Synth gems: Joachim’s TB4005 VSTi

From time to time i’m getting asked about the plugins i use and since sharing production experiences is a good thing, i’m going to present some of the things that i regularly use and why.

One of those that keep jumping in my face since quite a while is Joachim’s lovely TB4005 synth. The name might imply it’s yet another 303 mockup in disguise but that’s not the case. For the records, the original instrument was one of the earliest Buzztracker synthesizers developed by Arguru (the head behind DiscoDSP, R.I.P.).

In facts and figures it’s a neutral sounding, monophonic synth with a simple lowpass filter, 6 osc waveforms and 15 chord modes with virtually no cpu usage. All in all it offers 9 parameters using the hosts user interface due to the lack of an own graphical one (screenshot taken from Ableton Live).

When i first discovered the original synth back then i went through the different chords and i instantly realized it’s the perfect techno machine. Whenever i have no idea where to start from i put TB4005 in charge, fire up some minors and see what happens. The perfect device for those uninspired days. The legato-alike playmode with implemented portamento is just fine for those rubberish basslines, i rarely end up without having something i dig. I’m sure people like Rob Hood and Moritz von Oswald would actually love it.

Due to the lack of an own distinctive sound character it’s also quite easy to bend its color towards your liking. It easily finds its place in the mix and the filter decay has a good amount of punch on the backhand if necessary. Did i mention it’s free?

Okay, enough bubbles. You can download it from Joachim’s website where you’ll find some more sound examples as well.

Demos by various people:
Detroit/Minimal

Funky shit

Dubbish