Superbooth 22: Klavis Grainity, an innovative granular filter (VCF) for Eurorack, first look

May 23, 2022 Synth Anatomy Eurorack, Hardware, News, SUPERBOOTH 22 0

Superbooth 22: Klavis Grainity is a new innovative granular filter that slices and reassembles filtered elements from incoming audio, first look video

Belgium is the country of good beer, waffles, French fries, and much more. For some time, it’s also been a big country for innovative Eurorack modules.

Talking about innovation: Klavis presented the world’s first granular filter for Eurorack at Superbooth 22.

Klavis Grainity

Grainity sounds like a massive digital module but that’s wrong. It’s digitally controlled and has a completely analog signal path. But does granular and filter work?. In the audio area, it allows you to slice audio samples into tiny bits to create rich soundscapes. In this module, this principle is applied to the filters.

The core uses two filters: a classic multimode VCF and a granular VCF that runs in parallel. The latter consists of audio-rate slicing and reassembling bits of filter elements from the incoming signal. All this is according to a pattern and rate. The rate comes from the cycle of the audio that offers division options. Alternatively, you can bypass that by patching in a different signal.

Grainity gives you 13 different modes of how audio will be reassembled. It also has a 1V/oct tracking functionality with a frequency modulation (FM) option. The tracking also creates an alternative cycle for intervals and detuning. For example, you can set a 5th so you can play it as an oscillator.

Sonically, it cannot be compared to a traditional filter. It can sound like one but its main purpose is to sound unique. For me, it sounds like you have paired a filter with a waveshaper or a complex oscillator. Super special about Grainity is that it does not reduce the harmonic content of a signal but adds it to it. So it’s more a waveshaper than a filter. It colores the signal a lot. A very unique filter.

Tweakers & Two Bits Update

Both Tweakers and Two Bits were the new products for Superbooth 21. Both will arrive this summer.

Tweakers is a compact, analog dual-channel mixer/splitter module. Each channel gives you inputs/outputs, gain control, and an offset with a polarity option. If you put the switch in the middle it mutes the signal. The latter can be audio or CV sources so you combine it with modulation modules. The normalization of the inputs makes it possible to use Tweakers as a signal mixer or splitter.

Two Bits, on the other side, is a clever logic module with two independent sections. It’s a further development of Klavis Logica XT. Each section has two inputs (A/B), an output, and an inverted one. They give you in total of 15 different logic functions including CV-controlled random, pulse length, clock multiplier, delay, and more. An effective module to make CV signals much more complex and versatile. Plus, you can chain the channels together and create a virtual third channel.