Mutable Instruments Braids
Modular exclusive
Astonishingly sophisticated sound-generation
Braids, by French Eurorack pioneers Mutable Instruments, is not an oscillator.
It sort of looks like one, with fine and coarse pitch/frequency controls, a v/oct input, and voltage-controllable tone/timbre controls.
It even sort of sounds like one, in as far as it outputs audio.
Mutable Instruments call it a macro oscillator, but even that is an understatement. It’s a hugely sophisticated digital synthesis engine, able to produce and manipulate complex sounds by means of 45 or so fully-realized synthesis algorithms, featuring multiple oscillators, wavetables, filters, VCAs, ring modulators, and so on under the hood.
This plug-in REQUIRES Modular
Any sound you like
Classic waves from vintage synths, bells, resonant filters, plucked and bowed strings, vocals and vowel/formant sounds, wind instruments, percussion, noise, granular clouds and more.
Meta-parameters
'Timbre' and 'Colour' controls affect multiple different parameters per mode, morphing through all the sweet spots and ensuring every sound is lush, gorgeous, and useful.
Built-in envelope
Using the trigger input and built-in AD envelope, each algorithm can even become a self-contained synth voice. No other modules required.
"It’s so versatile and I just have to browse different settings in order to come up with something completely different. I use it for everything. Noisy flutes, lush chords, annoying percussion, and even some weird acid lines. If I could only use one oscillator while recording my next 12'', this would be it. Actually, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Stay tuned!"
Producer, DJ, remixer and artist
Digital macro-oscillator
In a sense, Braids can be looked at as both an encyclopedia of classic synthesis techniques, and a tool to bring them into the present-day, with tremendous sound-quality and ease-of-use to match.
Each mode represents a different, essential, and beautifully realised synth technique, with often very complex meta-patching going on behind the scenes. One, for example, features seven stacked and de-tuned sawtooth waves, while another passes a single oscillator waveform through a variable filter matrix to simulate vocal formants.
Incredible variety of sounds
Braids can produce an extraordinary variety of sounds, from 808-style drums to bowed strings, from bells and gongs to humanoid vowels, and from trance leads to Moog-ish basses. There's almost nothing this module can't do, especially in combination with other modules in your Modular system.
And what's more, it offers unprecedented ease-of-access to these sounds, with the heavy-lifting of the initial patch creation happening under the hood. All you have to do is select a mode, and use the two tone controls to find the precise flavor you want.
In short
- Macro oscillator featuring 40+ fully-realized digital synthesis algorithms.
- Produce millions of different sounds easily — classic waves and telecoms babble, bells and whistles, percussion and ambience.
- Just two controls morph through the sweet spots of each algorithm.
- Great for triggered percussion.
- Awesome for crazy complex waveform synthesis.
- Phenomenal for glitchy out-of-control modulated sounds.
- Incredibly deep, but easy to use.
- It’s like a library of the greatest synth sounds of all time.
- Requires Modular.
Have a listen
Dive deeper
One of the greatest things about a module this deep is that there's always more to learn.
So read the Softube Plug-ins Manual
…or Mutable Instruments’ own information on the hardware here
…or check out Bob Borries’ excellent unofficial diagrammatic manual here
…or watch this comprehensive video runthrough from Future Music
-
System requirements
- Mac OS X 10.12 or newer.
- Windows 64-bit, versions 7, 8 or 10.
- Intel Core 2 Duo, AMD Athlon 64 X2 or newer.
- Screen resolution 1280x800 or larger.
- 1 GB RAM or more, and at least 6 GB hard disk space for installation (individual plug-ins take less space).
- Any VST, VST3, AU, or AAX (Pro Tools 10.3.7*, 11.0.2 or higher) compatible host application.
- Softube account.
- iLok account.
- Internet access for downloading the plug-in(s) and managing the license(s).
- iLok generation 2 and up, if you intend to use an iLok dongle for authorizing your plug-ins (note that an iLok dongle is not a requirement).
-
All Softube plug-ins support both 32- and 64-bit hosts, although a 64-bit OS is required. Supported sample rates: 44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, 176.4 and 192 kHz, in both mono and stereo.
*Please Note: Pro Tools 10 is not officially qualified by Avid higher than OS X 10.8.
- Mac OS X 10.12 or newer.