Guitar Synths?

Are there any good guitar synths that are rack mounted? I am trying to give my sound a twist.

Thanks

Are you willing to put a hex pickup or piezo system into your guitar?

If not, Eventide and TC Electronic make some really cool, but not cheap, rackmount boxes that will make your guitar sound synthlike.

Yes I would be; How would I go about doing that?

For rack mount, there is the Roland GI-20 (half rack) or the Axon AX100. Both of which need a 13-pin compatible hexaphonic pickup of some sort. Or, you might find an old Korg Z3, which needs it's own hex pickup and delivers mucho cheesy FM tonage, is hard to find, but is pretty cheap... all of these are best if you midi them into a real synth tho.

A lot depends on what you want to do with guitar synths and if you want to get involved with MIDI, and for what reason.

Guitarists that just want to enter MIDI note data for sequencers/score creation type software like Encore and don't care about using MIDI guitar for live performance seem to like the Yamaha EZ AG or EZ EG - a "learning" guitar that sort of looks toy-like but is cheap (about $300 new) and does the job.

If you just want cool sounds and don't need MIDI, then the best rackmount synth solution might be a modular analog synth setup. Those are typically rackmounted;) There are so many cool effects and devices out there that will get you amazing sounds, from E-Bow, to Sustainiac, to looper boxes, delays, etc. without having to deal with the issues of MIDI guitar conversion. Think about it - all your dynamics, variations of tone, etc. will be reduced to 0-127 values of loudness, MIDI Note Numbers, etc.

Some guitarists will never be happy with the button-based interface of the Yamaha EZs or Ztars; they really do have a need for MIDI, and they don't want to learn keyboards so for them, pitch-MIDI is the answer. And for pitch-MIDI you need either a Roland/Axon/Yamaha hex mag pickup or a hex piezo saddle system by RMC or Graphtech. The latter is more expensive, because you have to replace your bridge saddles with the piezo saddles.

But that's not all. Then you need something to convert the hex signal into MIDI. That's where the Roland GI-20, Roland GR-series guitar synths, Yamaha G50, Axon AX-100 or the new Axon AX-50 come in. Of those, the GI-20, G50, and AX's are rackmountable.

Once you get one of these boxes, then any rackmount synth will do.

The upcoming Roland VG-99 does stuff similar to Variax (guitar, amp, etc. modelling, alternate tunings, etc.) plus synth sounds made by audio processing, plus MIDI conversion. It's a tabletop unit, though.

All variation of useful guitar synths that I know of need a hex pickup. After that - basically two choices - guitar to MIDI - in which case use whatever MIDI sound module or synth you like, or the other option is a guitar modelling synth - this basically re-models the waveforms from the guitar pickups to produce the sounds - most commonly various different guitar sounds, but also a whole load of wierd {censored} as well.

The advantage of the guitar to midi - you can record it in a sequencer and use it to play any midi synth. The downside you have to be a very clean and accurate player to get the best out of it. If you playing is a little sloppy, then your going to get very frustrated with lots of very obvious wrong notes. Also another downer with guitar to midi system is they all can take a while to decide what you are doing with a string and emit the midi data, at best a few ms, at worst a few 10s of ms. Axon AX100 is possible one of the best MIDI decoders. The latest Roland are supposed to be quite decent as well - assuming the pickups are well setup.

The advantage of the direct modelling/synthesis approach is very low latency and such system usually include very good guitar modelling processors as well for a whoole bunch of regular guitar sounds and amp models from accoustics to classic electrics and a whole bunch of string instruments sometimes. The disadvantage - they dont output midi, so cant plug in any old synth, nor record and sequence the midi. I think most less than pefect guitarists however get on better with these - Roland V-Guitar systems are probably the best known of this type and I think they can be used as regular guitar processors as well if you dont have a hex pickup.

Also just plugging in an eventide or tc fireworx or something similar and can easily get very wierd and non-guitar like sounds.

I recently bought a Casio PG-380 just to have around the studio for fun. The guitar players that come in (I can't play a note on guitar) like the feel (It uses a standard Ibanez guitar) the guitar's sound, and it has a built-in Casio synth with about 100 sounds. The tones are dated, but when layered with the guitar they still sound pretty cool. It also has a MIDI-out jack for connecting to any keyboard or module you might have. The tracking is about as good as the newer models that the guitarists have tried. I think I paid about $300 bucks for it on eBay.

not only does a hex PU look ugly, its also inferior to a piezo-based system.

I'm having great results with a combination of ghost piezo elements (in exchange for the original wilkinson saddles) with an Axon AX100 MkII.

The Axon is the only way to go, really. ether the 100 or its smaller sibling the 50. Properly set up they track like nothing else.

and the power to channel your six strings into six MIDI channels is not to be underestimated.

Nice! And the built-in synth engine (same as VZ series Casio synths) is pretty decent too.

One of the earlier Roland guitar synths, the GR50, was a rack mount - I used to have one. Although now, I'm using the GR33 (floor unit) and they've greatly improved over the years in terms of sounds and features.

I also have a Casio PG380 guitar with a VZ10M synth module that I used as a workstation for editing sounds and loading them onto ram cards to use in the guitar. I haven't been using that rig much lately, but still want to hold on to it. It was my main gigging guitar for years, although it's pretty heavy for a Strat-style guitar. Some of the sounds are quite good, although, as mentioned, a bit dated. It definitely doesn't track as well when you midi it out to a keyboard or module.

Okay, so I'm completely new to the idea of MIDI-synth for guitar. I realized this morning that it would dramatically increase the tonal palette I have access to. One problem, though: I know virtually nothing about synthesizers, MIDI pickups for guitars, or anything else relevant.

So here I am, and this below addresses one of the first questions I had.

Is there a rack-mounted (affordable) synth that you would say is close to the GR33?

I guess I'm being weird about it, but since I'm running my other stuff through a rack, I'd really like to stick with that. If I have to, I'll just get a floor unit and rack it, but I thought I'd see if there were other options.

If you already have a (regular) synth module and otherwise MUST use MIDI guitar, then the one new product that fits your description is the Axon AX-50. It is a half-rack size unit.

If you do not have a synth module already and are willing to wait a little longer and save up extra cash, the Roland VG-99 will probably give you the most satisfactory experience. It's internal synth sounds are produced by processing your strings directly with modeling tech (no MIDI), and thus are more responsive to your touch than MIDI guitar sounds. It has a built-in MIDI guitar converter, should you ever need it, as well. It can be rackmounted via the RAD-99 rack adapter, fully flush or at an angle.