How to resolve AdBlock issue? Supercritical Redshift 6
Having opened eyes and ears with show-stopping showcases at SUPERBOOTH24, May 16-18, FEZ-Berlin, Germany and Machina Bristronica, October 12-13, Bristol, UK, Supercritical announces the availability of its inaugural desktop instrument in Redshift 6 - self styled as a 6 voice Variable Character Synthesizer that combines technology from the budget travels in time and space-offering Finnish synthesizer manufacturer’s previous Demon Core Oscillator and Neutron Flux Filter products, each of its six voices featuring a DCO (Digitally-Controlled Oscillator) that can create up to 16 analogue oscillators per voice with analogue waveforms generated under digital control - as of December 16…
Supercritical’s self-styled 6 voice Variable Character Synthesizer wording - which is subtly featured on the front panel of the desktop instrument itself by way of optical reinforcement - effectively encapsulates the Redshift 6 concept. Consequently, the analogue path of each of its DEMON CORE OSCILLATOR-based six voices is under strict digital control in terms of tuning, gain staging, filtering, and more. Moreover, Redshift 6 has a lush- and warm-sounding sweet spot that is inspired by classic analogue polysynths, but it also runs the full gamut from almost digitally sterile and clean to distorted behaviour and beyond.
Digging deeper, the filter core is an analogue 4-pole VARIABLE CHARACTER FILTER that is also digitally controlled to act like almost any classic vintage synthesizer filter and more besides. But in addition to the oscillators and filters, Redshift 6 has all the features expected of a modern synth - think modulators aplenty, flexible voice routing, (six-part) multitimbrality, MPE (MIDI Polyphonic Expression), and (bypassable) stereo DSP (Digital Signal Processing) effects.
Elsewhere, Redshift 6’s six voices can be configured in a variety of ways - choose between true six-voice polyphony, classic vintage poly dual layer mode with 3+3 voices, six individual voices (each with their own patch and physical output), or any combination thereof. Those six voices can each also operate as a paraphonic voice with up to 16-note paraphony. And as if that is not enough to whet any serious synthesist’s appetite, multiple filters can be chained by routing audio from one voice to another.
Supercritical spent time - time that was well spent, clearly - realising Redshift 6’s physical form factor as a modern, compact - 378 mm (W) x 254 mm (D) x 63 mm (H) - desktop device with a 2.7-inch TFT (Thin Film Transistor) IPS (In-Plane Switching) colour screen surrounded by eight endless clickable potentiometers. Thanks to quick navigation via the shortcut button grid, menu diving is kept to a minimum, while a selection of familiar synth controls - DCO, VCF (Voltage-Controlled Filter), and AMP (amplifier), to name but the basics - are featured throughout the front panel. Put it this way: assigning modulations is equally easy and speedy with the modulation grid providing access to modulation source parameters, and all the assigned modulations can be edited via the MOD MATRIX. Meanwhile, a MACRO mode with six user-assignable buttons is included.
It is fair to say that Redshift 6’s slimline back panel packs in a lot of features for interacting with the outside world, including MAIN OUT (L and R) fed by the DSP effects, AUX OUT 1 (L and R), and AUX OUT 2 (L and R) - all on 6.3 mm jacks, alongside a modern MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) implementation with DIN IN/OUT and USB-B connection - not forgetting, of course, the headphone output.
One of the major design considerations of Redshift 6 is to facilitate a versatile and capable analogue platform with a flexible UI (User Interface) for accommodating new engines, easily updatable via software. Since its oscillators can currently go from traditional twin oscillator to supersaw behaviours while living in perfect harmony with the multimode filter, as well as incorporating various different character profiles - and all this in user-friendly ways that are easily controllable and modulatable, the relatively diminutive desktop Redshift 6 is already punching above its weight. Weighing in at 3.5 kg in actual fact, an exciting future surely lies ahead for Supercritical’s inaugural desktop instrument.
Priced at £1,099 GBP/€1,259.00 EUR/$1,349.00 USD, Redshift 6 is available through Supercritical’s growing global network of distributors.