This is going to be a tough one.
This is my story why GAS almost became an addiction.
Last December I was about to buy the Waldorf Iridium – the holy grail of synths. At least from my point of view.
But then I realized that something was going wrong. Really wrong.
GAS – Gear Acquisition syndrome – wasn’t fun anymore. I used to new synths as a treat to myself. Promising myself „after this project I gonna buy myself this or that new module“.
My reason for buying synths has changed over the years from exploring new musical realms to simply treating myself by spending some hard earned cash.
Then Pigments 3.5 came out, promising so much fun with wavetables, virtual analog, granular and additive synthesis.
This was the moment a thought hit me: Why spending 2500 Euros for a digital synth when a 70 Euro-Software offers me so much functionality in a free update. So I removed the Iridium from my shopping cart. Sorry, Thomann.
Also I discovered Vital, a free wavetable synth with an easy to use User Interface. Software is so much fun!
Also I have a small home office and I need some space to move around in there. And in some curious way it was bothering me when I started to think about where to place the iridium.
This is when I realized that GAS has become a way bigger problem than I thought. I was planning my living and working space to fit hardware synths.
That is so wrong for me.
Instead of unfolding my creativity the hardware claimed my creative working space.
I had to do something to change that. I needed space.
And so all of my synths went to the shelf – except my Eurorack. Also my rack desk which was eating up a lot of space got his wheels removed and is now sitting under my working desk.
I changed my creative workflow using mainly Arturia Pigments and Vital. When I need a certain sound I can pull a hardware synth from the self, plug it in and play it. Or I power on my Eurorack.
Now I have more space and I intend to keep it this way. For the time being there will be no more hardware synths. That saves a lot of money, a lot of space and it actually makes me feel better. If I feel like playing one of my synths I pull it from the shelf, plug it in and have some fun with it.
GAS is no fun – even if we laugh about it. My GAS became too close to an addiction.
That being said: This is only my experience. I don’t want so spoil your fun with synth hardware. And I will also have a lot of fun with my hardware synths – but I doubt I will buy another one.