My favorite thing from Superbooth, the one thing I’d pull out a wallet right away and get? It’s none other than Dreadbox’s utterly brutal-sounding, wildly fun analog semi-modular groove synth for Eurorack or desktop.

Things that do beats and things that do basslines, things that have some patch points, kits, stuff that fits in a Eurorack or desktop – you’ve seen that before. But the Dysmetria has two things going for it: one, an irresistible impulse-buy price, and two, it just sounds fantastically fun.

So the architecture is deceptively simple. You’ve got a sequencer, oscillators with noise and tuning and waveshape, simple decay control for amp envelope, and filter. It almost looked vanilla when I saw it from a distance. But then you get your hands on it, and there are a few details that stand out:

A post shared by Peter Kirn (@pkirn)

I love stuff like the semi-modular range from Moog, for instance, but this feels like a down-and-dirty machine for live jams in a way I haven’t seen from its rivals. This wasn’t even the only semi-modular at Superbooth, but sound and playability and look all stood out for me. The kit build also looks approachable. You will be doing some soldering, but there’s already a power board pre-assembled, and it’s all through-hole. Resistors are a little close, so I definitely wouldn’t take this on as my first soldering project, but it looks like it might actually be satisfying for anyone with a little experience who loves that solder smell. Plus you can use leaded solder and… shhh. Don’t tell anyone I said that. Please take precautions.

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