Vintage review Synthi AKS
By Norman Fay
From Voltage Magazine 87-88

When I heard the recent news that much of Keith Emerson's collection of old keyboard instruments was to be sold at auction, it got me thinking about the phenomenon of "celebrity owned" instruments. It seems to me that to wish to own an instrument once owned by a well-known musician is quite a strange thing. It isnīt something I've often aspired to, I must confess, although there are exceptions, of course. For me, Iīd love to own Brian Jones' Mellotron, as played on the Rolling Stones' "2000 Light Years From Home". I do own, though, an instrument which has passed through the hands of two of my favourite keyboard players, namely Tim Blake of Gong and Simon House of Hawkwind, and though I didn't know this when I bought it, I wasn't half pleased when I found out.

Back in the early-to-mid eighties there was a rather good, and rather
weird rock band doing the rounds of small venues in Britain. Called
"Inner City Unit", they were in part the brainchild of one Nik Turner,
who had previously been the saxophonist/vocalist for Hawkwind in the
seventies. I had the good fortune to support them a couple of times, and the first time I did this, I was most interested to note that Fred
Reeves, the band's keyboard player, used a EMS Synthi AKS as part of his keyboard rig. Now, like many readers I'm sure, I had in the past been completely freaked out by the film of Roxy Music on "Old Grey whistle Test" in which the band played, I think, "Ladytron" with Brian Eno manipulating an EMS VCS3 to great effect. It's a great piece of footage, and despite all that's happened in music since, the band still sound totally far out today.

Since originally seeing this footage, I'd got into groups and musicians
like Hawkwind, Gong, Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schultze, Tim Blake, and on reading the sleeve-notes of their records, had noticed that they all used EMS instruments as part of their sound. As you can then imagine, once I began playing synthesiser, I was very keen to have a go on one of these strange instruments, but as I'm sure you're all aware, though, there aren't a lot of them around, so ICU's instrument was the first one I'd ever seen!

About eighteen months after I'd first seen the band, they split up,
having got fed up with trudging around the country in their transit van.
Their road manager contacted me, and asked if I'd be interested in
buying the AKS, as Nik Turner, to whom it belonged, had no more use for
it.

-"How much?" I asked.
-"Ahh, about 250 pounds"
-"Done!"

In this age of inflated prices, this may seem cheap, though it certainly
wasn't to me at the time. The instrument was pretty battered too,
although everything worked. I bought it from Turner several weeks later,
but Fred had the manual and I had to wait a couple of months until he
was playing in the north before I could get it. When he gave it to me,
it was with the words "From Tim Blake, to Simon House, to Nik Turner, to you". As you can imagine, this made my day!

So what had I bought? A most unusual instrument, that's for sure. The
SYNTHI AKS lives in a little ABS plastic briefcase. The SYNTHI A is the sound-producing half, whilst the KS is a digital sequencer, with an
awful (though very space-efficient) touch-plate kevboard, similar to
that on the WASP. The SYNTHI A was available on its own, if you didn'
need the sequencing facilities (early versions can not power the KS,
morgans annotation)

Electronically, the SYNTHI A is identical to the cash-register shaped
VCS3, and although the VCS3 is easier to use due to its shape and layout (it also looks cooler, if vou're daft enough to worry about such things ...) I prefer the compactness and easy portability of the A(KS). As far as sound-producing facilities go the AKS isn't really like other
electronic instruments one encounters, old or new. You get three
oscillators, each of which is different. VCO1 has controls for frequency
(lHz to IOKHZ), level controls for two waveforms, sine and sawtooth, and a shape control for the sine wave. This sounds rather good. and varies the waveshape from a rounded W shape, through sine
shape, to a rounded M shape. VC02 has an identical frequency control,
but the waveshapes are now variable pulse and variable triangle
(sawtooth-triangle-reverse sawtooth), with the shape controls effecting
both waveforms. VC03's wavefonn controls are identical to VC02's, but
the frequency control now goes from 0.5 to 50OHz, so VC03 is mainly for LFO/control rather than audio duties. The oscillators on EMS gear are notoriously unstable, and the tuning on my AKS is very prone to
dfifting. (Norman 2001 note - I checked recently, and the oscillators
have been "stabilised", but I believe this was a long time ago) I don't
see this as a problem though, if you want stable tuning, there are
plenty of other synths to choose from, both analogue and digital. It is
possible to get the oscillators stabilised by EMS, if you feel the need.

The other signal source in the AKS is the noise generator, which has
controls for level and "colour" i.e. white and pink noise. The pink
noise sounds fantastic, very powerful. To process your sound sources,
the AKS has a ring modulator and a low pass resonant filter. Apparently, several players have modified their SYNTHI A's and VC3's by replacing EMS's filter with a Moog filter. This baffles me, I must admit, as one can easily patch the EMS to the external input of a Moog. The EMS filter sounds very nice to me, and why anyone would want to make different synths sound the same, I don't know. The AKS also has a reverb built in, obviously not a digital reverb, but the old spring type. It sounds really good, actually, in a "forbidden planet" kind of way. Finally, there are two control voltage sources, the joystick, which thanks to Brian Eno's escapades with Roxy Music, is one of the best-known features on EMSī instruments, it has controls for horizontal and vertical range, and it's great fun to use. Beside the joystick is the trigger button for the other CV source, the envelope generator. This certainly is a weird one, it has four controls, "attack", "on" i.e. hold time, "decay" i.e. release, and "off' which when turned fully clockwise has no effect, but which as vou turn it anticlockwise causes the EG to retrigger at an increasing rate.

There are also two controls for signal level and "trapezoid" i.e.
control voltage level. It's a shame though that the AKS has only one of
these envelope generators. As well as this lot you also get two inputs
for control voltages or audio signals, so you can process external
sounds through the AKSīs filter, ring modulator and so on. There is also a little stereo amplifier built in with a tiny speaker in each top
corner. Handy if you want to mess about with the AKS without switching everything else on.

I've left the best till last here, the heart of the AKS is the patchbay,
a 16 by 16 matrix of tiny little sockets, into which one pushes patch
pins, which look like miniaturised stereo jack plugs, to connect two
functions together. For example, if you want to modulate the VCF cut-
off frequency with the envelope generator, find the row marked
"trapezoid", follow it until it intersects the column marked "filter
frq", insert a pin there, then adjust the trapezoid level knob until you
get the effect you want. It's easier than it sounds, honest! The best
thing about the patchbay is that vou can connect anything to anything
else, a good one for really weird sounds is to have VC01 modulating
VCO2, VC02 modulating VC03 and VC03 modulating VCO1 - a different
meaning for the term "ring modulation"! I once got an amazing sound this way, a kind of electronic warbling, which built up in intensity for
about two minutes, before breaking down into noise, and starting again.
I wish I'd recorded it, because of course, I've never managed to get it
exactly the same again. The patch pins come in several different
varieties, white, grey, green, yellow and red. Unfortunately, my manual
doesn't tell you what the different pin colours signify, though the
green ones seem to attenuate the output of the device they're connected to. (norman 2001 note: the red ones have more precise resistors in them than the white ones) Although the patching system of the AKS is neat and compact, I do experience some problems with crosstalk. No doubt this is repairable by replacing the pin matrix though, and my instrument is a very old example. Watch out for this if you're looking at a second-hand EMS instrument, as I don't know how much it would cost to repair - I suspect it could be expensive! Another problem with the patching system is the patchpins themselves, which are very fragile, and not easily repairable.

I've owned my SYNTHI AKS for about eight years now, in which time I have found it useful in the following areas:

General goofing about - this instrument has fun potential like no other
synth I've ever owned, you can just sit and make weird noises for hours,
none of which, of course, have any musical value at all! highly
enjoyable, though.

Sample Fodder - if your sampler has good sound Processing functions,
then the AKS is an excellent source of unusual waveforms, which you can loop inside the sampler, and use to make your own unique sounds.

Processing other instruments - a wide variety of unusual effects can be
added to any sound source, the best-known example of this being the
"dalek" voices from "Doctor Who", created using the ring modulator.

Space-rock/Weird post-punk music - If you play in a band influenced by
Hawkwind, Gong, Ozric Tentacles, Pere Ubu, Metal Urbain, Cabaret
Voltaire, Stereolab, (2001 - add N to X) etc, then an AKS should be
right up your street.

Weird electronic music - If your into tape loops, musique concrete,
Stockhausen and so on, then the chances are you probably already own one!

Where the Synthi AKS falls down is in the production of more "normal"
music forms, it's almost impossible to play a tune on one, for example,
and if you're looking for "good bass sounds", forget it, because this
synth wasn't meant for such mundane chores!

It's a shame there aren't more of these instruments around, they were
usually quite expensive second-hand anyway, and now that they are
considered "rare" and "collectable" they are obviously even more so. The last one I saw for sale, a VCS3, had a price tag of Ģ1400 attached to it, which seemed much to me, as it was a rather tatty example, It
eventually sold for Ģ1200, which perhaps is a bit more reasonable. If
you are looking at one, and the seller is asking a very high price, then
contact EMS as they can still offer newly built VCS3īs for Ģ1800.
(norman 2001 note - this was the case when I wrote this. Check with EMS for current prices and avaiability) If you already have a VCS3 or an AKS then it's well worth contacting EMS for their list of modifications and service charges, as commendably, they still support their instruments.

Finally, if you want to hear EMS sounds on record try the following:
Tim Blake - "New Jerusalem" - Mantra 068 (CD)
Hawkwind - "Space Ritual" - United Artists UAD60038 (LP)
Gong - "Angels Egg" - Virgin (CD)
Franco Battiato - "Clic" - Island IILPS9323 (LP)


EMS VCS3/Synthi A Modifications:

Oscillator stabilisation - minimises drift (priced per osc)
Metal-can dual transistors for oscillators (priced per osc)
Oscillator Sync - variable via potentiometer (priced per osc)

Voltage Controlled Shape (priced per osc)
Hi/Lo frequency range - switchable (priced per osc)
Portamento/glide
Attack time extension - increased to 5 seconds

Voltage Controlled Filter Response ('Q')
10-turn pots on input channels - for easier tuning (each)
Centre-zero trapezoid gives bipolar output
External Gate input socket - uses one Control Output socket
Patchable Voltage Inverter
Extra Input Channel