The Analog Revival and the Return of Modular — A Longing for Imperfection

The Backlash Against Digital

After the DX7 (Article 6), electronic keyboards advanced toward “perfect digital” — pitch became stable, tones could be recalled endlessly, and sampling reproduced real-world sounds with precision. And yet, in the 90s, people began to crave the opposite. A longing for the thick, warm, slightly unstable sound of analog synths.

Used analog machines that had once been discarded as “outdated” and “inconvenient” now soared in price, and manufacturers themselves moved to recreate the analog sound. This was a “return to imperfection” in the history of electronic keyboards.

Nord Lead (1995) — The Opening Shot of Virtual Analog

The Nord Lead, released by Sweden’s Clavia in 1995, was an instrument that symbolized this backlash.

• VA (Virtual Analog) — digitally simulating (modeling) the circuitry of analog synths
• Producing the thick sound of analog while, thanks to being digital, keeping pitch stable and allowing presets to be stored
• A striking red chassis with a panel built around analog-style knobs

Having it both ways — “the sound of analog” and “the convenience of digital” — became one of the mainstream approaches from then on. The sound of analog was no longer the circuitry itself, but “the ideal sound to be reproduced.”

The TB-303 — A Failed Product That Gave Birth to a Genre

The most dramatic example of the analog revival is the Roland TB-303.

• Released in 1982. Built as a bass accompaniment machine, but panned as “not sounding like a real bass” and discontinued soon after
• Yet once it began circulating cheaply used, young people started using it for fun, drawn to its squelchy, electronic sound
• The “acid” sound produced by aggressively sweeping the filter gave birth to an entire new genre: acid house / techno

“A failure as an instrument” turned into “the star of a new kind of music” — a reversal unique to electronic keyboards. Just like the TR-808/909 in Article 6, this is a prime example of “unnaturalness” itself becoming value.

The Return of Modular Synths — Eurorack

And then, the modular synthesizer we saw in Article 3 (parts connected by patch cables, the earliest form of the Moog) made a dramatic comeback in the 21st century. The key was the Eurorack standard.

• Standardizing module size and power allowed manufacturers and individual builders alike to freely create modules
• Users combine whichever modules they like to build a synth of their own
• A culture that delights in patching itself — the opposite of “efficiency”

This is a modern-day return of the Buchla philosophy from Article 3 — “a device for exploring new sonic territory,” “deliberately made inconvenient.” It stood as a clear antithesis to the preset-selecting culture of the FM era (Article 6).

Why Does “Imperfection” Become Value?

What the analog revival and the resurgence of modular reveal is a paradoxical maturation of the electronic keyboard:

• Perfect digital was convenient, but was felt to be “too predictable” and “lacking in interest”
• Analog’s slight pitch drift, unit-to-unit variation, and unpredictable filter behavior were reappraised as “rawness” and “character”
• At the far end of efficiency, people deliberately sought out effort and chance

This is another answer to the question that runs through this series — “what is authenticity?” Just as violinists keep pursuing 300-year-old masterworks, electronic keyboards, too, came to pursue “the lost feel of analog.”

Everything Becomes Software

That said, the moment VA achieved “emulating analog in the digital domain,” the next development was inevitable — reproducing any synth at all, inside software on a computer, without even needing dedicated hardware. An era in which the Moog, the DX7, and the TB-303 alike are brought back to life with a single plugin.

The next article follows this age of software synths and DAWs — the final stage in which the electronic keyboard leaves its physical box behind and fits inside anyone’s PC.