Ant's Prophet 6 vs Prophet 5 rant treat

[Manbird]

(I hope Razmo doesn't mind me mutating his Rant thread title!)

I'll post the link to these tracks in Your Music as well, but most of any actual ranting (by me, anyway) will take place here...

I'm sort of living between two Prophets these days. In Berlin I have my Prophet 6, in California my gf has a rev 3 Prophet 5.Hers used to belong to Terry Riley and was used on his Songs For the Ten Voices of the Two Prophets album, so it's rich with history and vibe! The P5 has been the greatest instrument of my life. I owned my own once, a rev 2, for a few years from around age 19. I traded a DX-7 for it and a Roland TR-707. The music shop threw in the drum machine cos I think they felt guilty for "ripping me off," thinking I was a fool to get rid of the hippest machine ever in favor of a dusty old has-been Prophet!

Anyway, I think the DSI forum is probably a safe enough place for me to rant, as I move back and forth between synths and countries.

I won't ramble on at this point, though. Instead, I'll just put money where mouth is and offer a SC link to two recordings of the same song, one made using the P6, the other with the P5. I posted something similar in the forum a while back, a song recorded once with only a Juno 6 and then again with Prophet 6. The SC playlist page with the P6/P5 track has a bit of info about the tracks, so I won't go into that here. It's fascinating for me to hear the versions back to back, especially given that the synths live thousands of miles apart...

Cheers, and I hope you enjoy!

https://soundcloud.com/anton-barbeau/sets/magazine-street-prophet-6-vs-prophet-5-variations/s-DBHEZ

[Herr Schmitz]

Interesting, will check it out, thanks.

[chysn]

(I hope Razmo doesn't mind me mutating his Rant thread title!)

It's perfectly acceptable, as an homage. 

Hers used to belong to Terry Riley and was used on his Songs For the Ten Voices of the Two Prophets album, so it's rich with history and vibe!

That's awesome. I'm obsessed with Terry Riley these days (The Autumn of Riley is following the Summer of Subotnick), but I haven't heard Songs For the Ten Voices of the Two Prophets yet. That's now on my listening list this afternoon after work.

The music shop threw in the drum machine cos I think they felt guilty for "ripping me off," thinking I was a fool to get rid of the hippest machine ever in favor of a dusty old has-been Prophet!

!!!!

I've had two chances to buy a Prophet 5. On the first chance, I bought an Akai AX73 instead, largely because it was velocity-sensitive and had MIDI. So I do sort of understand evaluating something incorrectly before history is totally in the rear-view.

Anyway, I enjoyed both versions of the song. It would be hard for me to determine which synth is which, if it had been a blind test.

[Manbird]

(I hope Razmo doesn't mind me mutating his Rant thread title!)

It's perfectly acceptable, as an homage. 

Hers used to belong to Terry Riley and was used on his Songs For the Ten Voices of the Two Prophets album, so it's rich with history and vibe!

That's awesome. I'm obsessed with Terry Riley these days (The Autumn of Riley is following the Summer of Subotnick), but I haven't heard Songs For the Ten Voices of the Two Prophets yet. That's now on my listening list this afternoon after work.

The music shop threw in the drum machine cos I think they felt guilty for "ripping me off," thinking I was a fool to get rid of the hippest machine ever in favor of a dusty old has-been Prophet!

!!!!

I've had two chances to buy a Prophet 5. On the first chance, I bought an Akai AX73 instead, largely because it was velocity-sensitive and had MIDI. So I do sort of understand evaluating something incorrectly before history is totally in the rear-view.

Anyway, I enjoyed both versions of the song. It would be hard for me to determine which synth is which, if it had been a blind test.

Glad you you liked listening to the track. And "The Autumn of Riley" sounds wonderful. Think I'll try that out myself. I don't know his music so well, but I love anything I come across.

I've done my share of buying off past regrets (seems like half the gear I've picked up in recent years is stuff I owned in my earliest days), but a Prophet 5 is still well out of range for now. Funny - I'm literally sitting next to one and can use it 24-hours-a-day, but it hurts my heart that I don't "own" my own. The P5 has been the ultimate for me since I was a teen. I do love the Prophet 6, though it always requires much more effort for me to find myself lost in it, if that makes sense. "It's a clean machine," as the song says, and maybe it'll take a decade of chip degradation to bring it up (down?) to the dirty level of the 5. 

[cloudswimmer]

I traded a DX-7 for it and a Roland TR-707. The music shop threw in the drum machine cos I think they felt guilty for "ripping me off," thinking I was a fool to get rid of the hippest machine ever in favor of a dusty old has-been Prophet!

Yeah that sounds about right .. in 88' I could only get $150.00 each for my two Minimoog D's, $450.00 for my Jupiter 8 (with MD/8 and Anvil ATA), and my DX7 brought me $200.00 .. fifty bucks more than the Minimoogs lol. Yeah I'm sure we could all kick ourselvs many times over .. fortunately I have good samples of all the old and gone boards .. and pretty much burnt out on endless knob tweaking a long time ago. So now I'm asking myself what I'm doing here .. hmm midlife crisis maybe lol 

[Manbird]

I've just returned to Berlin after two months in California. Over there, I've got a Prophet 5, a PolySix, an MS-10 and a Minilogue to play with. I took a few songs with me that featured my Prophet 6 quite heavily and replicated the sounds on the P5. For all my years playing synth, I always claim to be pretty basic in my understanding of what actually happens to make sound sound as it does, and frankly, after this latest round with the P5, I'm convinced that beneath all the Curtis filters and ladder filters and CEM and SEM and SSM this and that's there's plain old-fashioned magic at play! The P5 fits into anything I'm working on, and it's always the easiest thing to tweak a tone into submission without much effort. Meanwhile, now that I'm a Juno 6 owner, I confess my love of the PolySix is slightly scrambled. I think it's a case of knowing so well what it's GOING to do, no matter what I do with or to it. It's a beautiful synth, but I think I always hope it will surprise me in a way it doesn't quite.

Back in Berlin, I've been reverse-tweaking various Prophet 5 tones on the Prophet 6, including P5 patches I copied from the P6 in the first place. Hours spent each evening conjuring the most basic basses and brass patches. I do love the Prophet 6, but I fight with it a fair bit. It doesn't sit in the mix, as we say, the way the 5 does for me, or at least it requires more attention. I've started recording it in mono, trying to get my ears to stare straight ahead and hear a 5 hidden in the 6. Of course I'm not the only one who feels like this, and I don't feel odd posting it here. Back to the actual magic, that Fine knob on the P5 gives one a choice between lovely and luscious, really. The Slop on the P6 mostly bugs me! Still, with judicious Slop use and careful setting of the Fine knob here, the P6 goes to good places, certainly.   

I did stop in the Justmusic to check out the Rev 2. I kinda knew it wouldn't be my thing - I have nearly no interest in menu-gazing, for a start. I've heard posts here on the DSI Rev 2 page that impressed me, but already owning a P6, I'm not, thankfully, tempted. My routine at the shop is always: play the OB-6, think "I shoulda..." and then move to the P6 next to it and think, "Ah, of course!" I really do adore the lovely, washy, synthy sound of the Oberheim, but I never leave the store feeling conflicted. I say that as one who, like many here, would be happy with about 10 more synths, maybe 11 or 12. I also finally checked out the Waldorf Streichfett. Didn't take to it as I'd expected, again thankfully! I take a simpleton's approach, but I want to be able to feel/hear the right vibe within a minute. This is silly, I know, and I will go back and give things many second chances to make a good first impression, but the Waldorf didn't do it today. A synth that DID make that perfect first impression and grabs me every time is the Yamaha CS. "Limited" like my Juno 6, it seems to only make "good" sounds. Yummy, synthy sounds. I've had the CP for a couple years and have toured with it a couple times. I wouldn't do a whole show on one, but for a few songs, it's great. But yes - the CS has that magic thing that appeals to me. For all my years, for all my ears, I'm always pleased to be pleased and happy to be surprised.

Anyway, synths, eh? And always that damn Prophet 5!
 

[Paul Dither]

Back to the actual magic, that Fine knob on the P5 gives one a choice between lovely and luscious, really. The Slop on the P6 mostly bugs me! Still, with judicious Slop use and careful setting of the Fine knob here, the P6 goes to good places, certainly.

Isn't the fine knob resolution the same on the P-5 and the P-6? It's my understanding that both cover the range of a semitone. Or do you mean that the fine knob on the P-5 allows for finer adjustments because it's only unipolar instead of bipolar and hence has twice the travel range?

A synth that DID make that perfect first impression and grabs me every time is the Yamaha CS. "Limited" like my Juno 6, it seems to only make "good" sounds. Yummy, synthy sounds. I've had the CP for a couple years and have toured with it a couple times. I wouldn't do a whole show on one, but for a few songs, it's great. But yes - the CS has that magic thing that appeals to me.

What Yamaha CS are you referring to? There are quite a few.

[Manbird]

Back to the actual magic, that Fine knob on the P5 gives one a choice between lovely and luscious, really. The Slop on the P6 mostly bugs me! Still, with judicious Slop use and careful setting of the Fine knob here, the P6 goes to good places, certainly.

Isn't the fine knob resolution the same on the P-5 and the P-6? It's my understanding that both cover the range of a semitone. Or do you mean that the fine knob on the P-5 allows for finer adjustments because it's only unipolar instead of bipolar and hence has twice the travel range?

Honestly, I don't know the tech specs at all, so I can only speak in vague, "magical" terms here - the P5's Fine adjustment knob has a a broader range of "musical usefulness," to my ear. It makes sense, from what you're saying, that there's a greater amount of subtle blurriness available. In my clumsy way, I'm suggesting the P5's Fine knob simply offers more "Oh, that's really nice!" It's difficult to be displeased with the detuning, whereas, for me, on the P6, things jump rather quickly from "Yeah, that's pretty good" to sounding simply detuned. I'm not knocking my beloved P6, but maybe a different way of describing what I'm hearing is that the oscs on the P6, as I raise the amount of Fine detuning, sound like they're pulling apart. It's a clean machine, yes, and I can sorta hear each of the oscillators doing its own thing at the same time. On the P5, the oscs are still checking in with each other, high-fiving and shouting "Travel safe!" as they drift! (Besides being a neo-luddite on the tech front, I'm also jet lagged beyond repair at the moment. I hope I'm still making some sense with all this!)

A synth that DID make that perfect first impression and grabs me every time is the Yamaha CS. "Limited" like my Juno 6, it seems to only make "good" sounds. Yummy, synthy sounds. I've had the CP for a couple years and have toured with it a couple times. I wouldn't do a whole show on one, but for a few songs, it's great. But yes - the CS has that magic thing that appeals to me.

What Yamaha CS are you referring to? There are quite a few.

Ah, sorry - I wasn't clear at all. I meant the Reface series CS.

[Paul Dither]

Honestly, I don't know the tech specs at all, so I can only speak in vague, "magical" terms here - the P5's Fine adjustment knob has a a broader range of "musical usefulness," to my ear. It makes sense, from what you're saying, that there's a greater amount of subtle blurriness available. In my clumsy way, I'm suggesting the P5's Fine knob simply offers more "Oh, that's really nice!" It's difficult to be displeased with the detuning, whereas, for me, on the P6, things jump rather quickly from "Yeah, that's pretty good" to sounding simply detuned. I'm not knocking my beloved P6, but maybe a different way of describing what I'm hearing is that the oscs on the P6, as I raise the amount of Fine detuning, sound like they're pulling apart. It's a clean machine, yes, and I can sorta hear each of the oscillators doing its own thing at the same time. On the P5, the oscs are still checking in with each other, high-fiving and shouting "Travel safe!" as they drift! (Besides being a neo-luddite on the tech front, I'm also jet lagged beyond repair at the moment. I hope I'm still making some sense with all this!)

Ah, okay. Makes sense, as the fine tune knob on the P-5 has twice the travel range so to speak: In a 270° turn it goes from zero to one semitone upwards, while the fine tune knob on the P-6 goes from a semitone downwards to a semitone upwards in the same range.

Ah, sorry - I wasn't clear at all. I meant the Reface series CS.

Ah, I thought you meant something like the CS-80/60/50 or the CS-40m or 70m.

[Manbird]

Honestly, I don't know the tech specs at all, so I can only speak in vague, "magical" terms here - the P5's Fine adjustment knob has a a broader range of "musical usefulness," to my ear. It makes sense, from what you're saying, that there's a greater amount of subtle blurriness available. In my clumsy way, I'm suggesting the P5's Fine knob simply offers more "Oh, that's really nice!" It's difficult to be displeased with the detuning, whereas, for me, on the P6, things jump rather quickly from "Yeah, that's pretty good" to sounding simply detuned. I'm not knocking my beloved P6, but maybe a different way of describing what I'm hearing is that the oscs on the P6, as I raise the amount of Fine detuning, sound like they're pulling apart. It's a clean machine, yes, and I can sorta hear each of the oscillators doing its own thing at the same time. On the P5, the oscs are still checking in with each other, high-fiving and shouting "Travel safe!" as they drift! (Besides being a neo-luddite on the tech front, I'm also jet lagged beyond repair at the moment. I hope I'm still making some sense with all this!)

Ah, okay. Makes sense, as the fine tune knob on the P-5 has twice the travel range so to speak: In a 270° turn it goes from zero to one semitone upwards, while the fine tune knob on the P-6 goes from a semitone downwards to a semitone upwards in the same range.

Ah, sorry - I wasn't clear at all. I meant the Reface series CS.

Ah, I thought you meant something like the CS-80/60/50 or the CS-40m or 70m.

On the P6, I can move the Fine knob from 12 o'clock to maybe 13 before the detuning starts to sound simply out of tune. On the P5, to my taste, there's a wider pleasing interval available. I'm speaking in regards to fairly standard type patches - strings, chordal pads, brass etc. It makes more and more sense to me, if the dial resolution is like 1-100 on the P5 and 1-1000, that it feels quick and easy on the P5 to get a sound to do the tricks I want. With the 6, it's a far more nuanced
operation. Bear with my always-un-techspeak, by the way. I learn slowly, mostly taking a caveman approach to making sounds happen! (Edit: I mean, I can barely managed the formatting on this forum, it seems!)

I've only ever seen a CS-80 once in a shop, in SF, maybe 1987?! I've seen the 40m and 70m for sale in Berlin, but my experience otherwise with the CS series consists of twenty minutes of recording time with a CS-5. It did catch my attention, that humble thing.

[Paul Dither]

On the P6, I can move the Fine knob from 12 o'clock to maybe 13 before the detuning starts to sound simply out of tune. On the P5, to my taste, there's a wider pleasing interval available. I'm speaking in regards to fairly standard type patches - strings, chordal pads, brass etc. It makes more and more sense to me, if the dial resolution is like 1-100 on the P5 and 1-1000, that it feels quick and easy on the P5 to get a sound to do the tricks I want. With the 6, it's a far more nuanced
operation.

Makes sense, as you have twice the amount of travel with the fine tune knob of the P-5, so it gives you twice the tactile space to make adjustments.

I've only ever seen a CS-80 once in a shop, in SF, maybe 1987?! I've seen the 40m and 70m for sale in Berlin, but my experience otherwise with the CS series consists of twenty minutes of recording time with a CS-5. It did catch my attention, that humble thing.

They certainly had a very unique character that's not really available in the analog domain currently. Although utilizing the HP filter of the P-6 can get you into that nasal territory the CS synths are famous for.

[Manbird]

I've only ever seen a CS-80 once in a shop, in SF, maybe 1987?! I've seen the 40m and 70m for sale in Berlin, but my experience otherwise with the CS series consists of twenty minutes of recording time with a CS-5. It did catch my attention, that humble thing.

They certainly had a very unique character that's not really available in the analog domain currently. Although utilizing the HP filter of the P-6 can get you into that nasal territory the CS synths are famous for.
[/quote]


And the easy trick of using Aftertouch to open up the filter, and/or add vibrato - royalty cheques land on Vangelis' doorstep every time! The P6 is an incredibly playable instrument - I've never spent so many hours with a synth just roaming around... and the CS-80 feel is often an aspect of that roaming...

[starscrm7]

I couldnt tell the difference between the two samples.

[Manbird]

I couldnt tell the difference between the two samples.

When I sit down with the P5, it takes me no time at all to find the sound I want or the sound I didn't know I wanted. It always has that *thing* about it, and it sits/fits in the track effortlessly. The P6 is fussier for me, frequently. As I mentioned, the two synths live across the world from each other, so any A/B work I do is months between, but in all my efforts, I'm learning to patiently reverse-engineer those easy P5 tones with the P6. I've started adding the slightest touch of distortion and white noise, and I confess I love running the P6 in mono.

I have a Pro One here in Berlin, and it's like the P5 for me - it just has the sound always ready to go. The Prophet 6 is so clean and the oscillators are a bit well-behaved, but I can usually match it to the Pro One. To what end? That's where vague existentialism comes in, I suppose! But it's fun and fascinating for me, especially as I'm pretty low-tech despite decades of obsessive synth rocking.

[Sacred Synthesis]

Ant, your down-to-earth humbleness is admirable.

[Manbird]

Ant, your down-to-earth humbleness is admirable.

The result of years of carefully cultivated cluelessness!

[dslsynth]

The result of years of carefully cultivated cluelessness!

I like that expression. Someone ought to make a T-shirt with it!

[Sacred Synthesis]

Ant, your down-to-earth humbleness is admirable.

The result of years of carefully cultivated cluelessness!

Or perhaps instead, an emphasis on music, rather than technology...brother. 

[dslsynth]

Or perhaps instead, an emphasis on music, rather than technology...brother. 

Well, synthesizers have both an artistic and technical sides of their use. That is why I like his statement so much. It deserves to be framed and put up on a wall. Truly insightful. And no, I am not ironic. Its genius!

[dsetto]

carefully cultivated cluelessness