VIKTOR'SMODULAR_SYNTHDIARY

Using Pachinko (Marbles clone) as a clock. Topic from a session with Matthew.

A collection of SVG album cover illustrations generated by Claude Code — abstract interpretations of iconic electronic/ambient albums.

Artists

Amon Tobin — ISAM

Ana Roxanne

Aphex Twin — SAW

Autechre — Confield

Barbieri — Ecstatic Computation

Basinski — Disintegration Loops

Ben Frost — Aurora

Beverly Glenn-Copeland

Charles Cohen

Ciani — Buchla Concerts

Cortini — Volume Massimo

Deepchord — Hash-Bar Loops

Emily Sprague

Grouper — Ruins

Hainbach

Iasos

Joanna Brouk

Julianna Barwick

KAS — EARS

Kelly Moran

Laraaji — Radiance

Lawrence English

Loscil — Submers

Mark Fell — Multistability

Midori Takada

Porter Ricks — Biokinetics

Radigue — Trilogie

Rhythm & Sound

Sarah Davachi

Stars of the Lid

Suzanne Kraft

Tim Hecker — Ravedeath

Todd Barton

Visible Cloaks

Vladislav Delay — Multila

Whitman — Playthroughs

Clicks & Cuts Moodboard

Clicks+Cuts Vol.1

Oval — Systemisch

Pole — 1

Alva Noto — Transform

Ryoji Ikeda — Dataplex

Fennesz — Endless Summer

Pan Sonic — Vakio

Jelinek — Loop-Finding-Jazz

Richard Devine — Creature

The core concept is elegant: a gate signal has a sharp transient attack followed by a sustain and release. By driving the QPAS’s radiate/resonance into self-oscillation, you can treat the filter itself as a pitched sound source, and then use the gate (often via an envelope) to excite it — like physically striking a tuned resonator.

The Core Technique: Filter Ping

The QPAS has a pair of bandpass filters in a stereo configuration with its unique Radiate parameter controlling the interaction between them. When you push Radiate high and increase Q (resonance), the filters approach and eventually enter self-oscillation — they ring at their cutoff frequencies like tuning forks.

A short trigger or gate sent to the audio input (or used to modulate the input level via a VCA) causes the filters to “ping” — they ring out at their tuned frequency and naturally decay. This is the same physics as hitting a bell or a drum: an impulse excites a resonant body, which then decays at its natural frequency.

Basic patch:

• Send a gate or trigger from your clock/sequencer into a fast envelope (e.g. Zadar or Maths)
• Run the envelope into a VCA, with white noise or the gate itself as the audio input
• Patch that VCA output into QPAS audio input
• Set QPAS resonance high (close to or at self-oscillation)
• The Radiate parameter controls the stereo character — low Radiate = both filters in phase (thicker, mono-ish), high Radiate = filters spread into stereo image

Drum Voices You Can Make

Kick drum: Tune QPAS low (60–100 Hz range), hit it with a short impulse, then modulate the cutoff frequency downward with a fast envelope (pitch drop is key for a convincing kick). The Zadar is great here — use one channel as the audio envelope, another for cutoff CV with a sharp initial peak that falls fast.

Tom / resonant thud: Slightly higher tuning, slower pitch envelope decay, moderate Q. The QPAS’s stereo bandpass character gives toms a rich spatial quality that mono filters don’t.

Hi-hat / snare-adjacent texture: Mix noise into the input, tune QPAS higher, use very short gate/envelope. Adjust Radiate to spread the stereo image — high Radiate creates a nice wash. Adding both cutoffs spread apart creates a more complex, metallic texture.

Clap / transient crack: Very short ping, fast envelope, mid-high frequency, high Q but not quite self-oscillating. The transient becomes the sound rather than the sustain.

Cowbell / metallic perc: This is where QPAS really shines. Because it has two filters, you can tune them to non-harmonically related frequencies (say, a minor 7th or minor 9th interval apart). The two pitches beating against each other create that characteristic metallic inharmonicity. Push Radiate to control how separated vs. blended they are.

Key Parameters to Modulate

The QPAS has dedicated CV inputs that make this really playable:

• ωA and ωB (the two cutoff frequencies) — Sweep these with a fast envelope for pitch drop/pitch bend. Patching both from the same envelope with slight offset between them creates movement.
• Radiate — Modulate with a slow LFO for evolving stereo width on repeating hits
• Q — Dynamic resonance control, can push into self-oscillation territory on peaks
• ΔFreq — Offsets the two cutoffs relative to each other; modulating this creates metallic shimmer

Deep dive into Clicks & Cuts — a movement in experimental electronic music where artists deliberately embraced digital errors, glitches, and sonic artifacts as primary creative material. Named after the Mille Plateaux compilation series (2000).

Key Artists

• Oval (Markus Popp) — physically damaged CDs to create glitch loops
• Alva Noto (Carsten Nicolai) — sine waves, granular synthesis, co-founded Raster-Noton
• Ryoji Ikeda — ultra-minimalist, converts data into sound and barcode visuals
• Pole (Stefan Betke) — dub meets glitch via a broken Waldorf 4-Pole filter
• Pan Sonic — raw analog minimalism, self-built electronics
• Fennesz — guitar processed through laptops into lush glitch textures
• Richard Devine — all-modular records, essential reference for Eurorack C&C

Sonic Palette

Microscopic clicks & pops, digital buffer glitches, extreme frequency exploration, pointillist textures, dub-influenced bass and space, granular clouds, and silence as a compositional element.

Modular Synth Artists

The original C&C movement was largely laptop/software-based — the modular world inherited and evolved the aesthetic as Eurorack exploded. These artists bridge the two worlds:

• Richard Devine — the most direct overlap. Last three records made entirely out-of-the-box on his massive Eurorack system. Rapid clicks, metallic thrums, scattering beats — clicks & cuts realized in hardware
• Keith Fullerton Whitman — moved from laptop glitch (Playthroughs) into hybrid digital-analog modular. His album Occlusions is subtitled “Real Time Music for Hybrid Digital-Analogue Modular Synthesizer”
• Pan Sonic (Mika Vainio) — self-built electronics and raw analog circuits. Not Eurorack, but fully in the spirit of DIY hardware minimalism
• Marcus Fischer — Eurorack, tape loops, and field recordings in a quiet microsound aesthetic. More restrained than Devine but very much in the genre
• Mouse on Mars — Jan St. Werner collaborated with Peter Blasser (Ciat-Lonbarde) to create the Clicker, a synth for “microsecond orchestras” — clicks & cuts philosophy made physical
• Hainbach — Ciat-Lonbarde synths, test equipment, and Eurorack for glitchy ambient textures

Notable hardware: Møffenzeef Mødular built Eurorack modules specifically for clicks & cuts style glitch percussion.

Modular Synth Takeaways

• Sound sources: Granular modules (Morphagene, Arbhar), ultrashort envelopes (<1ms = click), FM at extreme ratios, self-oscillating filters
• Processing: Extreme bandpass filtering, sample & hold for bit-crush, wavefolder distortion, feedback through delay lines
• Sequencing: Chaotic clock sources, probabilistic triggers (Marbles, Branches), Bernoulli gates, sub-audio LFOs modulating everything slowly

See the full Clicks & Cuts mood board for the complete timeline, discography, labels, and visual language reference.