Am still in the "getting to know you" phase with the Perkons so am here combining a simple pattern with a couple of kit changes and a lot of track muting.
But the vital part is the WMD Geiger Counter pedal. I was very fortunate to find one of these brand new to buy (in Germany). I paid more than the old list price but everyone raves about how good this pedal sounds. And it is certainly a good fit for the Perkons. It's also helping with my color issues :) I don't touch any of the Geiger Counter's controls so this not a showcase for the pedal, but will get to that soonish. Or very soonish if there's any interest in a deep dive...
Here channel one of the Perkons is on its own output to the DAW and is otherwise completely uneffected.
The other three channels are all going through the Geiger Counter then into the Boss EQ.
No other effects or processing in the DAW this time except of course for the added samples - a two and half minute drum solo would have been too much even for me. You'll also see a few video edits where I've chopped this down from the 11-minute original.
Finally, the pattern actually starts on beat 13, which reminds me of the bad old days with the DB-01 before it got its "pattern rotate" feature and you could change the start point. Well, live and learn guv'nor.

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If you don't know the movie "This is Spinal Tap" this video isn't going to make much sense, so here's a quick explainer. Spinal Tap is a 1984 fictional documentary about the rock band Spinal Tap. Among their many problems is the cover of their new album "Smell the Glove". The band wanted a greased woman on all fours smelling a glove - shops and the record company say no.
So the video intro is a few seconds from the movie and images are my AI-generated prompts attempting to create a 'Smell the Glove" album cover.
As for the audio: The DB-01 is going into the Oceans-11 reverb (which is usually off) then in The Glove, then to the Nemesis delay. There's a tiny bit of EQ in the DAW.
Drums are from the Perkons going into the Death By Audio Rooms reverb. That then gets another layer from the Fabfilter Saturn plugin in the DAW. So hardly a clean or produced drum sound but meh, this was meant to be a simple demo of the Glove pedal, but that got "out of hand" hahahahahaha.

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What a stupid title. It's a combination of the Chug pedal used on the synths (DB-01 then the Behringer Cat) as well as the Perkons doing drums. The title coulkd have been more useful but then I'm beginning to suspect my dry and useful titles make absolutely no difference to anyone or any metric.
This piece started as a dull test of whether a DI box made any difference to the performance of the Chug pedal. It did - it made it worse. Then I just started noodling with the pedal to see whether I could coax some different sounds out of it. Couldn't do that either. It sounds good but it only has one way it grates the audio.
So then I thought I'd better add some drums so the Perkons got it's first run. It's so huge I have to work out a way to get multiple items in frame without everything looking tiny.
Against my usual policy I added some effects on the Perkons (but not on the synths) in the DAW. The Perkons got a little EQ to take out some of the massive bottom end, a little Fabfilter Saturn to dirty it up and a touch of Pro-R reverb. I wasn't using individual outs so it just got slathered over everything. A few gratuitous samples to finish.
0:00 DB-01 and Perkons
2:15 Cat and Perkons

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0:00 Intro blather
0:52 Blood and dragons
2:00 Pedal talk
2:10 Music begins (talk ends)
4:50 Knob twiddles
6:54 On duophonic synth
9:08 Final thoughts (talk starts)

I like pedals that mess up synths and give them an edge. Sadly a lot of distortion, drive and fuzz pedals simply don't work well with synths. At least half the pedals of this sort I buy are almost useless on synth and never make it as far as a video. Instead they go straight into the "buyer's remorse" bag to be resold. There seems no way to tell ahead of time which will work and which will just sit there with the knobs having almost no effect. So it's an anxious lucky dip.
The Chug pedal by Solar Guitars is a reasonable success on synth, tried here with the DB-01 Bassline and the Behringer Cat. Some of the gain controls do almost nothing but overall you can sculpt a pretty nasty sound and, depending on the synth, do some extra shaping with the gate control. Strangely the gate was vital to reduce noise on the DB01 but wasn't even needed on the Cat.
I bought this pedal with my own money at full price. I haven't communicated with Solar Guitars other than as a regular customer. The links here are for your interest only:
More details on the Chug pedal:
https://www.solar-guitars.com/product/chug/
Ola Englund's "Will it Chug" series:
https://youtu.be/4D4iYZi4RI8

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The microSD card is the heart of the LXR-02 drum machine. Here I update the firmware, load all the default factory content and add the extra Hrtl project with kits and demo patterns from the Erica Synths website.
If you've bought a used LXR-02 and want to "factory reset", or just want to update the firmware, or start with a fresh "blank canvas" then this is for you.
In the process we look at the contents of all six factory projects as well as the free Hrtl project. At the end I quickly play through the 16 Hrtl kits and demo patterns.

0:00 intro
0:15 Checking the firmware
0:35 Remove the card
0:52 Get the new files
1:30 Card contents
2:20 Load new files
4:00 Factory content
5:20 Load Hrtl project
6:35 Insert SD card
7:05 Firmware updater
8:00 Test
8:20 Hrtl kits (no more talk)

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Saw is everyone's friend, square is famous, so where does that leave triangle? The quiet one of three three, but beautifully formed and hides many talents. This is sort of a jam video, a tribute to the triangle but also a way to demonstrate a few different techniques to use when playing live.
First, the triangle is the only primary waveform used here to generate all the sounds. That varies from the cute little plinky sounds of a pure high triangle to the almost brassy sound when the sub-oscillator is layered in.
The pattern consists of just three notes spanning three octaves so it's incredibly basic. But the contrast between the low hits and high plinky-plonks going through the Nemesis delay rhythmic setting creates the illusion of a much richer - even layered - pattern with drums. But of course it's all just one layer on the monophonic DB-01.
I'm playing the DB-01 arpeggiator over the top of the pattern and this causes the pattern notes to sometimes be "overwritten" and drop out which appears like a pattern variation. Then by varying the length of the arpeggiator gate you can get apparent note length differences between the pattern and the arp. The LFO synced to a 6-beat loop on a saw shape adds to the variations.
As usual there are no other effects used or DAW processing. But I did do some chopping up of the piece to trim it back from its magnificent 18-minute original :)
Images are all original creations on the theme of triangles using the Stable Diffusion AI platform.

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Yes, it's my first Cat video, the Behringer Cat, which recently plunged in price by almost 50 per cent. It cost me substantially less than the Nemesis delay which it's paired with here. It's a bargain and since there was zero chance of me ever buying (and hoping to maintain) a 50-year-old original Cat it seemed a fair deal. Strangely enough I'd been looking at this synth for a month or so specifically because of two features: It's paraphonic with separate VCO 1 & 2 CV inputs; and it has beautifully raw cross-modulation. (More with the CV inputs in a later video)
This is also my first unboxing video (a challenge accepted from Berin) but I couldn't bring myself to utter lines like "here is the power supply, oh and a lovely sticker" so there's some Cat sounds over the top. There's a lot of dischordant sounds in this demo but that's what I bought it for. Of course it can do all the usual things too.
The Nemesis delay is slopped over the top of everything for which I offer no apology since it sounds so much better that way, covers up sloppy playing, and makes filter twiddlings interesting. But if anyone really wants 100% raw stuff let me know. As usual there is no post-production audio trickery, the path is Cat to Nemesis to you. And for any Cat veterans out there I'm sure various settings were either redundant or bypassed (I couldn't work out the second envelope), but it's early days so live and learn. It was fun not needing to even look in a manual though, it's there in front of you. One thing that did strike me was how powerful the resonance is. I've been spoiled by the no-risk DB-01 Polivoks resonance which happily goes to 100 per cent anytime. Not here!
Visuals are AI-generated images made using Stable Diffusion. Being the creative type I came up with my very own set of AI word prompts, which I think makes me "lead visual artist, SFX supervisor and CGI chief designer".

0:00 Unboxing with bloops
1:02 Paraphonic grind
1:36 Filter sweeps
2:32 Awful twiddlings
4:04 Sick mid
4:23 Twiddlings two
4:55 Not Arabic

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This piece began as a demo for the Boss SL-2 slicer pedal. After noodling with it I thought it'd be interesting to slice up a distorted sound, so added the trusty Darkglass B3K which just loves chewing the the DB-01's Polivoks filter.
Turns out that the SL-2 is a lot more subtle than just the obvious rhythmic patterns. Here's there's three intertwining elements: The actual programmed pattern of notes on the DB-01; the DB-01's synced LFO with a sawtooth wave giving a separate filter envelope hit every 8 beats; and then the SL-2 which superimposes its own pattern on top. The mix of the DB-01 pattern and SL-2 pattern is set on the pedal, and the relative strength of the LFO filter hit depends on how much you open the filter. So with three synced patterns clocked together there is much fun to be had. Which is why I didn't make it past preset one in bank A.
I was going to layer this up with some other sounds but thought it was more useful to show the degree of complexity that you can get from a mono synth and a couple of pedals looping through one 32-step pattern.
This is all one take with no DAW effects or processing (other than the added movie quotes of course), but I did chop out a few sections to trim it down from its original 7-minute version.
As soon as I can make it past the first few presets I'll do a real walkthrough of the SL-2 - it's an incredibly deep machine. Like so many pedals and synths the satisfaction and beauty comes from subtle tweakerings. The main change I made was to switch it into 'ping-pong' mode which is perhaps a bit too strong if you listen through headphones - well, live and learn. My only immediate advice with the SL-2 is that, unless it's the master, it's absolutely vital for it to run off a common MIDI clock. You also must be able to send a MIDI clock restart.
The short intro video and title of the piece "You Love That Machine?" is one of the quotes about halfway through. They're taken from the low-budget classic "Creation of the Humanoids" - one of my all-time favorite movies.
The robot-human images are all originals generated by me using AI. All 79 images (plus a few extras) are on my Patreon page for download and you're free to use them for any purpose.

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Who doesn't like a bit of guitar feedback squeal? A great sound which has no easy synth equivalent. Yet maybe here we come close. An Erica Synths DB-01 goes to an EHX Oceans 11 reverb which gives the required feedback starter sound, which is then torn up and given bite by a Fairfield Circuitry Roger That, and at the end for a different flavor, a Dark Glass B3K. With some careful twiddlings the ear-splitting awfulness is quite playable and ready for friends, family to enjoy.

0:00 Guitar examples
0:40 Synthy things
2:05 Reverb starter
2:48 Feedback squeal
4:20 Ear killing highs
4:50 Darker & dirtier
7:20 B3K playable filth

Guitar clips at the start are from the Dead Kennedys and The Partisans.

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0:00 A few demo sounds
2:27 Overview - power, tails, bypass etc
5:38 The value of 100% wet
6:34 The controls
8:10 Factory reset
8:55 Programming fundamentals
14:10 Hall
17:03 Spring
19:45 Plate
22:50 Reverse
26:09 Echo
30:35 Tremolo
34:54 Mod - Chorus
36:58 Mod - Flerb
37:36 Mod - Chorus & Flerb
38:56 Dyn - Swell
40:24 Dyn - Gate
43:30 Dyn - Ducking
45:15 Auto Infinite
48:15 Shimmer
51:23 Poly

The EHX Oceans 11 reverb is a much deeper, weirder and more interesting effects unit than you might expect. It's called a reverb pedal but can happily function as a multi-effects unit with excellent delay and tremolo and passable chorus and flanger. And various reverbs of course. Here I go through all the settings and options in detail and only repeat myself once or twice.
The pedal does has a reputation for complexity, but spend a mere hour here and you'll be completely at ease with all its functions and be suitably rewarded with a huge range of flavors. Don't judge it on a 30-second demo of hall and spring, that is a mere spec of its powers.
Despite the length of this video there are two little things I left out. Double-click the footswitch when in spring reverb mode to simulate "kicking the box" and hearing a little "doiing". And somewhat similarity, if you press and hold the footswitch (in most modes) the reverb will infinitely sustain.
Also be assured that when I say in the video about the green, red and orange LED colors that's what they actually are in reality. Unfortunately in the video they're almost completely washed out - my lighting skills and the idea that "I'd fix it in post" were both inadequate.
As usual this is not a sponsored video. I bought the Oceans 11 with my own money at full price.

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For days I've been trying to make an "Oceans 11 - Complete Walkthrough" video, but I keep getting distracted by the sounds. So I gave in and made this first. Originally I was going to just take a few seconds of this but I like drony dirty choiry things and thought you might enjoy it too, especially as it was so simple. The danger with a giant multi-tier stand of vintage polysynths is that you might feel obliged to use several of them at once. Less is more. At about the halfway point (as mentioned in the video) I add in some FabFilter Pro-R "Cathedral" reverb at 50% mix. But there's no other DAW fiddlings.
Since I blab endlessly in the video I won't repeat all the info here but merely add that the FM knob on the DB-01 is very useful but could perhaps be great. Imagine if it could be somehow locked to the chosen scale? Now that would lead to all sorts of good things.

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Not depressed enough about everything yet? Maybe this can help! Here's the DB-01 synth in a single take with a little help from some pedals. No other music or processing. Sampled voices are from the brilliant 1984 UK movie "Threads" a harrowing, grim and completely believable movie about the lead up and aftermath of a global nuclear exchange. There's no happy ending.
(And yes, for anyone who saw my last video this is exactly the same setup - I was noodling afterwards and this just fell out).

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It's the one trick grammy award winning dentists don't want you to know - yet nine out of 10 cats agree!
Seriously though there are functions on some machines that you just never get to unless you go digging. I'm a big fan of the DB-01 arp, especially jamming over the top of existing sequences. And recently I made a huge discovery. Well, actually, a tiny and insignificant realization, but it was that in the DB-01 arp section "PIA" stands for "piano" and "STP" stands for "step". For two years I was guessing at that acronym. A cosmic ray must have nudged a defective neuron aside. Yeah, obvious to you but not me. It turns out that "step" is a fantastic auto-slicing jamming function.
In the comments a while back someone said they enjoyed my "crusty" take on things. That means "a little bit grumpy". I like that. I am a little bit grumpy - about a lot of things. One thing I don't like is demos with too many machines. What tends to happen is that one (or more) machines get latched onto some never-ending-16-step-loopy-thing. Or maybe more than one. I don't like that (but of course I've done it lots of times). They've got too many machines and feel obliged to use them. I get irritated these days when just one machine is endlessly repeating a 16-step pattern. Did any of the great composers just mindlessly copy bar after bar after bar of the same sludge just to fill out supporting instruments? Of course not. (Although I do like Phillip Glass)
OTOH modern machines usually present you with a 16-step grid. So what can you do?
Which brings us back to STP "step" mode on the DB-01 arp. A single, boring, 16-step pattern can be sliced up on the fly and made into endless variations. Possibly the best use of this is recording it as audio and slicing it up in the DAW. Or perhaps live performance. Whatever you do it's a good way to make 16-steps a lot more interesting.
The quick version of this is to take an empty pattern, go into the randomizer and "randomize all" (the button on the far right). Now you have an unplayable mess. But with the "step" arp (latched) you can probably pick out selected parts and make something coherent. In any case it's entertaining. What do you think?

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Strymon's El Capistan tape delay version 2 pedal has configuration options that need to be adjusted if you're using line level instruments or MIDI. There are also secondary sound tweaking controls that can make a huge difference to the sound. Happily everything is either set-and-forget or very straightforward.
This is part one of a two-part tutorial. Part 2 will explore the looper and more advanced MIDI functionality.

0:00 Intro
1:00 Time controls
2:37 Front panel overview
3:32 Config overview
4:35 Input type
5:34 Spillover
6:30 Bypass mode
7:30 Activate MIDI
9:38 Set MIDI channel
10:54 MIDI Clock
12:35 Trails test
13:06 Clock sync changes
14:55 Wow & Flutter, Tape Age
17:44 Secondary functions
18:38 Tape Crinkle
19:37 Low End Contour
20:55 Tape Bias
22:18 Boost & Cut
22:44 Secondary defaults
25:06 Audio outro

This pedal was bought by me at full price.

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Add Violence is a fuzz pedal but I prefer the sub-heading from JPTR-FX "Planetary Disorder Unit". With just three knobs and a switch they've managed to create a very tweak-worthy machine. At first I put an EQ in front of it but soon took it away - the pedal does a better job by itself. An EQ after might be better but I haven't got that far yet. I've only been using this for a day and was so impressed by the sound I thought I'd better record it before any of the magic evaporated.
I bought this as a pre-order a few months back and am sorry to say I'm the kind of guy who constantly messages "Are we there yet?" Sorry JPTR-FX, my excuse is I'm keen. In truth I wasn't expecting too much. I've tried a lot of overdrive, distortion and fuzz pedals and at least half of them are woeful on synth. I don't know what it is but some of them do almost nothing except add an annoying insect-like buzz. So I was overjoyed at Add Violence - it loves synths and drum machine. Even better, it's silent. My dearly beloved Dark Glass B3K overdrive fizzes and hisses like crazy, but the Add Violence is silent. And when jamming I was torn between constantly turning up the volume and being worried I was going to vibrate the cones to destruction - this thing can really amplify the low harmonics.
There's still more to explore with this pedal since you can open it open and turn it into an octave fuzz. Until then I hope you enjoy this sample of its powers. I was going to blab and blather on this video but the sound seemed to warn me off - the dirt and filth must remain pure. Instead I added a few sampled quotes just to add a little color. Other than them the sound is as you see it: raw from the DB-01 into the Add Violence and a little delay every now and then from the Boss DM-2W. With the LXR-02 I took one channel from the stereo out into the pedal, the other straight into the DAW, then centred both, so the original dry sound is still there. The on-screen waveform is from the effected channel only.
If you like this format - no talk with a few little sample enhancements - please let me know so I can do more, especially since you're one of the good and true people who've read the full description :)

0:00 Drums 1
2:32 Doom keys
3:46 Drum 2
4:49 Arp
5:18 Pattern 1
5:47 Arp 2
6:31 Doom keys 2
7:22 Drum variations
8:25 Pattern 2

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How "sweet" can the DB-01 sound? Can they gently float through the fairy grotto sprinkling magic pixie dust? Well it's certain they didn't want to, and they fought against the visit the whole time, and wouldn't play with the fairies at all unless they had help from some heavy effects. In the end they were probably rightly regarded as a couple of intruding goblins, but they behaved themselves and might yet get another invitation.
Here we have three short little sketches. Each DB-01 gets the effect next to to it: The Strymon Timeline on the left and either the Strymon El Capistan V2 or the DBA Rooms reverb on the right. Absolutely no other effects or processing are used. The Keystep-37 is central to the setup and you'll notice the different key modes on the DB-01 in each piece, either "key" which means the Keystep is playing the unit directly, or "arp" which means the Keystep is triggering the DB-01's own arpegiator. This gets most interesting where the Keystep is in strum mode and each strum note is in turn activating a restart on the arpegiator.
The MIDI chain is simply out of the keystep into the left DB-01 then MIDI Through to the right DB-01. All three units (and the Timeline) are receiving their own feed of an external MIDI clock (the ERM MIDI Clock).

0:00 Silky's Theme
1:41 Midnight
2:56 Dame Slap

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Not many pedals are designed to be played. Usually you just dial in a sound and then play or tweak something else. The Fairfield Circuitry 'Roger That' wants to be tweaked. Its controls can be very sensitive for something so brutal. Here I don't try to give a "showcase" of sound but more a feeling of what it's like to tweak the pedal. Sometimes tiny movements give drastic changes, other times you sweep a knob and nothing much happens. I was initially very excited for the CV input but it often seemed to have little effect. OTOH an external LFO (or perhaps Schlappi Engineering's similarly conceived Interstellar Radio) would probably be a much better CV source.
There's no nice stuff here, it's all grinding tones and noise and it gets worse (better?) as it goes along until it ends with a Throbbing Gristle style tribute. But I like the Roger That. It's hardcore distortion generated in a new way and without the high noisefloor which usually comes with traditional distortion. Good raw material for sampling and looping.
Roger That was bought by me with my own money at full price. Fairfield did include a handwritten postcard though so that was nice.
And by the way, you know the (British) slang meaning of "Roger That" don't you? :D

0:00 Mild tweaking
2:15 With CV
3:10 Slow sequence
3:56 FM drone
5:45 Robot gas
7:51 Slow sequence 2
9:16 Random honking
11:20 Gristle time

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DB-01s in slightly more exotic flavors. The setup is two DB-01s, one left, one right, going into the Strymon DIG delay in ping pong mode and/or into the DBA Rooms reverb. The on-screen display shows the separate channels. In the first "Patterns" section there's two 64-step patterns and I let it run as I tweak the knobs.
The second part is "Keys" and started out as me just mucking about after I thought I'd finished the video. But I stumbled on the old riff to the title track from my 2007 album "Worlds Beyond Number". Yes, I used to play such sweet and gentle stuff :( I thought it was interesting to show the DB-01 in a more thoughtful mood with the slow attack happening via the LFO.
The third section "Drone" was inspired by the recent dronescape videos. With effects the DB-01 really excels at live dronescape performance. I think there's a lot of territory in there to explore.
If there's a point to this video I think it's to explore your machines. I've always thought that every synth has its obvious sound, the one that's easy to find, places that the knobs are willing you to go. Some machines don't have much beyond that, others can surprise.

0:00 Pattern flavor 1
0:27 Flavor 2
0:52 Flavor 3
1:17 Flavor 4
1:30 Flavor 5
1:52 No flavoring
2:13 Keys theme
3:53 Dronescape

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Who likes grinding, grating, howling, scraping, buzzing, screaming, inharmonious detuned filth? I'll tell you: The harder, cooler more experimental edge of the synth world - and that's you :D So here they are from the PWM Malevolent and all completely raw. No pesky effects to mask the horror and wash away imperfections. Why experience 'pleasant, lush or smooth' when you can have 'random, resonant and cross-modulated' ?
Experience the vicarious fun of ugly, dirty noodling on one of the world's most ugly synths! Yes, the Malevolent is ugly, and not even catwalk-weird-ugly, just plain ugly. From its bug-guts-green color scheme, messy layout and annoyingly small filter, resonance and drive knobs, ugly. But ugly is as ugly makes, so see how easily the controls can tip from one sound into something completely different. Then add some careless CV patching in utter disregard of pitch.
And as fun as it is to tweak it'd be a brave (or spiteful) soul who'd play this live without a beefy limiter or some other device to catch the inevitable volume peaks, piercing resonances and unexpected low-end swells. It is not a tame lion. In the video I tried to keep the volume under control and have made only minor overall volume adjustments to individual sound clips in the DAW. But there are absolutely no effects, EQ or post-processing.
I might replace all the knobs - but the layout will still be awful :/ But what about that sound?!

0:00 Formant insect
0:48 Box of dirt
1:18 Zappy McZap
1:40 Space Cow
3:00 Tuned toad
3:27 Allsorts
4:39 Wobbler
5:08 My ears!
5:36 Android vomit
6:10 Tuna
6:33 Drummer Boy
7:20 Noise plonks
7:50 Paint scraper
8:54 FM digestion
9:50 Noise flavors
10:37 Bulldozer
11:12 Dying modem
11:50 Annoying clanks
12:37 Bag of cats
13:27 Oof
13:55 Let's get seasick

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A much longer exploration of dronescapes on the DB-01. I find these long distorted dronescapes strangely therapeutic and relaxing. As I mention in the video it reminds me of the Lyra-8. That device I found more to be personal therapy than musical instrument, but is a fantastic way to relax and drift away.
Part 2 takes a different starting point: Multiple steps in a key to create smooshed chords. I could have explored this a bit more, but the idea is to restrict the playback key range, then to randomize the pitch, and get different chords. For more variety you could then transpose the entire thing.
The Death By Audio Rooms reverb is providing the required ambient blur and I keep it on the basic 'Room' reverb type.
This video is hopefully both a useful collection of ideas for DB-01 dronescapes as well as being somewhat calming in its dirty dark ambient gloom.

0:00 Setup blather
0:42 Choose a scale
0:50 Pattern setup
1:27 Random pitch
2:20 Playback mode
2:52 Gate length
3:45 Effects on
4:28 Attack amount
5:20 Filter wash
6:18 LFO settings
8:00 Playback range
8:35 Amp emvelope
8:53 Drones begin
12:18 FM pitch
14:50 Adding an arp
17:06 Lyra-8 style ?
18:28 Dry sound lol
19:00 Scream
19:57 Where beauty lives

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My website: https://richarddehove.com/
My other channel "IntraCosmos" of long-play dark ambient textures: https://www.youtube.com/@intracosmos

A simple way to perform live ambient dronescapes with the DB-01. Here I just use the DB-01 with a Strymon Timeline on the pattern delay setting. Ideally I would have changed the Timeline pattern but the delay can't handle the transition and completely cuts out. For a more "hands-free" performance you could switch the LFO to "sample and hold" and give it a little filter modulation for interesting filter echoes. Or put a few more steps into the DB-01 pattern and switch playback mode to "random". If there's any interest I'll do a part 2 for more techniques. The on-screen display is showing the left & right channels of the DB-01.

0:00 Intro blather
1:08 Program the pattern
2:38 Scale fun
2:58 Random pitch
3:35 Initial hit
4:31 LFO filter mod
6:00 FM

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What better way to set the tone for 2023 than a cover version of the uplifting 1977 pop hit "Hamburger Lady" by Throbbing Gristle. Here all synth sounds are generated by the PWM Malevolent synth - the perfect family sing-along keyboard. (The "heartbeat" displayed waveform is also the Malevolent synth.) Vocals are by my daughter processed through the Bitspeak and Manipulator VSTs.

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What better to team with a dirty DB-01 than an absolutely filthy Malevolent :D Here the DB-01 feeds the Malevolent some CV and provides a percussion-like bed for some simple keyboard noodlings. This isn't an exploration of the Malevolent, more just a momentary discovery that I recorded. I'm not sure that the knob and cable positions were all significant but small changes made big differences so I kept to playing with the filter and resonance knobs (which deserve to be a lot bigger) and a little touch of FM1 and FM2 amounts, all slopped over with near-maximum drive.
The setup: The DB-01 is sending its clock to the Malevolent's back-panel clock-in (which keeps the arp in sync). DB-01 CV out is going to FM2 in; and the DB-01 Gate Out to FM1 in. The Malevolent is also sending its own gate to AM2 in.
There's no effects on either machine, nor is there any DAW EQ or other fiddlings. It's all raw as you see it. The two scope displays show the direct output of each machine.
More Malevolent videos when I start to understand what's going on.

0:00 Filthy stuff
1:13 Filthy arpegiator
2:35 Happy arpy filth
3:30 Simple filth

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0:00 Synth 1
1:19 Drum 1
1:42 Synth 2
4:32 Drum 2
5:29 Synth 3
7:28 Drum 3

Roland's cheap plastic E-4 "voice tweaker" hates line level audio in. It's "allowed" only with a particular flavor of TRRS known only to Initiates of the Fifth Circle. I was shunned by this elite even after offering multiple brands and configurations of TRRS cableware. Why did Roland make it so hard? Because it's a "voice tweaker" and they know best.
So stuff that. I went line-level into the mic input and even cranked up the mic input level as well. The little 'peak' light complained bitterly for some time, then often appeared to just give up and pretend the levels were fine. Was it now broken? I neither know nor care anymore. I don't expect this cheap plastic box to last very long anyway.
Most reviews and demos of the E-4 are launch day promo vids where people gush about their corporate gift. And of course it's easy to say nice things about free stuff. But when you swap your dollar-delineated labour for plastic music boxes, your scrutiny is perhaps a little sharper.
This is a lightweight toy which, although regarded as "cheap", is still way too expensive for what it is. Under no circumstances would I rely on it live but for mucking about, and especially for cutting loops in the studio, it's excellent.
Although some of the video here is chopped and messy it does perhaps give a sense of the reality that for every 30 seconds glitchy loopy joy there's usually another 10 or 15 minutes of unseen sonic garbage that has been edited away.
SIGNAL FLOW:
With the DB-01 it goes: DB-01 mono out to the Xotic SP Compressor, from there to the BOSS RV-6 - which is off - to get two mono channels. One channel goes straight to the DAW. The other goes into the passive DI box and then into the mic input on the E-4.
With the LXR-02 it goes: Left out to the DAW; right out to the SP Compressor, then into the DI box, then into the mic input.
There is absolutely no processing in the DAW aside from centering every channel and creating a simple, roughly 50/50, wet-dry mix. The E-4 has no mix control, just a tiny volume knob.
The white patch cable coming into the E-4 is the clock from the DB-01 / LXR-02. On many settings the clock seemed a bit laggy.
The oscilloscope shows the output of the E-4 only.
Happy to answer any questions.

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Six of the Strymon Timeline's 12 delay modes are featured here, most from the less used "back of dial" zone. The Erica Synths DB-01 provides the raw material to transform. Both machines are running at 74bpm synced from the ERM MIDI Clock on the right. The DB-01 is going straight into the Timeline and from there straight into the DAW. Absolutely no other processing of any kind.
The Timeline is now more than 10 years old yet is still one of the top choices for delay. Since it was so famous I avoided it for ages thinking others must have surpassed it in the meantime. Yet it seems with all its fine flavors and excellent ergonomics it's still very hard to beat. I've churned so many delays it's painful to contemplate but this one looks like staying. I only wish I'd waited just a couple more months and got a midnight edition one instead of the awful greenish bug-guts color.

0:00 Ice presets (2)
1:30 Ducking presets (2)
3:12 Swell preset (1)
4:10 Tremolo preset (1)
4:58 Filter preset (1)
5:48 LoFi presets (2)

My other channel "IntraCosmos" of long-play dark ambient textures: https://www.youtube.com/@intracosmos
Lots of downloads for supporters on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/richarddehove
Many thanks to my kind patrons who keep this channel ad-free
My website: https://richarddehove.com/