Moog Music Forum

First posting... sorry it must be redundant , but the forum won't search for the word "minimoog" as too common!
I am confused by so many products, which sounds most like the Minimoog D .. that I had and loved many years ago?
thanks
zenmusic

Well you have the Voyager, the Little Phatty, and the Sub Phatty. The variants on these are mostly not about sonics.

Of these, the Voyager will come the closest to sounding like your beloved Model D.

Stephen




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Actually, technically, the Voyager is the only one that can come close to the sound of a Minimoog, simply by the fact that it is the only one to offer 3 oscillators...

But if one uses only two, like in the case of a Minimoog that has the third oscillator used as an LFO, then the vintage Moog The Source is the one that comes the closest.
In modern Moog instruments, however, the Voyager is a pretty good performer (no pun intended) at bringing back familiar typical Moog sounds of the original Mini.
The Sub Phatty is no slouch either.

But, ultimately, nothing can match the sound of an original Minimoog D. Not even another Minimoog D (depending on calibration)!

Welcome to the forum!

Depends on what sound you are trying to reproduce. Some of what happened with Model D was done with 2 Oscs as the third provided modulation.
But if you are asking for that juicy bass, the Taurus III is the only thing that approaches the face melting sharp and thunderous bass in my opinion. Maybe you can approximate it with the Minitaur. The Voyager simply can't do it.

If the minimoog sound is what you are after, get a minimoog.

EricK's advice makes perfect sense to me but can anybody please point to an actual popular recording and a specific holy grail "D" sound that one can't actually achieve with a Voyager and/or other MOOGs?

EricK wrote:If the minimoog sound is what you are after, get a minimoog.

Pete, if you ever get the chance, like I did and others have too, to have a Voyager and a Mini side-by-side and play them both, then you'll see or rather hear what it's all about.
It's not night and day. More like sunny day and hazy day.

Even the filters are different both in sound and mostly in behavior. Some might even say that the ones on the Voyager are better, because the one on the Minimoog D "suffers" from peculiarities found only on a Mini.

Sorry. No other Moog synth comes close to the synergy of a good Mini, the best being very early ones with certain upgrades. (in my opinion.)
The Source is the next best thing, but very different in many ways. (no knobs all over the place, for one.)
Even a Moog modular doesn't sound like a Mini. Different glide taper, different gain structure, etc.

When someone makes a synth with the same discrete filter,
Same input to output ratio for that filter and vcas. (gain structure.)
Same distortion characteristics.
Same envs.
Same glide and mod wheel taper.
Low note priority.
Any inductance, leakage or other influence on signals due to wire harnesses and PCB layout.
And depending on your taste, a choice of classic Mini oscillators (older and newer.)
Only THEN.. you can start comparing.
To anyone trying, I suggest not abandoning the very low voltages the machine runs on too.
I feel this causes a certain amount of less headroom ("good" distortion), and a DC signal to noise ratio that adds a bit of jitter.

The closest to a Mini that isn't one are the Studio Electronics repackaged or duped models.
But they don't have the same taper glide, a huge part of the classic Mini sound.
All the boards of their early ones were original Moog boards, but not board #2- the one with the envs and glide.

This is all from a purist's standpoint though.
90% of the sounds one gets from a synth are closely enough duped by many other synths.
It's that 10% that sets a Mini apart and it's noticeable.

Finally, a huge part of the Mini's sound is that the envs overshoot the sustain levels for just a few ms.
A theoretically correct env would allow the attack to only reach the sustain setting set, never exceed it.
But the design is off ever so slightly and this is the cause of the famous "bump" or highly percussive abilities.
The attack of most stock Minis exceed the max sustain level and then come down very quickly.
Try it if you have a model D. (med attack, full sustain while listening to the filter frequency.)

When I modded Minis, I'd fix that bump on the filters because most people want their attacks to reach and not exceed the maximum sustain levels.
It made for more correct siren sounds and slowly opening filter sounds.
But I never touched the VCA's env. That's where the punch comes from.

So when someone puts together a package that's likely a duplicate of an actual Minimoog in most places (but make it programmable like the Vgers and Source), then the Mini will have met its contender.
40 years and it's not been done again. (and neither has what Wendy Carlos did with her modular.)

It'd also be nice if some newer synths had the build quality of a Mini- metal enclosure, strong pot shafts that don't wobble, nice wood and keyboard, etc.
But in my opinion, nothing sounds like a Mini... and yes, even Minis vary model to model and not all sound the same.
I've A/B'd (compared) countless Minis and the timbre can be different between individual models.
But all were undeniably Minimoogs in their overall sound.

Finally, it's my contention that many plug-ins and VST type synths use similar engines, but change the graphics and features, then call it whatever synth they were trying to mimic.
This isn't a blanket statement as I know people have tried to delve deeper into what makes these synths tick, but by and large, most don't capture a lot of what the individual synth they're trying to copy has.
Different lipstick on the same pig.

great piece of literature kevin,
agree on every word of it.
often envelops and vca's are neglected when a synth is described, you story makes it clear again that they contribute more then many of us understand.

I want to take some time here to really turn anyone away from the Voyager who may be purchasing it with delusions of Minimoog bass. It will absolutely not happen. You'd be much better off with the Phatty (little, slim, sub, whatever) as their oscillator design is far more suited to those punchy model d lines everyone thought the Voyager would do so well. I consider the Voyager's envelopes to be somewhat snappy in the mid to upper range, but for whatever reason they turn to mush the second you try and get a robo bass patch out of it and no amount of tweaking will fix it. Kill me.

Now that I have rid myself of those awful feelings of negativity toward the only instrument I have truly loved, I feel purified. Whew. Gonna go play my voyager.

In other words, the Voyager is a wonderful instrument, but it does not sound like a mini to me.

Minimoog plugins and VSTs

Pro: Looks like a minimoog
Con: doesn't sound like a minimoog

Kenneth wrote:... In other words, the Voyager is a wonderful instrument, but it does not sound like a mini to me.

+1

I got a vintage 1979 minimoog, a Voyager with slew-rate modification, and some other Moog synths. But non of these sound 100% like the real minimoog if compared 1:1. But this is not a problem to me. I actually sometimes prefer the SubPhatty or Prodigy bass more then the mini's one in certain contexts. And the Voyager is great for having two modulation busses for extended modulation fun.

Short story for those bored or waiting for their TV dinner to cook….

About 10 years I ago, Moog hired me to rep them at Namm.
They nicely provided me a Vger beforehand to familiarize myself with it.

As I explored it, everything worked and it was pleasant and all, but I had a very hard time making it sound like a model D in several ways.
The Vger was like silk and the Mini was like leather.

Just my luck- at the show, the most often question was "Does it sound like the original?"
Damn.
This was hard for me. Some of these people I knew personally.
I'm used to calling things as I see (or hear) them, but I was working for someone else.
On the spot, I had to come up with various answers that kind of answered their questions and kind of misdirected them to things the Vger could do that the D couldn't.

I'd ask "What sounds were you looking for or in what settings do you play?", hoping to suggest a strong point of the Vger over the D.
Play live? "It will stay in tune!"
"It's got Midi and you can make program chains."
"Things sound different live anyway and I doubt anyone could tell the difference. Playing the right notes is hard enough, isn't it?"

Same types of answers for those that were studio musicians.
Whatever positive I could come up with.
It was a really uncomfortable feeling though.

But by the 2nd and 3rd days of the show, I ended up telling the ones that I knew had money, "no, it's not exactly like a Mini, but you should have both to cover everything", hoping to still make a sale for Moog.

It's an all new design based on the structure and filter of a Model D. Period.

Now if someone asks, I just say that a Vger is a really nice synth.
It's less raw than a D, but has more features…. and end it there.
Anyone who has spent time with both instruments just knows.
You have to play them both.

Hahaha, not easy being an honest salesman is it ? Or a politician for that matter...

"...Waiting for their TV dinner to cook..." There's something that I haven't eaten in a loooong time ! From about the same era as my Minimoog D actually.

Kevin Lightner wrote:Short story for those bored or waiting for their TV dinner to cook….

About 10 years I ago, Moog hired me to rep them at Namm.
They nicely provided me a Vger beforehand to familiarize myself with it.

As I explored it, everything worked and it was pleasant and all, but I had a very hard time making it sound like a model D in several ways.
The Vger was like silk and the Mini was like leather.

Just my luck- at the show, the most often question was "Does it sound like the original?"
Damn.
This was hard for me. Some of these people I knew personally.
I'm used to calling things as I see (or hear) them, but I was working for someone else.
On the spot, I had to come up with various answers that kind of answered their questions and kind of misdirected them to things the Vger could do that the D couldn't.

I'd ask "What sounds were you looking for or in what settings do you play?", hoping to suggest a strong point of the Vger over the D.
Play live? "It will stay in tune!"
"It's got Midi and you can make program chains."
"Things sound different live anyway and I doubt anyone could tell the difference. Playing the right notes is hard enough, isn't it?"

Same types of answers for those that were studio musicians.
Whatever positive I could come up with.
It was a really uncomfortable feeling though.

But by the 2nd and 3rd days of the show, I ended up telling the ones that I knew had money, "no, it's not exactly like a Mini, but you should have both to cover everything", hoping to still make a sale for Moog.

It's an all new design based on the structure and filter of a Model D. Period.

Now if someone asks, I just say that a Vger is a really nice synth.
It's less raw than a D, but has more features…. and end it there.
Anyone who has spent time with both instruments just knows.
You have to play them both.

Wow Kevin, having used a Minimoog D and Voyager in the past, and owning a Source and Little Phatty Tribute, I must say that your Voyager is like silk where the Minimoog D is like leather analogy is spot on. Very, very well put, sir.

And I agree in the response to the OP's question... the closest you could get to the D is a Source. But each synth is its own animal. The Source is the Source... the D is the D.

As Porky Pig would say; the D, the D, that's all folks !