Quick addendum to the Arturia MatrixBrute. That French icon of luxury offers a vast synth architecture with massive features and control options. While there is no doubt about the instrument’s impressive technical potential, there are varying opinions about the instrument’s tonal character. Just how good does it SOUND? Can it compete with any classic (vintage) synth, with any classic (vintage) analog sound?
The MatrixBrute Factory Presets, however, get us nowhere closer to a suitable answer. Standard straight-sounding lead-lines, sync-sounds, technoid sequencing stuff, a few basses and effects … not too many classic sounds with vintage vibe here.
So we did some oldschool sound programming. Detuning of oscillators, classic filter sweeps, PWM, ultra-slow frequency modulation, that stuff. Just to figure out whether the MatrixBrute is capable of truly WARM sounds (or not).
And yes, it is! Admittedly, it won’t become “The French Minimoog of the 21st Century”. But it is without doubt capable of those classic warm, analog sounds.
Ok, ok, there are two small drawbacks: First, a certain lack of power in the low audio range – there could be a little more “lower end”. Second, attack times could be faster (which would be useful for percussive patterns, for example).
Aside from that: Respect to the MatrixBrute! It’s a flexible performance synth with billions of features, and with a flexible, yet “also” warm sounding tonal character. The attached audio files (“Analogue”) are a supplement to the already existing 40 minutes of audio material of the MatrixBrute test report.
