Mutronics Mutator Vs. Shurman Filterbank?

norrin radd · Post by **norrin radd** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 1:06 am

hellooo thar, this is my first post so please excuse any n00bery, but as mostly a guitar player im sadly under-educated in the synth world. basicaly what i want to do it run a roland sp-404, boss space echo (the pedel one) and mutator together into my guitar rig and along with a drummer and a bass player, rock out some heavy arse dub. my problem is the mutator is discontinued and being the one i really think i want, im gathering info.

what are the real differances between the 2? do i even have any grounds to compare them? the only reason i ask is becasue in a few places iv seen, people have said they swiched from mutators to the filterbank. how do they differ in terms of features? how close to eachother do they sound? any info would be amazeing and greatly appricated...

thanks alot -John

rivas3 · Post by **rivas3** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 2:29 am

first of all man, they are completely different. i mean, basically the mutuator is more of a sweet filter, great features, f**k sweet. the filterbank will just crush your sound and take it to anothe world, alot more than just filter.
heres the deal , im not gonna go into them and their features. but what i suggest is looking into the moog mf101 low pass filter. its the closest thing you are gonna find to a mutator that is being made today, its affordable, sounds f**k awesome, has CV. check it out. plus they have a whole line of other moogerfoogers that will sound great together.

http://www.moogmusic.com/detail.php?main_product_id=5

Post by **shaft9000** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 2:46 am

the mutator is true stereo, while the sherman is mono in and 2 out. unless you're putting a whole mix or some patently stereo sound thru the sherman its not much of a problem.

my experience with the mutator is limited to some studio noodling. daft punk used one all over their first album, among some others.
i have a sherman mk2 currently.

that said, the mutator is smoother all-around, and the resonance is sweeter. the sherman is initially very difficult to tame - but after some practice it can be made to behave quite smoothly and imparts a throaty arp or eml-like tone. the resonance on the sherman is tricky - it doesn't self-oscillate like most filters - more of a squealy sound unless you get some EG-action to smooth it out a bit. then the resonance gets much more useful - pretty charming really- even squirty-cute at times.

the sherman's 'claim-to-fame' is the gain knob - turn it past 50%and it absolutely destroys and pumps up anything you put through it. some complain about this aspect making the sherman seem one-dimensional, especially if they have little experience with programming semi-modular gear - but nothing is further from the truth. it's the most versatile piece of gear i've ever used, and it's sound is (often ridiculously) BIG, dynamic and reminds me a lot of classic vintage gear long before digital came on the scene. it can integrate into ANY setup and provide semi-modular flexibility.

the sherman is really a comprehensive synthesizer minus oscillators, whereas the mutator is more of a botique filterbox/envelope follower.

eventually i'd like another sherman and a mutator to go with it, but that's a long way off....

GeneralBigbag · Post by **GeneralBigbag** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 2:57 am

For dub you'll be wanting the Mutator, it's a smooth, clean filter, and it's stereo, which helps hugely. The Sherman is much grittier, and although most people that own one don't actually know how to use it for anything besides signal destruction, you'd need to want to make a gritty kind of dub.
I personally can't get enough of mine, I run practically everything through it.
Like people say, you might want to consider the moogerfooger idea, but there are a number of options:

Vermona DAF
Eowave Filterbug
both of these are stereo 24db low pass filters that will cost you a whole lot less than a Mutator

Evolver Desktop - It's a synth, but you can run audio through it, it's an incredible FX unit, with stereo 12/24 db low pass filters

Or, you can spend an incredible amount of money and buy the Schipmann Ebbe und Flut, which, from what I hear, sounds incredible. It's 2 filters with seperate inputs and outputs, but it's not designed as a stereo unit.

Also, the Mutators aren't exactly out of production, it's just that they aren't easy to get this side of the ditch.

Hades · Post by **Hades** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 4:13 am

nothing much I can say about the difference between the 2 that hasn't been said by others already...

a couple of months ago, I was planning on buying a mutator from some guy that eventually tried selling it to 4 different people or something here on VSE.
anyways, he tried saying they were out of production, but then this guy from mutronics popped up saying they were still in business all right.
that was perhaps a year ago or so
so it would surprise me if they went out of business by now.

norrin radd · Post by **norrin radd** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 4:38 am

man, thanks for all the info! i dont have enough time tonight to throughly research all the suggestions but i looked quickly at them all and in my travels across the vast interweb came across something like the moog 101, the frostwave resonator, and another filter which was the EH Bi-Filter and was just wondering what you though about those 2, i just say the EH kuz i know there guitar effects are good so hopefully they carry through...

p.s. the sound(s) im aiming for are regular spacy dub and also kinda wanna go into stuff like this...
http://www.dubtrio.com/newheavy/

thanks again for all the help so far

Dirk · Post by **Dirk** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 4:51 am

If your into DUB, get the Mutator.
The Sherman sounds harsh compared to the mutator.
The mutator uses cem chips if I recall correct.
Alternatively you could get a Doepfer diy power suply and some filter modules. I think this could be even better than the mutator.

GeneralBigbag · Post by **GeneralBigbag** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 7:15 am

I forgot:
If you're patient, and have about $800, you could also consider the Waldorf X-Pole.

konvert · Post by **konvert** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 7:35 am

This seems like a good place to ask:

Does anybody know anything about EHX Bifilter?

It seems like a cool piece of kit. Too bad the audiodemo doesn't work.

GeneralBigbag · Post by **GeneralBigbag** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 7:37 am

There's one in my local. I've been thinking about checking it out, I could let you know, if you're really interested.

konvert · Post by **konvert** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:10 am

GeneralBigbag wrote:There's one in my local. I've been thinking about checking it out, I could let you know, if you're really interested.

Was that answer to my question?
If so, I'm very interested! There's one available to me, I could use part of my tax refunds for it if it sounds as nice as I expect EHX to sound.
And it's cheaper thatn Sherman too. (That's the main reason I'm considering EHX)

ThinkTanx · Post by **ThinkTanx** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:11 am

I'm kind of curious about all this outboard filter stuff too.

I'm seriously considering selling my Voyager, and I thought that maybe rather than getting another synth (other than the 777 I already have coming), I may get some more nice hardware fx.

Right now, essentially all I've got is the MuRF and the Line 6 DL-4.

I have considered a Sherman a lot before, but I just wish it was stereo. I guess they have the 2x2 now, which is a thought. But if I were gonna spend that much I might just jump up to the Ebbe and Flut, although that is a ton of cash for a filtering device (even if it appears to be the baddest, most complex filter ever).

Ahh... just more things to consider.

piRoN · Post by **piRoN** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:13 am

I've got a Bi-Filter. It's a fairly tame filter really, nice and round but nowhere near as edgy as some of the other options. Where it really excels is doing complex dual-filter sounds, especially using the phase-invert switches in the mixer to create interesting cancellations and such - that might sound boring but it effectively quadruples the available sonic palette. It's also got an effects loop, so you can use the original signal's dynamics to control the filter, then do nasty things to it with some external hardware before it hits the filters.

It's not the sort of thing where you chuck it onto your signal chain and create instant sonic annihilation; it's more of a 'special sauce' kind of thing when you've got a nice sound but want to take it that extra bit further. That said, you can turn boring drum machine rhythms into some pretty wild sequences with all sorts of filtering and phasing sounds flying around.

konvert · Post by **konvert** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:19 am

piRoN wrote:I've got a Bi-Filter. It's a fairly tame filter really, nice and round but nowhere near as edgy as some of the other options. Where it really excels is doing complex dual-filter sounds, especially using the phase-invert switches in the mixer to create interesting cancellations and such - that might sound boring but it effectively quadruples the available sonic palette. It's also got an effects loop, so you can use the original signal's dynamics to control the filter, then do nasty things to it with some external hardware before it hits the filters.

It's not the sort of thing where you chuck it onto your signal chain and create instant sonic annihilation; it's more of a 'special sauce' kind of thing when you've got a nice sound but want to take it that extra bit further. That said, you can turn boring drum machine rhythms into some pretty wild sequences with all sorts of filtering and phasing sounds flying around.

Sounds like it could be for me then. I'm so totally not after any sonic annihilation. My music does not go into that territory at all, that's why I'm little shy for Sherman.

norrin radd · Post by **norrin radd** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 11:12 pm

cool, thanks guys. just wondering still if anyone knew anything about the frostwave resonator>? thanks again for all the help!