Kastle - pocket modular synthesizer

[h4ndcrafted]

Pair it one of these, just bought it for 15 squids and it goes really loud without distorting, and it's only 8cm wide.

Got 1/8 jack input USB recharble

link pls? takk

JBL GO.
They are cheap on amazon sometimes, especially unpopular colours. I got mine from a supermarket over here , Sainsbury's, they were doing them for £15 but retail is normally £25.
A lot of sound for such a tiny thing, not much under 80hz though.

[h4ndcrafted]

smetak, FWIW I've switched all my batteries to Sanyo Eneloops (AA and AAA) and iPower 9V rechargeables, and they all are absolutely best-of-breed when it comes to rechargeables. These models all hold charge on the shelf quite well and work perfectly in the devices I use them in (Ciat Lonbarde synths, Grendel Drone Commander, Monotrons, Mini Kaoss Pad, etc.).

I'm not one for chiptune or 8-bit everything, but the Kastle has some sort of crackle and pop and funk that's musical to my ears, a very pleasing gritty texture. Definitely considering one. Plus: Rungler!

+1 for Eneloops, stay charged well when not in use also.

[DeanG]

My micro granny needs a friend.. I think I will get one.

[banalytic]

two new videos:

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[mousegarden]

This is cool.

[beaver]

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[smetak]

smetak, FWIW I've switched all my batteries to Sanyo Eneloops (AA and AAA) and iPower 9V rechargeables, and they all are absolutely best-of-breed when it comes to rechargeables. These models all hold charge on the shelf quite well and work perfectly in the devices I use them in (Ciat Lonbarde synths, Grendel Drone Commander, Monotrons, Mini Kaoss Pad, etc.).

I'm not one for chiptune or 8-bit everything, but the Kastle has some sort of crackle and pop and funk that's musical to my ears, a very pleasing gritty texture. Definitely considering one. Plus: Rungler!

+1 for Eneloops, stay charged well when not in use also.

Haven't touched chargeble batteries in centuries! Yep, with that in mind, I may consider walking out of Control with one of these gizmos in my bag. This thing really sounds funky! Great to pester my wife......

These kids from Bastl are really coming out with some weird & wonderful stuff.

[starthief]

I bet this interfaces nicely with an Olegtron 4060.

[Infinity Curve]

Mine just arrived. Only spent a couple minutes with it so far but first impression:

It's TINY!! I knew it was small, but it takes 3x AA batteries and isn't much bigger than that. Layout is good, patching seems fine. I have fairly big hands, and no issues with knobs even when patched. No battery cover on the back, but not a big deal.

It sounds HUGE!! Plugged it into one of those little accordion Bluetooth speaker things the missus has, turned it on and the bass had the entire table shaking!! Modulation sounds sweet on the various inputs, the asr/rungler/s+h dealies seems cool, will be useful.

The different oscillator modes all sound pretty beefy, and different from each other. Really impressed with the sound of it to be honest, wasn't expecting near this quality for what it cost.

This thing is going to be an absolute beast for drones and weirdness, stoked to hook it up to some pedals, and utitlize the I/o jacks with expression biz. Mayhem will ensue

So ya, anybody on the fence on this guy, just go for it!! You won't be disappointed.

Might try and get some recordings tonight or over the weekend if any interest

[Astrolabe23]

Anyone know if this is available from a U.S. Retailer currently? (Nov/Dec 2016) The only place I found that it looked to be in-stock was asking $120 where-as several others have it for pre-order at $80. Looks like a good stocking stuffer for myself if I can find one.

[Infinity Curve]

I pre-ordered direct from bastl. With fed ex shipping option it arrived to me in about 2 weeks from when I got the shipping confirmation

[PewPew]

Hey guys, I'm Luke from Bastl Instruments,
this is an e-mail I sent to all our customers who ordered Kastle.

"Hello there,

this is an informative e-mail for all our Kastle customers.

We recieved your order and we know about you.

You haven't heard from us because we have so much work with building such a big number of Kastles that we had to cut some priority to other our products. We didn't even expect such a high demand and since we're a small team of enthusiasts, we're also learning to deal with this new situation.

We're trying to do our best to send it to you asap, because we realize how hot it is, but still we would really appreciate your patience, because this is something we really need the most right now.

We send about 40-50 Kastles every week to all of you and we're trying to keep it that way, because we don't really want to rush it to the point that you'll get some incomplete piece of garbage.

Some of you have a combination with bitRanger or Microgranny and that will take some time too, because again - there is a priority issue.

Some of you already asked about your order so take this email as a full explanation of this situation at our HQ.

If you have your order number you can calculate an estimate package delivery.

We start a new batch on number 10500 and the last Kastle order is number 10942, so you can imagine what we're dealing with.

Thank you and best regards to all of you

Your Bastl crew"

It will take some time when our retailers get Kastles but it will be pretty soon. We're working hard on it.

[neuroportal]

The way I view it is this:

Past me bought future me a present.

(Mine arrived, btw. It is incredible fun)

[joskery]

Does this do melodies? Or just bleep 'n' bloop?

[smetak]

Does this do melodies? Or just bleep 'n' bloop?

Hehehehe.

[Infinity Curve]

Does this do melodies? Or just bleep 'n' bloop?

It could do melodies i guess, but not sure if it is meant to track 1v/0ct well or not - haven't tried. After more messing last night, I found the default phase modulation mode sounds the best. This seems like it will excel at noisy stuff and drones, not sure if melodic is it's style, but you never know. The modulation is pretty fun, and the interaction possible on the LFO and ASR/rungler/s+h section is pretty fun.

For 65 euros, well worth a punt I'd say.

Oh, and the i/o section works great, I fed it a clock signal from a gameboy to the LFO reset(which also triggers the rungler thing) and it was quite happily clocking along in time

[CopperHydra]

Tempting!
I'm considering it along with other battery operated gear I can take to school and sketch ideas with.

[Old-TimeyWimey]

New demo from Bastl!

[video][/video]

I'm really attracted to this. Dreaming of pairing it with reverb, filters, filtered delay (Monotron Delay + this in yr pocket!), Clouds... The I/O feature is neat.

[ghostly606]

There is now a DIY kit for sale on the Bastl website, ordered mine... hurry up Santa!

[nnbveh]

Hi!

I'm wondering if i could take the vco output of this little synth and feed it into some eurorack module? Does it have the same voltage levels? Or is it just line out?

Thanks!

[Andrew_Culture]

I ordered my Kastle about a couple of weeks before Christmas. I emailed to ask (nicely) how long it would take to arrive and got an answer right away saying they were taking it easy over Christmas. Fair enough!

My Kastle arrived yesterday and I'm really impressed by the well thought out DIY ethic feel to everything about this wee synth.

I made an unboxing video so you can see how nicely the Bastl folk package their stuff http://making-music.com/bastle-kastle-synth-its-here/

[starthief]

I ordered my Kastle about a couple of weeks before Christmas... My Kastle arrived yesterday and I'm really impressed by the well thought out DIY ethic feel to everything about this wee synth.

I ordered mine on Christmas day (as soon as I was sure I didn't get one as a gift, heh) and it arrived today, so I guess they were done in the same batch

For those wondering, no, it doesn't track 1V/Oct. The modulation tends to be inharmonic anyway. But I've got it sitting here boinging away through an LPG, completely distracted from whatever it was I sat here to do...

[blungo2]

I just made this very funky felt case for my Kastle so that i could safely throw it in my bag while still patched.

[bucketbrigade]

I built the DIY kit this morning and I've been playing with it all afternoon. Loads of fun.Good lo fi grit. And patching the tiny synth with the tiniest patch cords is really fun. Had no problem clocking it from Euro and getting some nice rhythmic weirdness going alongside a Euro patch.

It's my first experience with a "Rungler" and it's really cool, using it to modify the LFO rate gets you endless quirky grooves that repeat. But my favorite thing is how you can modulate the synthesis type... use the stepped voltage on that and you get some crazy sounds as it switches between phase distortion and track and hold modulation. Stuff I've never heard before.

Bastl!

[thetechnobear]

my Kastl finally turned up!
never played with anything like this before, so lots to learn, but its great fun.

here, I thought Id pair it up with an Axoloti (for fx) and see what noises it could make with the new fx in the latest axoloti firmware.
(no other effects, just kastle + axoloti)

axoloti goes well with it, as they are both so compact/portable, could be fun sitting outside noodling with them, and if you loose them, cheap to buy replacements


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