offering it at a good price it may be worth a punt, particularly if you're not keen on the alternatives. 

Which other synth pedals have you considered and what is it about them that put you off? 

[OzMike]

No matter what, all-analog synth pedals will have issues with tracking accuracy and pitch-detection latency. Guitar-based demos are very misleading from this point of view, as the pitch detection latency is proportionally less the higher the pitch of the source material. For consistent latency that is pitch-independent IMO it's better to stick with the excellent synth sounds to be found in modern digital pedals or to use outboard (iPad / PC) based processing. You won't find much or any improvement after the release of the Cockerell-designed EH Microsynth in the late 70s in these areas, or at least with the pedals I've tried (admittedly not the one under discussion but the latency is clear to see/hear on the bass demos of this pedal).

[Al Krow]

11 minutes ago, OzMike said:

No matter what, all-analog synth pedals will have issues with tracking accuracy and pitch-detection latency. Guitar-based demos are very misleading from this point of view, as the pitch detection latency is proportionally less the higher the pitch of the source material. For consistent latency that is pitch-independent IMO it's better to stick with the excellent synth sounds to be found in modern digital pedals or to use outboard (iPad / PC) based processing. You won't find much or any improvement after the release of the Cockerell-designed EH Microsynth in the late 70s in these areas, or at least with the pedals I've tried (admittedly not the one under discussion but the latency is clear to see/hear on the bass demos of this pedal).

That's really interesting. My understanding has been that analogue pedals had less latency than digital ones although they typically couldn't track quite as low as digital ones (which is certainly true with octavers).

Is the position different for synth pedals?

[OzMike]

It depends on what you mean by 'tracking'. Do you want to:
a) generate a control voltage in proportion to the perceived pitched of the input signal?
OR
b) do a simple division (eg octave down) or multiplication (octave up) of the input signal?

I did mix up these two in my previous comment, apologies. My understanding with the Pigtronix pedal is that they are doing a), and to the best of my knowledge this hasn't advanced beyond the level of the Korg MS20 (for one example); the technology here is a couple of decades old as the limits of what you can do with analog processing had been reached already back then. I'd be pleased to be corrected if I'm wrong, however anyone coming up with an all-analog pedal that does a) will do no better than what has been done previously in terms of tracking accuracy and latency.

With something like the EH Microsynth, it has various stages that filter the input signal, and then what I guess I'd call 'mathematical' circuits that detect the pitch of the input signal and then divide it for the octave down or multiply it for the octave up; this happens in essentially real time, so the latency is as close to zero as you can get. So, yes, what you wrote is correct. The big 'but' here is also what you wrote, i.e. the tracking is not perfect and can track the octave (or other!) harmonic of lower notes instead of the note itself.

With digital pedals, they are simply applying DSP to the input signal so there's not really 'tracking' involved, hence why pedals like the POG-series can deal with more than one note at a time and track more accurately ('perfectly') than (say) the MXR Octave pedal (and many other similar designs).

An interesting design is the Future Impact pedal, which based on a reading of the manual has both a 'mathematical tracking' section (with very low latency) and also DSP-based pitch-to-frequency section (with higher latency).

[Al Krow]

A fair bit of love for the FI on this forum. Guess I'm kinda hoping they are going to release a version 2 at some point...

There's also a difference between subtractive synthesis and frequency modulation synthesis which the Iron Ether FMeron does. Maybe worth having a think about that also as a possible alternative to the PM2? The PM2 did seem attractive, precisely because it is analogue but if, as you say, it's 20 year tech then forget it - that's being crossed off my list as we speak!

As mentioned above a couple of folk are quite positive about the Bananana Matryoshka although there have been some comments from others that some of its best sounds are in the 'bit crush' realm.

 

Edited March 24, 2018 by Al Krow

[TrevorG]

3 hours ago, Al Krow said:

Are there some decent demo's up now? Was very limited pre Christmas. If he's offering it at a good price it may be worth a punt, particularly if you're not keen on the alternatives. 

Which other synth pedals have you considered and what is it about them that put you off? 

Tough question to answer as these preferences are usually very subjective. I hear a richness and a density in the Pigtronix pedal that matches the sound I'm always trying to achieve.  The envelopes also sound more musical to me. The others are like different shades of the same colour but not a shade I prefer.