Akai VX600

Back in 1988, this synth broke ground as Akai's compact answer to wind controllers like the EWI and EVI, packing dedicated jacks for those expressive brass and woodwind interfaces into a true analog poly powerhouse.

At its core, it's a 6-voice subtractive beast with two voltage-controlled oscillators per voice—serving up sawtooth, triangle, pulse (with PWM), and noise waveforms that sync, FM, and cross-modulate for gritty, thick tones. A resonant 24dB CEM3378 lowpass filter (self-oscillating) pairs with a highpass for sculpting, fed by two LFOs (triangle, saw, square with delay) and three multi-stage envelopes (ADDSR with delay). The modulation matrix shines with 10 source/destination pairs, enabling wild routings, while 37 velocity- and aftertouch-sensitive keys, chord memory, unison, stacked mono, and 6-part multitimbrality add versatility. MIDI in/out/thru, stereo outs, 13-pin individual voice outs, and memory for 50 patches, 40 programs round it out in a sturdy 602x350x116mm frame weighing 8.2kg—no pitch/mod wheels, keeping it pure for controller life.

Players love its raw VCO warmth for fat basses, evolving pads, and aggressive leads that stand tall today, though tuning stability demands occasional tweaks, a classic analog quirk embraced by collectors.