Neutral Labs ELMYRA - DIY Build
As we bring in the new year, we took a look back to see what we were missing in our studio. We were looking for something unique, something with guts, something to kick a little more ass in the upcoming year.
The neutral labs Elmyra was our answer. This synth was going to be a new type of build for us since this synth was a standalone and not a modular one. We were up for the challenge. In case you were looking for our previous build of the NL NERMAL, it can be found here.
We picked up our white paneled Elmyra kit from our friends over at Synthcube, who also offer the black paneled version as well. It runs on USB power which gives the synth a lot of flexibility. Beginners can rejoice too, its a fairly simple build that took a little over an hour to complete. With that being said, let’s jump into the build.
What is the Elmyra?
With our love for the SOMA Lyra-8, think of the Elmyra as a “smaller” version of it. According to the neutral labs website, the Elmyra is “a digital/analog hybrid drone synthesizer and platform for sonic exploration inspired by the widely beloved Lyra-8”. It is played in the similar fashion as the Lyra-8 as well with its 6 metal finger pads. With a 10-bit audio resolution, its oscillators gives it a gnarly gritty soundscape…. just right for our tastes.
As with our previous neutral lab build (the NERMAL), the documentation is clear and concise. It is available via the neutral labs website, along with a user manual and schematics. Another cool thing about the way the kit is packaged is that all of the components are grouped into bags so that all of them can be identified without having to look up resistor codes. Talk about a considerate thing to do for the builder!
