The rumours were true! Sample and software tycoon Vengeance-Sound has just released its first synthesizer. The key features of VPS Avenger include eight independently-routed oscillators, a step sequencer, an FFT spectrum filter, and even a full drum machine.
Computer Music magazine has bagged special early access to Avenger, which is demonstrated in the above video and reviewed in full in CM issue 238, on sale now.
Oscillators
Avenger can load eight sound generators, selectable from a list of everything from basic analogue waveforms to advanced wavetables and multisampled instruments. As is becoming a necessity with modern wavetable synths, there's also a 'draw-your-own' oscillator Editor in there, too.
The V-Saw section offers up to seven unison voices, detuned, panned and offset to taste, and the synth's Chorder allows for the creation of one-finger four-note chords, and features plenty of preset configurations.
Also in the oscillator section there are modulation controls, including Vibrato, Amplitude Modulation and Frequency Modulation (AM & FM) controls, bit reduction and formant filtering that you can use before sending your sounds of choice off for further processing.
Modules and routing
Any other synth sends oscillator signals through a number of modules before reaching the output, but VPS Avenger isn't any other synth. Instead, each oscillator signal is freely routable through any combination of processing modules. You could, for example, use one oscillator for a bassline, two for a pad sound and three for a lead sound, and route each through whichever processors you see fit.
Avenger can host between four and eight of each module type, with processors drawn from other Vengeance-Sound plugin algorithms.
- Gain
- Pitch
- Arpeggiator
- Step Sequencer
- Filter 1
- Filter 2
- Filter 3
- Shaper 1
- Shaper 2
- Reverb
- Delay
- Master Filter
- FX1
- FX2
Drum machine
Alongside VPS Avenger's oscillators is something new. We don't have to think too hard before confirming that we've never seen a drum machine in a synth before, but Vengeance-Sound has gone there, adding a host of sample-based drum kits into Avenger.
The drum machine gets its own sequencer module and output mixer, but its signal can also be piped through the same list of effects as any oscillator. Samples can be tweaked with basic sampling features such as start time, pitch, volume, and amplitude envelope controls.
Mixer
A full mixer is included, giving you ultimate control over each oscillator's signal before it leaves the synth. Created in the style of a traditional mixing desk, it offers faders, panning, and muting/soloing of each output signal. 'Submix' faders are then available for both the eight oscillators and the drums output, followed by a master fader for the entire output.
VPS Avenger has just been released in VST/AU/AAX formats for €199. You can read the exclusive review in Computer Music issue 238, and get the plugin directly from the Vengeance-Sound website.
