1. Favourite knob or fader or switch on a piece of gear and why?
The volume knob for my computer. It’s usb based, has a semi-heavy aluminum knob to it. All it does is adjust volume, and it does it VERY well.
USB Volume Control
2. Do you have an ‘almost’ perfect bit of kit? What would you change?
The KeyStep Pro from Arturia. Powerful sequencer, great for on the fly adjustment. Just wish it had more channels to expand it.
Arturia KeyStep Pro
3. What setup do you bring on holiday or tour or commute etc.?
I have been known to bring basically my whole studio sans computer (use a laptop instead for streaming). The past 3 years during a synthesizer conference called KnobCon based outside of Chicago, I have streamed a live set from my hotel room with a few people from the Golden Shrimp Guild (a Twitch.tv guild of synthesizer folk) hanging out and enjoying the tunes.
4. What software do you wish was hardware and vice versa?
Software to Hardware? Massive from NI. Great bass and lead VTSi with easy automation. Hardware to Software? I don’t think I have anything that ISN’T software now. However, wish there was a SID chip synth software that had the same warmth and sound as original hardware SID chips have.
Sammich SID
5. Is there anything you regret selling… or regret buying?
It’s rare that I sell anything. I almost sold my first synth I owned, a MicroKorg, to help pay for a MiniFreak, but forgot to. Thankful that I didn’t.
6. What gear has inspired you to produce the most music?
Again, with the KeyStep Pro. I’ve been producing music over 20 years now and for a few years things had really come to a halt. It was only these past few years have I been doing “live” music. It was suggested to me when I was just started getting into the modular/eurorack ecosystem. The KSP was super intuitive, I could hit the ground running with it, and it helped me take off on my live music streaming. A very close second would be the MiniFreak. It’s wide range of sound makes it an inspiration in itself.
KeyStep Pro and MiniFreak
7. If you had to start over, what would you get first?
Depends on where I start over at, there has been so many chapters of my ‘career’. Hardware-wise for performance, I would have loved to start out on a semi-modular synth if I was able to afford it.
8. What’s the most annoying piece of gear you have, that you just can’t live without?
A eurorack module called Temp_Utiles. Great clock divider/multiplier, deep features for syncing. But just a bit too menu-divey.
Temp_Utile
9. Most surprising tip or trick or technique that you’ve discovered about a bit of kit?
Making your own synth is a lot easier than you think. A bit of solder, some patience and a kit of parts, you can make synths at a fraction of the cost.
Synth DIY
Artist or Band name?
DJ Doughy
Genre?
Broad; ranging from electronic, hip hop, dub, and ambient.
Selfie?
Kyle Runge aka. dj_doughy
Where are you from?
Kansas City Area (Kansas side! hah!)
How did you get into music?
Been playing piano and violin since I was in early grade school. Electronically, finding a copy of Acid DJ 2.0 (linear DAW) back in 2001 for cheap and playing around with it till I got decent at it.
What still drives you to make music?
The friends I have made along the way whilst streaming my performances on Twitch.
How do you most often start a new track?
It’s rare that I sit down to do an actual track, but if the inspiration hits, I drop what I am doing and start it. Sometimes middle of the night!
How do you know when a track is finished?
Scope creep is real. I often have to put down a track for days or a week at a time. Come back and listen. If it sounds “complete”, or something that resembles a song “made for radio”, then I will call that a track!
Show us your current studio
Setup with greenscreen
Best creative advice that you’ve ever heard?
Don’t be afraid to experiment. There are tons of great resources and artists out there to learn from.
Promote your latest thing… Go ahead, throw us a link.
hivemindsynthesis.com is a synthesizer co-venture I am apart of with a good friend of mine. djdoughy.com is a good place to find anything new or extra about my work, with all my socials and music links
1. Favourite knob or fader or switch on a piece of gear and why?
Peavey PA-600 mixer
The “reverb” knob on my old Peavey PA-600 mixer. It’s big and it’s beautiful. As the name suggests it’s an old PA mixer but It sounds amazing in it’s own way, and I run a lot of stuff through it. It’s brilliant on electric/acoustic guitar, vocals and drums. The preamps in itself are great, but that spring reverb on electric guitar or a snare drum – WOW! Only problem is that weird enough it’s mono so wouldn’t work as a real mixer in the studio. I need to find someone who can make it work as a stereo mixer! 🙂
2. Do you have an ‘almost’ perfect bit of kit? What would you change?
As I’m a guitarist I have a lot of guitar pedals and my favourite one has to be the Strymon Deco. I recently traded my old version 1 to the v2. The v1 didn’t have a tone knob on it and no midi – it does now! To me it’s now perfect and I wouldn’t change anything as it now has the tone knob. Nice and smooth, crunchy and fat tape saturation on one channel and great wobbly tape modulation on the other. Great on guitar, but definitely also on synths, bass and even drums! It’s a Desert Island piece of gear to me! Guitar pedals in music production in general can be mind blowing!
Strymon Deco
3. What setup do you bring on holiday or tour or commute etc.?
I’m originally a guitarist and songwriter so I tend to always have a guitar near me, whenever I’m away. But holiday sometimes is a weird state of mind for me as I try to relax but often end up feeling restless and guilty about not working and sometimes feeling more creative when I’m away and not able to work. Having a guitar around sometimes only makes it worse, as I’m supposed to be on holiday with my family – not working!
4. What software do you wish was hardware and vice versa?
Almost all the software that I use are some kind of emulation of old outboard gear. Hmm.. Fabfilter plugins wouldn’t be that sexy as hardware would they? Maybe the good old ValhallaVintageverb would be fun to have as an outboard gear! I would love to have more reverb outboard effects in general! Although I don’t own one myself, It would be great fun if Chase Bliss Audio made their pedals as plugins as well. On second thought… that would maybe just make you craving their guitar pedals even more…
Chase Bliss Audio Mood
5. Is there anything you regret selling… or regret buying?
I’ve had a lot of guitars in the past – and present. Two comes to mind. I sold a Gibson Melody Maker from 1965 which used to belong to Kashmir’s Kasper Eistrup. That guitar was used a lot during the recordings of their last album E.A.R. I actually didn’t buy it because of him, it just really spoke to me and I just had to get it. I used it a lot in the studio and live, but sold it in a weak moment to buy something else.. Can’t remember what really… The other guitar that comes to mind was an all original white Fender Mustang from 1966. A really great guitar, but I sold it to buy the most precious guitar that I own, my all original 1965 Fender Jazzmaster. I do miss that Mustang quite often, but I know it’s in good hands.
Pedalboard of goodies
Regret buying.. Hmm.. I tend to buy nice things! Haha! Well.. I remember when I was a kid I had a Strat and an okay transistor amp and then I bought a Korg multi effects pedalboard. I never really learned how to use it and I kinda hated it, but I used way too much time with it. Should have stuck to pedals from the beginning. I did have some nice ones that I skipped for a long time. Had i just stuck to them I think I would have dug into the pedal world much earlier and developed my playing, musical style and songwriting much more and at a younger age.
6. What gear has inspired you to produce the most music?
Gibson J-45 acoustic
About 10 years ago I bought a 1967 Gibson J-45 acoustic guitar. That guitar made me write stuff so easily. Songs in me were waiting to be written on that guitar. It was quite amazing really, and somehow I always knew that I needed to get that guitar model at some point. These days I find my Jazzmaster through my newly acquired 70’s Vibro Champ pretty inspiring as well! Amazing studio amp.
7. If you had to start over, what would you get first?
As a producer you can’t live without your computer. Sad to say.. But what I’ve learned over the years is that it’s not the expensive preamp or the vintage microphone you record with that’s the most important thing. Of course it helps indeed! But in the end it comes down to the instrument and the performance. So if I was to start all over and had the money, I would skip the bad decisions of buying cheap and bad quality instruments and get some nice ones from the beginning – and then find an inspiring teacher and start a band 🙂 Also I would have loved to learn how to play the drums! I love playing drums but I never really took the time to learn it.
Synths and keys
8. What’s the most annoying piece of gear you have, that you just can’t live without
The most annoying is when something doesn’t work. I am NOT a great technician or a computer tech guy – AT ALL. I wish I had the skills to repair my own gear but I don’t, and I don’t think I’ll ever have the time or mindset to learn it. Computer problems must be the most annoying part of music production.
9. Most surprising tip or trick or technique that you’ve discovered about a bit of kit?
I have definitely underrated the power of hardware gear. When I first started recording music with my own band I didn’t really think too much about outboard gear.
Outboard and studio gear
And when I started off producing and recording music myself, I didn’t have much more than a laptop, a cheap interface and one microphone. And that’s all I used for a long time, but at some point I found out that just because the technology is so good now that you can hardly tell the difference between vintage outboard gear and plugins, doesn’t mean that I don’t need the hardware gear. I do. Hardware is so much more inspiring. Turning knobs on a synth while playing, running guitar through my PA mixer or Space Echo with worn out tape that keeps jumping around. There’s the magic. It’s inspiring. That’s the trick. That’s the technique. Don’t underestimate the power of the outboard gear!
Peavey PA-600 mixer
Artist or Band name?
Linus Valdemar
Genre?
Alternative pop, Indie, Folk, Britpop, Shoe-gaze and organic, nordic music.
Selfie?
Linus Valdemar
Where are you from?
I grew up in Lynæs (Hundested), a small town in the north of Sjælland, Denmark, but have lived in Nørrebro, Copenhagen for about 18 years now.
How did you get into music?
My dad was always a singer/songwriter and played his own songs in a local band, so I picked up the guitar at a young age because of him, learning from him and the local music school.
Also I was fortunate to have a few good mates and we made our first band before we could even play really.. We were 11-12 years old.
My mom has definitely influenced me as well, while my dad was the executive musician, my mom had a nice vinyl/CD collection and the knowledge about music in general. This combination made me fall in love with music.
What still drives you to make music?
Over the years I’ve only been more and more curious about new music. Discovering new great artists and producers and how they do it really inspires me. Doesn’t have to be new upcoming artists, as long as it’s new to me it’s inspiring. When I was younger and frontman/songwriter in a rock and roll band, I was definitely more narrow-minded and thought I knew exactly what I liked and disliked – what a fault that was! You can find inspiration and drive in any genre really.
Also new gear or new ways to use gear definitely drives me. And as my studio is based in a complex with other studios and great colleagues, we’re constantly talking and exchanging experiences which helps you and drives you on to the next project with new approach and ideas.
How do you most often start a new track?
It changes from time to time. Sometimes I have an idea on the guitar or piano, and sometimes I try to make a drum beat and play some bass on it. I like messing around with the Logic Drummer – haha! Today I entered my studio and instantly sat at my upright piano and just started writing – before having my morning coffee! So yeah I don’t have a go to way to kick things off really.
A selection of instruments
How do you know when a track is finished?
I don’t. It’s really tough. I will always find things in my mixes that I want to change and edit, but working with deadlines can be a nice way to get things done. Also working fast is a nice way to get it done. I’ve composed some scores lately that I almost started and finished the same day. I’ve learned over the years that being in a flow and working fast is nice. Get it done and move on! Don’t dwell too much. In the end you are your own biggest critic and the audience can’t tell if you think it’s done or not.
Show us your current studio
Linus Valdemar’s studioLinus Valdemar’s studio
Best creative advice that you’ve ever heard?
Here’s one phrase that just came to mind: “Stay curious”. That’s what I intend to do! I keep searching the internet, talking to fellow producers, trying to find new methods to record stuff, write stuff and so on. Music is universal and can still feel different to each of us and hopefully I will never get tired of finding new ways to produce it.
Promote your latest thing… Go ahead, throw us a link
It’s been a while since I’ve released my own music but here’s a track I produced last year by Marie Fjeldsted.
Also please visit my website to see/hear my portfolio, thanks!
1. Favourite knob, fader, or switch on a piece of gear—and why?
That’s the FREQ knob on the Serge VCFQ filter—pure magic for bass. I almost always run it in low-pass mode; it’s got this gritty, alive quality that roughs up even the simplest sounds in the best way. It’s a core part of my setup at this point. I’ve actually had to fix it twice from how much I push it… says a lot about how essential it’s become for me.
Serge filter freq knob
2. Do you have an ‘almost’ perfect bit of kit? What would you change?
Definitely the Octatrack. It’s complex, versatile, and can do almost anything. Whether I’m using it as a performance mixer, sampler, looper, or effects unit, it adapts to whatever I need. It feels very “modular,” if that makes sense for eurorack users. I use it as the main hub for most of my projects, mixing different sources together.
Octatrack
Even though it came out in 2011, it still feels ahead of its time. People are still sharing new tips on forums regularly. Honestly, I wouldn’t change a thing. It’s tricky to learn, but totally worth it. If you compare it to learning piano or guitar, getting comfortable with the Octatrack in a couple of years is a pretty good deal, haha.
3. What setup do you bring on holiday, tour, or commute?
iPad with AUM and Koala Sampler
It changes every year, but I always put a lot of care into it. There’s something I really enjoy about designing a compact setup that still brings inspiration. A few of my favorite “holiday rigs” have been: 1) iPad 2) Laptop with Strudel, the browser-based TidalCycles 3) Monome Norns Shield + field recorder
4. What software do you wish was hardware—and vice versa?
I’m a big fan of some of Hainbach’s iPad apps, especially Gauss Field Looper by Bram Bos. It’s a beautifully designed tape-style looper that’s super tactile and sounds incredible, especially with its built-in bit reducer, which adds a nice digital grit. I even recreated a similar patch on the Octatrack which does the job quite well.
Norns
On the other hand, I wish there was a desktop version of Monome Norns. It’s an amazing environment, but very tied to its hardware. I’d love to use some of those scripts on my laptop without needing the box.
5. Is there anything you regret selling… or regret buying?
Honestly, I don’t really have any regrets. When I first got into Eurorack, I bought a mix of modules from all sorts of brands. That phase helped me figure out what worked for me. Over time, I sold most of those and kept the ones that felt right.
Serge Eurorack
Now I mostly stick to systems built around Make Noise and Serge. It helps me stay focused and more creative. If I’m not using something, I pass it on. Gear should be played, not just sit on a shelf.
Make Noise Eurorack
6. What gear has inspired you to produce the most music?
Classical guitar. It’s not my most used instrument, but I really love its warm sound and how flexible it is. It was my first instrument, and even though I mostly stick to cowboy chords, it always feels good to play. No cables, no setup, just pick it up and go.
Classical Guitar Camps M6C
For my last album “Arquitectura”, I used a lot of flamenco-inspired phrases from maestro Pedro Javier González. They brought something really special to the music.
7. If you had to start over, what would you get first?
I’d keep it simple and affordable. You don’t need to spend a ton of money to make great music. If I were starting from scratch, these would be my essentials: 1) an iPad for sound design and recording, 2) a field recorder for capturing sounds, and 3) a sampler for building tracks and performing.
The iPad is super versatile. I use it with the AUM app as a mixer. To round it out, I’d add the Moog apps, especially Animoog Z and Minimoog, which sound great and are a good deal. I also use Koala, which is like a mini SP-404. For more experimental stuff, I love Hainbach’s apps like Gauss, Fluss, and Noises. For live setups, I’d add a basic audio interface (I use the Roland GO:Mixer) and a MIDI controller (like the Akai Midimix). You can get the whole iPad setup for under €500.
Olympus recorder, Roland GO:Mixer and Akai Midimix.
For a field recorder, any Zoom, Tascam, or Olympus will do. I use a Zoom H4n and an Olympus LS-11. Both work great, I even found the Olympus used for just €60.
As for a sampler, Koala app might be enough on its own, but if there’s room in the budget, I’d go for a newer Akai MPC (Live or One). They’re powerful for both sound design and live performance, packed with solid synths and strong sampling features. For non-experimental music, I’d even pick one over my beloved Octatrack.
8. What’s the most annoying piece of gear you have, that you just can’t live without?
The Monome Norns Shield is a super powerful little box, with an amazing community behind it (shoutout to the Lines forum). I’m not a coder, so I know I’m not using it to its full potential, but even without coding, it can do so much.
Some scripts can be a bit tricky, with menu diving and button combos, but it’s totally worth it. A few of my favorites are:
benjolis – a digital Benjolin
dronecaster – great for thick drones
icarus – Monotron Delay-style synth
molly_the_poly – Juno-6-style synth with random patches
oooooo – six-voice tape-style looper
passersby – a West Coast-style synth voice
All of these have made it into my albums. That said… I fried mine. Tried to fix a broken encoder and ended up burning the PCB. Thinking about upgrading to the full Norns now instead of just the Shield.
9. Most surprising tip or trick or technique that you’ve discovered about a bit of kit?
Honestly, I’m a bit late to this, but I’m really into feedback and making sound without external inputs. Lately, I’ve been having fun patching my small Euro Serge without using oscillators. It’s not just about music, it’s about exploring sound and how different devices work together. It feels like finding the machine’s soul.😀
Artist or Band name?
Ivo V. My active projects are Les Eines (The Tools), a solo project influenced by ambient, west coast synthesis, and musique concrète, and Refugi de Fauna Salvatge (Wildlife Refuge), a collective project. We use live coding tools (Tydal Cycles, Supercollider), trumpet, modular synths, and samplers. Crazy stuff!
Genre?
abstract electronic, alien folk, kosmische.
Selfie?
Ivó Valdivielso aka. Ivo V
Where are you from?
I’m from Barcelona, though I currently live on the outskirts, in the Baix Llobregat area. It’s a nice place full of creativity and great cultural initiatives.
How did you get into music?
I started teaching myself guitar. Since I couldn’t find any bandmates, I began making backing tracks with a free software called “Dance Ejay” that came on a CD-ROM in a box of cereal. It was a cheap way to start!
What still drives you to make music?
Music makes me feel alive! I love learning new techniques, meeting new artists, and designing new projects. It helps to keep me balanced.
How do you most often start a new track?
I usually start with some samples, like a field recording, a guitar phrase, or a blip-blop from the modular system. I load them into the Octatrack and start jamming until it “clicks.”
How do you know when a track is finished?
I stay focused when creating tracks. Usually, the tracks are part of a bigger project, so they need to meet certain requirements. I do a lot of prep work: field research, interviews, sound decisions. By the time I start making a track, I know what I want. I’m not a big fan of post-production; I prefer doing most of the work in pre-production and creating with intention.
Show us your current studio
Ivo V’s studio
Best creative advice that you’ve ever heard?
There’s a time for buying gear and a time for making music. Keep the phases separated for maximum creativity.
Promote your latest thing… Go ahead, throw us a link
This is my last album from my solo project, Les Eines
And this is something very special. The Experimental Protest Song Device (DCPX) is the result of a collective creation process, drawing from poetry and computer code, science and activism. It is published by Discs noIA, an online record label for artists with a critical or confrontational attitude towards AI. Their website cannot be scraped by AI bots!
