The very first time I had really “heard” a synthesizer played on a record was in 1970, when I picked up Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s first album. Sure, I had already heard many synthesizers played on classic albums from The Beatles, Rolling Stones and Beach Boys, but on those records the synthesizer was used mostly as a background to the vocal track – so I really did not take notice of just how cool a synth could sound. That was before I heard Keith Emerson’s solo on Lucky Man. When I cranked up my old Bose 901 speakers it just blew my mind. I can still remember saying “What is that”????? “That” was Keith playing a Moog Modular Synth. One of those defining moments.

Moving ahead forty years, I was (almost) able to get my hands on a Moog Modular synthesizer and create a library of sounds for it when Arturia released a virtual version of the classic synth. It may not sound quite a good as the original, but for a software version it does sound very good. It also did not cost me nearly as much as what the original is going for these days. I just noticed one on ebay going for 30K! For those kind of prices, I’ll be happy using the software version.

More info on our Moog Modular V collection can be found HERE.