Arturia Matrixbrute Aide-Mémoire D'utilisation page 75

7.2 MusicRadar
Some folks have been worried that the MB can only do more edgy sounds but rest assured it can do
smooth, warm and woody too; just be sure not to add any drive or Brute Factor (though driving the
mixer levels adds some lovely thickening/saturation without getting too gritty).
Getting back to the mixer, the design is very flexible and you can add more character by pushing the
oscillator levels. You can level volumes then route all three VCOs (plus noise and external sources)
through the Steiner or ladder filter (or both together) in series or parallel (for wildly different sonics) by
simply hitting each oscillator's Filter button.
Filter 1 is a diode-base Steiner filter which has LP/HP/BP and notch modes and 2/4-pole slopes; it has
a more edgy/less linear/wilder sound compared to Filter 2 and has a more vocal-like/human quality. In
24dB Steiner mode, the MB reminds me a lot of my Korg MS-20 (but fatter!) and has a similar throaty
distortion/overdrive when pushed.
Filter 2 is a modified Moog-style ladder filter that retains low-end at high resonance settings. It also
has LP/HP/BP modes and 2/4-pole slopes but to my ears (and when comparing to my Moog Source
and Voyager) it's definitely rawer and more textured. It has some Moogy character but it's its own thing
(an asset, not a downside).
We also love the big bi-polar global filter cutoff dial so you can sweep both filters simultaneously
relative to their individual cutoff settings, plus each filter has a drive control for thickening or gently
saturating the sound and the infamous Brute control for bolstering or destroying. As you can see,
there's a lot of versatility here and what seems like an almost infinite palette of
combinations/colours/sweet-spots (and that's without using any modulation)!
Despite all this awesome power, the MB remains surprisingly intuitive, (though it would be nice if the
display showed the value of every pot when turned and displayed a dot to show the stored value like
the Prophet-6).
There's also a lot on offer performance control-wise besides the matrix. Legato, Glide, Legato-Glide,
Mono, Duo/Split and 3-note Paraphonic modes are also available. Yes - you can play standard leads
but also 3-note chords with envelope articulation (and the MB sounds great in this mode).
Plus in Duo/Split mode you can run the arpeggiator to the left of the user-definable split-point and a
lead to the right. Add in the four Macro knobs that can be assigned to multiple destinations
simultaneously in the matrix and you get the picture - uber flexible!
Talking of modulation, the MB is a powerhouse! For more 'out there' sounds, VCO1 can be modulated
by VCO2, VCO3 can modulate 1 or 2, VCO3 can modulate VCF1 or 2 and noise can modulate VCO1
or VCF1 (all bi-polar too); there are also three envelopes (they're snappy enough, although not as
punchy as a Minimoog/Voyager). Env1 goes to the filter(s), 2 to the VCA and 3 is freely assignable via
the matrix.
The aforementioned three LFOs go nicely fast into audio range/overdrive and are all MIDI-syncable
too. Once you've designed your sound and basic modulation, hop over to the brilliantly designed
matrix (see left) to go in deep with mod routings, then design a simple or complex sequence and/or
arpeggiation and send the info out over MIDI or CV/Gate.
To top things off, you have five unique modulatable bucket-brigade delay-based analogue effects
which sound wonderful blended with the VCOs (mono/stereo delays, chorus, flanger and reverb).
If there's any synth that deserves the title of most well-featured analogue monosynth then this is it! It's
rock-solid, capable of a genuinely mind-blowing array of sounds and it's so versatile you could spend
years with it and not exhaust the possibilities.
At an RRP of £1,879 (£1,659 street currently) it's a significant outlay but still seems like a bargain
considering the features and its competition. Arturia have really made something special here. Future
classic? Absolutely!
Arturia Matrixbrute – Aide-mémoire d'utilisation 75/86
Juillet 2017