Moog Subharmonicon

I hadn’t used it for while, and was actually thinking of swapping it out for a Mother 32. But I’ve ended up using it in a track I’m working on currently and it still surprises me, and the tones it makes can be gorgeous. For me, it’s probably a bit of a luxury synth – it’s super fun to noodle with but doesn’t end up being used a whole lot in stuff I’m actually working on. Also, there are some things that I find a bit frustrating such as not having acceess to the envelope controls and osc mixer levels from the patch panel (although to be fair I guess they had to make choices as to what was included there oherwise the panel would be massive). I’m keeping it for now.

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After having owned one for about seven months I totally love the sound. And I don’t always even do any patching. What I’ve been starting to find limiting is the four-step sequencer. If there was a way to overcome that obstacle the possibilities of this synth would be limitless.

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Yes, I still like the subharmonicon - it is a great instrument!

In this recording 4 different Rhythms of the subharmonicon are controlling the two 4-step-sequencers and all oscillators are active.

The subharmonicon runs through the OT : I set up 5 tracks for live sampling with different record&play- trigs, parameters and effects on each track.

Finally there is some effect added in ableton with valhalla supermassive.

I love this setup of OT and SH!

It is like orderly chaos - as if music would be the mathematics of the soul. :loopy:

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You could use MIDI to sequence it externally or delve into euro rack and do the same. There are a lot of ways to both compliment and overcome those 4 steps.

I do not own an MPC One but, have you considered clocking the SubH using one of the available CV outputs? You would likely get rock solid timing that way.

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One can’t control the two VCOs separately with midi though, right? But yeah, maybe it’s time to get one of those midi to cv converters or a small dedicated cv sequencer. I had a eurorack system for a short time but I sold everything before I got the SubH. Not going there again (at least in a big way.) Like I said above, the SubH is a seriously capable instrument as is and overcoming the 4-step sequence limitation would significantly expand the possibilities.

Correct. The VCOs cannot be controlled seperately over MIDI. However, with a MIDI to CV converter, like the very powerful [Expert Sleepers FH-2 ](Expert Sleepers - FH-2 'factotum', you can control the pitch of each oscillator independently as well as the sequencer clocks. I just picked one up with the CV expander for use with my Octatrack. It will allow me to use the MIDI LFOs with my eurorack setup which is built around the Moog Dark Trinity; SubH, M32, and DFAM. <3

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Subharmonicon sequencer is unique, I wouldn’t replace it with another MIDI controlled one, but that is a great idea for sure. Don’t forget about MIDI breakout module for FH-2, because OT doesn’t send MIDI data over usb like other Elektron boxes does. Alternatively, you can purchase iConnectivity MIO or similar cable based solution

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This is my point basically. That’s the most fun part of the SubH. Having said that, I have used it for chords (or intervals) quite a bit as well with both OSCs sharing the same rhythm. However, since getting the Matriarch (which I can crosspatch with the SubH as well), I’ve used the SubH more for arp-like ’polyrhythmic’ stuff again.

The Expert Sleepers FH-2 sounds great. Although I do have to say I really dislike all kinds of dongles…

I’m using a Roland UM-ONE MIDI to USB adapter from the OT into the FH-2 :smiley:

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This was great! Thank you for sharing!

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This is great! Are you on Bandcamp or other streaming services?

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Yeah, clock timing is fine on the SubH as you’d expect. I haven’t used that with the MPC yet because there isn’t a simple clock output - I expect I’d have to set up a sequence of gates. But that itself could be interesting as I could then send irregular or shifting rhythms, or reset triggers running at a different pattern length. So thanks for the reminder of this option!

There’s a bit of a Barker-ish vibe going on here :slight_smile:

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I think you could send a 4PPQN stream of gates as clock. You would likely need to noodle with the gate length to get it right.

One thing I’ve enjoyed doing is sending gates of varying lengths to the Play/Stop patch point. It’s like sending clock bursts to the SubH and you can get some really interesting results. Coupled with resets, it adds another layer of complexity to the sequencers.

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Yep - this is something I haven’t really explored much with the MPC for various reasons (location, the fact they’re stereo CV/gate outputs, no native clock function etc.) - it’s just easier to use something like the DFAM or a bit of modular gear, all of which are more flexible than the MPC in terms of what they can do. But ideally I just want a little setup where I can sync the SubH to the MPC and record it in sync, so I think experimenting with a gate sequence is going to be the key there. I might lob a support ticket into Akai suggesting an easy clock option in the UI, just on the offchance.

Bolting the Analog Four into the setup fixes and extends things enormously - the MIDI sync works, for a start, and of course you can also start throwing conditional trigs, LFOs and so on into the mix. So in practical terms I have a good solution, but I’d still like to understand why the fairly simple MPC > Moog connection has this problem…

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@MichaalHell @aloud @spikysimon
Thank you for listening, I really appreciate that!

I have a bandcamp account, but did not upload anything so far, - I`ve got to work on that.

Thanks for the hint, didn`t know Barker, listening to „utility“ right now and I like it. :happy:

What are your favorite effect pedals for SubH?
I only have a NTS-1 and like the tape delay a lot but thinking about buying a analog pedal soon…

A delay and a reverb are always nice. I’ve got the Oto Bim and Bam for that. Then again, I’ve made a lot of music with just the SubH and the Octatrack’s fx, for example. I’m not a huge fan of complex delays or reverbs anyway.

I’m using the Meris Polymoon on it. It allows you to go from delay to reverb nicely