This is intended to be a somewhat provocative question, as I’ve got a theory that this kind of thing won’t happen as much anymore, because 1) we’re in a postmodern era of music taste because of streaming, and nothing’s entirely out of style, so all decent gear is useful to someone; and 2) the power of software and the miniaturization of analog circuits has made it easier to keep designs alive. So the value of things will be more in the arena of hardware quality, meaning that expensive things will stay relatively expensive on the used market, and cheap things will stay cheap. There may no longer be high quality gear that loses almost all its value because of changing tastes, then skyrockets in price later.
Anyway, if I’m wrong, what’s the stuff nobody wants right now that everybody will want later?
Almost everything that’s made now is just newer versions of stuff from the 70’s and 80’s and is being made in much higher volumes than stuff like 303s and 909s and whatever.
So the things most likely to meet your criteria are things that are fairly unique or have been made in fairly small volumes.
I think a lot of the Soma stuff will become fairly legendary and I see a time when Lyras are selling for quite a bit more than they are now, but also something like the microfreak, just because of how cheap and fairly original it is.
I can also definitely see a world where Timbre Wolves are selling for silly money.
there will always be a subset of low production highly sought out items amongst a certain subset of musicians and or collectors that will be under the microscope, in this case by cheap you probably are talking about some as of yet unpopular modular or small batch synth stuff off fringe sites like tindie or etsy that have not quite taken off yet, because let’s be real - anything that is popular and not produced en masse is already expensive.
And just to be clear, cheap (in my opinion) isn’t a word that I use to describe something just because it’s under $1000, it’s maybe a couple hundred dollars, so I can’t include oto or digitakt as much as I think the product is quite nice. Because we aren’t talking about value for price, we’re talking about cheap.
A lot of people describe the Microfreak as a future classic, but I suspect there are a LOT of them out there, so not sure they’ll be that rare.
I think the Digitakt could be a real future classic too.
OTO effects pedals feel like a safe bet.
Soma stuff seems like a good shout too, and I’d group it (perhaps strangely) with Ciat Lombarde - they’re esoteric and unique - there won’t be a lot of similar stuff to use as an alternative. Critter & Guitari also, just look at @brucegill and his pocket piano journey lol
Most of the things I think of though are eurorack stuff, Mutable Instruments stuff is already expensive and that’s only been unavailable for 5 minutes. WMD modules are what I’ve invested in recently There are lots of interesting, unique approaches to modules that haven’t been made in huge numbers.
Yea it’s an interesting one - people will always value the genuine article. You have to pay over £1500 to get a genuine Juno 106 and it’s gotta be one of the most aped synths in history.
I wonder if there’ll be a time where Behringer clones become sought after for their quirky pastiche It can be hard to predict these trends.
DX7s were the most produced synth of all time, but they aren’t cheap in 2023. Many probably went into landfills, Trent Reznor smashed a few. Every theater who wants to put on Phantom needs to have a DX7 on hand and maybe a backup for the score.
At $200, a Microfreak is a must-by for me. Just the sound alone is worth 200 currency units, and I doubt they will sell for less than $150 for long, so I should be able to get my money back at any time. It is likely that Microfreak prices will drop a bit when it is eventually discontinued, but prices will quickly (2-5 years) be in the $500-$1000 range.
People love physical objects. Publishers were scared to death when eBooks started to become a thing. What they didn’t realize and didn’t expect is that eBook buyers buy many physical books for each ebook they buy. I’ve got both variants of the TD-3 as well as a handful of synths that can do acid. Instead of being satisfied with what I have, I’m likely to pick up every acid machine that I can find. If I see a good deal, I’m jumping on it because I know that just as no two 303s are the same, every clone design sounds a little bit different.
You can probably take a Warren Buffet value investing approach to synths: read everything you can about vintage synths, and then buy everything that you encounter that seems cheap. Storage and transportation can be a problem - unless you live in the middle of nowhere, your vintage synth collection probably won’t cover its own warehousing costs. But you will have unique gear that doesn’t quite sound like anyone else.
Edit: I suspect that “value investing” is essentially what Hainbach is doing. He is a very competent artist, and is highly skilled at combining things into interesting art. At some point he must have realized that vintage test equipment was underappreciated by musicians. From this perspective, the correct way to emulate him would be to develop similar compositional skills (in the broadest sense, not necessarily the creation of musical scores) and then identify things that make noise but aren’t usually seen as musical instruments. You could be the Hainbach of truck backup sirens!
Part of the difficulty with this is that it is unpredictable things gaining a following. Look at low volume items that have unusual qualities. What would help a lot is if someone makes interesting music with that rarer item, and predicting that future is not really doable.
The same process is involved with predicting things like with stamps, or comic books, or other collectables.
But categories of items might include items like for instance the Landscape Noon, the Ellitone E64, the Sismo ICE, the Modern Sounds Pluto ( if they never make another ), i have whole lists of these sorts of products.
What others do that play this sort of market is since predicting the future is not possible, they hedge their bets, and buy a wide variety of items.
I’ve done a few short term ‘investments’ in synths - I think my most profitable synth purchase has been the Moog Sirin, I even bought a second one when I saw a good deal and almost immediately flipped it. If I’d waited an extra year I’d have made even more on them. The Plaits I bought for 20% off retail a month before they closed shop was the smartest buy I’ve made I wish I bought all the stock tbh but that would be a dick move I’ve been telling my close friends to invest in synths for years they never listen to me
Also video gear. Unlike music gear a lot of it is owned by folks that have it in their loft from 20 years ago and don’t have any interest in video art/synthesis and good deals can be had. I think I’ve made money on every video mixer I’ve bought/sold and that wasn’t intentional investment.
And, a cliche, as with art, collect what you like. That way you have both the utility of having fun with the instrument, and maaaaaaaaaaaybe a good investment. No one has fun playing with gold bars, or Tesla stock.
I say maybe, because some synths have held their value more than others, but very few have increased in value over when they were new. An mpc60 or a minimoog is a lot of money now, but you could almost buy bedsit at the time for what they cost new.
And, then there is the efficient market theory, which says that if you are certain something will increase in value, everyone is certain, and the future value is already part of the current value.
That was my argument in favor of buying the Syntrx - 10-20 years for now I’m sure they will be selling for more than $5k. Until then, I can easily get $3k of enjoyment out of mine, so it is a good buy even if prices don’t go stratospheric. At this point, I think it would have to be worth well over $10k for me to even contemplate selling, but what would I replace it with?
It needs to be something special sound-wise / have a certain sound that is maybe defining to a genre or style. This also means it was used by many recognisable artists. Old Roland classics, M1 (piano), DX7 (rhodes), MS-20 (filter), Moog (bass) etc. fall under this category. I can’t really think of any new gear that would be like that, these days it’s actually software that is genre-defining. Think Massive, but it was relatively soon replaced by Serum and now others, because in software world there is always something newer and “better” (besides, once NI will drop support Massive will be gone, and that’s just how it goes with software).
Then there is gear that is so rare and interesting at the same time, that someday becomes collector’s items. Soma stuff might be a candidate for this.
Microfreak might be interesting for it’s keyboard more than it’s sound capabilities.
I think that’s an additional thing the freak range has going for it in that regard - it’s a physical incantation of some well liked and used software - Mutable and Noise Engineering algos specifically. You can buy a freak for less than a single NE module
There are lots of interesting, unique approaches to modules that haven’t been made in huge numbers.
It can be hard to predict these trends.
