Crows Electromusic Goes Fully Analog with the Five-Voice OVUM Analog Sound Explorer

Built by hand in eye-catching aluminum and wood, this USB-powered synth eschews the digital world altogether.

Gareth Halfacree
1 year ago β€’ Music / HW101

Crows Electromusic has launched a standalone tool designed for musicians eager to experiment with analog sound synthesis: the OVUM analog sound explorer.

"OVUM is designed for exploring pure tones, drones, and microtonal sound textures," the company explains of its creation. "Five independently controlled triangle-core oscillators give you five lush voices to layer and evolve. Each voice has a separate control for volume, pitch, and tone, and can be switched between a bright square wave and a crisp triangle wave."

What makes OVUM stand out from the competition, aside from the eye-catching wood and aluminum housing in which it is built, is that it's truly 100 per cent analog: there are no digital components involved at all, no screens, and no complex user interface, just knobs and sliders. The USB Type-C input on the back is purely for power, and there's a 3.5mm jack for headphones or as a line-out to external hardware.

The OVUM is a hand-built, fully-analog tool for experimenting with five analog synth voices. (πŸ“Ή: Crows Electromusic)

A wheel on the back of the unit provides a volume control, while the machine's tone and pitch are set by two rows of jobs at the top β€” one for each of the five voices. A switch allows each voice to be independently toggled between square and triangle waveforms, and five sliders control the mixing of each voice β€” which are then sent to the headphone socket as a stereo mix.

The OVUM is now available to order on the Crows Electromusic Tindie store at $129; there's no internal battery, the company notes, but it can be made portable through the use of any USB powerbank.

Gareth Halfacree
Freelance journalist, technical author, hacker, tinkerer, erstwhile sysadmin. For hire: freelance@halfacree.co.uk.
Latest articles
Sponsored articles
Related articles
Latest articles
Read more
Related articles