Moog One

It caters to every need, from deep but
well-rounded basslines, to sparkling
chimelike tones; from lush, warm
electric piano sounds to otherworldly
crystalline soundscapes. I attribute
this partly to the wonderful oscillators
but mostly to the filters and
envelopes. The ability to assign each
oscillator to either the ladder or state
variable filter, in series or parallel, is
fantastic, as are the three envelopes.
The filter and amp envelopes are
what you’d expect from such an
instrument and the third makes it all
the more special. I really appreciate a
separate envelope generator for that
extra level of creative freedom. The
envelopes themselves are similar to
those of the Sub37, one of my other
favourite synths, and they range from
superfast and snappy to long, with a
lot of extra depth from things like
Loop and Latch. On top of that, and
similarly to the LFOs, each of them
has a destination button to quickly
assign envelopes.
Where I spend most of my time
with the One however tends to be
with modulation. The possibilities
here are endless and it is a breeze to
create evolving tones that twist and
warp, all the while staying
controllable via a multitude of input,
from aftertouch (sadly not polyphonic
though) to the great XY pad. I have
other synths with XY controls but
they often fall flat, unlike the One. As
with everything on the One,
modulation setup can be as simple
as assigning the most common
controls to an attribute, or you can
dive in to further levels of complexity
and this is where the large display
really comes in handy.
One to rule them all?
I’ve not even touched on the
awesome sequencer and arpeggiator,
or effects. They’re not the very best
available but surpass most built-in
offerings and the Eventide reverbs
sound wonderful. The chorus is
outshone by the (admittedly limited)
Juno’s, but still does a good job.
The One still looks and feels new
and inspires me every day and, if it
was a little lighter I’d happily gig with
it. In an ideal world it would have an
extra octave and the texture of the
black keys could be better but I’ll
forgive it all of that for its ability to
spark ideas and allow me to realise
them, without needing to dig around
in menus, meaning I actually use it
every day, and love doing so.
THE PROS & CONS
+
Incredibly versatile
sound design tools
Excellent
navigation via
controls and screen
Connects easily to
other gear with good
I/O ports
-
Large and heavy for
gigging musicians
Expensive
Really, it’s the sound
design workflow that sells
it for me
FM VERDICT
VALUE
••••••••••
BUILD
••••••••••
LONGEVITY
••••••••••
USEFULNESS
••••••••••
OVERALL
9.0
A beast of an
instrument. If you could
only ever own a single
synth then, well, the
clue is in the name
ONE OR THREE
It took me a while to get used to
One’s wilfully split personality but
I’m so glad I did. Being able to
effectively make it one, two, or
three separate synths is so useful.
Having a sequence set up on one,
a drone with a second and lead on
a third makes the One a very
playable standalone band in a box.
Creating multitimbral soundscapes
that can be split or layered, played,
or left running in the background
can feel like having the best of
modular, alongside the accessibility
of keys for a lead at the same time,
all from one instrument.
Moog One | Long term test
95
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