Meeblip Review – my first synthesizer

I got my Meeblip a few months ago, but have enjoyed it so much since then that I thought I would write a little review. Now just as a disclaimer, as a reviewer I have little experience, and I’m still quite a newbie to the synth scene as well. That being said, I’ll share my experiences and impressions so far, and perhaps they will be of some help to others considering picking up (or putting together) one of these cool little guys.

Of course in an ironic twist, I finally got around to writing this just as James Grahame has announced the Meeblip SE, which is the newest version of the Meeblip, with a newly programmed chip, different overlay, added patch saving feature, redesigned board, and more. I may update my chip and use the new overlay, but for now this review and post refer to the original Meeblip, not the Meeblip SE.

I don’t remember how I first came across the Meeblip, but it was only just a few months after the synth had been released. I managed to get one of the very first versions with a 9V power adaptor vs. the usb power, which was fortunate because of a lot of issues with noisey usb power.

Anyway, there were a few things that attracted me to the Meeblip. It was new, small, cheap, and had tons of knobs. No really, having a ton of knobs to turn and fiddle with was a huge plus. I’ve been interested in audio synthesis for a long time now, but every time I’ve gone to Guitar Center or some other music store, I’ve sat down at some synth and had no idea what was going on. Great little synths like the microkorg or alesis micron always seemed like they could be so cool, but not only did I not understand synthesis and how to tweak the sound that was coming out of the synth, but I couldn’t even figure out how to get to the different parameters to tweak anything.

With the Meeblip, just about all the basic synth parameters are right there at your fingertips, ready to turn and manipulate. This was great, because I could actually hear what was happening when I turned something, and I wasn’t having to dig through menus to try something new out. So it was good for a newbie to learn a bunch of stuff. James Grahame and Peter Kirn also posted a nice little synthesis reference guide specifically for the Meeblip which was invaluable as well. It was an extremely thoughtful and beneficial addition that I am very grateful for.

The Meeblip is a quirky little machine, drawing on influences of old analog subtractive synthesis, but also implementing some newer digital choices as well. It is monophonic, has MIDI in and sound out, and that’s about it. It is small, light, and plasticky, but doesn’t necessarily feel cheap. Because it is open source, you can change it, hack it, or throw it into your own case if you’d like, which makes it very flexible as well. My version doesn’t even have a power switch (they’re adding one in the SE.) But all these limitations really seem to add to the device overall somehow. Its just great fun and I have really enjoyed using and playing with it. You can get a nice variety of sounds out of it and the layout really is a throwback to the analog synths of old, really making you want to dig in and change your sound. The fact that there are no presets or storage function (on the original) makes this point stand out even more. Maybe a downside to some, but for me this synth is more about having fun and “play.” Not that you can’t use a lot of sounds this bad boy can produce, you certainly can. You may just never be able to get the exact sound you had before twice. Kinda cool.

I’m not really going to go into any details concerning the hardware and features, as they are laid out quite clearly over on the Meeblip website.

Here’s a couple of admittedly bad sound examples. Neither really show off the Meebip, but hey, I figured I’d post them anyway. “Charles” is a cover of a song my bro wrote that I put together really fast one evening, recording the vocals on my tin can mic. The Meeblip plays throughout and has a little solo section. My release was too sharp and it needs more volume. The other example is the middle part of a song I made that has the Meeblip playing both the bassline and the lead. I’m not really happy with the bass sound that I got (I needed to spend more time on it), but I enjoyed the lead part. I’m actually adjusting the LFO rate knob as I play manually, making for some fun warbles there. Also of note is that I played the parts directly into my iPad, and the drums are with Modrum, all mixed together with Multitrack DAW.

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If I can save up, I’d like to get the hacker kit for the SE sometime down the line. I feel much more comfortable with my soldering and electronics knowledge now (the Drone Lab probably helped) than when I first got my Meeblip, so I’m looking forward to making a few tweaks, and maybe installing it into another device to give it keys… (bent Casio MT-240 perhaps?)

Anyway, its an awesome little synth! I’d recommend it to other newbies like myself, and I’m sure there are plenty of synth vets out there that can find a lot to like with it as well. If you have any questions, comments, (corrections), etc, let me know!

Tagged as: first synth, meeblip, review