Apaeron AFOUR Is a Dirty Mystery Synth From Sweden
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The Apaeron AFOUR has knobs aplenty – but what kind of synthesis? Place your bets, place your bets…
Apaeron AFOUR
Superbooth is almost upon us, and the new synthesizer teasers are coming fast and furious. Here’s one from Malmö in southern Sweden and a new company called Apaeron. The synth is AFOUR, and it’s very intriguing indeed. There isn’t much information available yet, but let’s see what we can glean from the pictures and video.
Apaeron AFOUR: Four Channels
Apaeron AFOUR is an A4-sized (their words) synthesizer. It’s got 44 knobs and 27 keys, and is lovely as all get out. I’m already in love.
Although at first glance it appears to be analog subtractive, I’m going to make an executive decision and say that it’s digital. I have a couple of reasons why I’m choosing this hill to die on, but the main one is that Apaeron declares on their website that AFOUR has “instant boot time.” That says code to me.
The other reason is that it’s four-channel. Or, in other words, four-part multitimbral. While a four-part multitimbral analog synth is not impossible, it’s much more likely that it’s digital. You can see that multitimbrality in action in the demo video, which starts on Ableton and then pans to a prototype of the instrument.
Apaeron AFOUR: Drive Galore
Looking at those 44 knobs, they reveal a synthesizer with two oscillators, each with controls for octave, detune, waveform, xfade, drive and phase. (That phase control is another digital clue as far as I’m concerned.) There’s also a mixer for the oscillators and a ring mod pot. Moving onto the filter, we have resonance, cutoff, mode, slope, and two drive knobs.
That’s four drive stages already. This says to me that this synth will be capable of getting dirty. And speaking of, there’s a dirt knob in the global section, along with glide and pan (so we know it’s stereo).
And if that wasn’t enough grime, there also appears to be a drive parameter as part of the effects list across the top, which also shows delay, reverb, compressor, ducker, and an EQ with low, mid and high controls. You can see that EQ in action on the lovely color screen in one of the pictures.
Apaeron AFOUR: Modulation and More
Leaving the dirt behind, let’s look at modulation. Images reveal two ADSR envelopes along with two LFOs, each with frequency, waveform, phase and amplitude controls. The website also mentions a mod matrix.
Continuing on, we have an arpeggiator and looper, plus what could be three macro knobs.
Then there are the 27 velocity-sensitive keys, which promise onboard play. There’s also MIDI.
Apaeron AFOUR: Pricing and Availability
AFOUR from Apaeron looks like a fun little synth. I’m thinking it’s virtual analog but we’ll have to wait until Superbooth this week to find out for sure.
There’s no pricing or availability information as of yet. Sign up for the mailing list on the Apaeron homepage if you’re interested.
More Information
- Apaeron homepage
- More about synthesizers
- Buy synthesizers at Thomann*
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